Nobel Prize

Wilhelm Ostwald was born on September 2, 1853, in Riga, Latvia, as the son of master-cooper Gottfried Wilhelm Ostwald and Elisabith Leuckel. He was educated at the “Real gymnasium” there and in 1872 was admitted to Dorpat University to read chemistry. After taking his final examinations three years later, he obtained the post of assistant…

Otto Wallach was born on March 27, 1847, in Königsberg, Germany, the son of Gerhard Wallach and his wife, née Otillie Thoma. His father was a high-ranking civil servant, who later became Auditor General at Potsdam. During his early school years at the humanistic “Gymnasium” at Potsdam, Wallach had a profound liking for history and…

Theodore William Richards was born in Germantown, Pennsylvania, USA on January 31, 1868. His father, William T. Richards was a well-known painter of landscapes and seascapes: his mother, Anna, née Matlack, won fame for her poetical works. During his childhood, Richards travelled to England and France and, up to the age of fourteen, he was…

Arne Wilhelm Kaurin Tiselius was born August 10, 1902, in Stockholm. After the early loss of his father, the family moved to Gothenburg where he went to school, and after graduation at the local “Realgymnasium” in 1921, he studied at the University of Uppsala, specializing in chemistry. He became research assistant in ‘s laboratory in…

Linus Carl Pauling was born in Portland, Oregon, on 28th February, 1901, the son of a druggist, Herman Henry William Pauling, who, though born in Missouri, was of German descent, and his wife, Lucy Isabelle Darling, born in Oregon of English-Scottish ancestry. Linus attended the public elementary and high schools in the town of Condon…

Vincent du Vigneaud was born in Chicago, Illinois, on 18th May, 1901, the son of the late inventor and machine designer Alfred J. du Vigneaud and his wife, Mary Theresa. He studied under Professor C.S. Marvel at The University of Illinois and took his B.Sc. degree in 1923 and M.Sc. in 1924. During the year…

Sir Alexander Robertus Todd was born in Glasgow on October 2, 1907, the elder son of Alexander Todd, a business man of that city, and his wife Jean Lowrie. He was educated at Allan Glen’s School and Glasgow University, where he took his B.Sc. degree in 1928 and, after a short initial research training with…

Melvin Calvin was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, April 8, 1911, of Russian emigrant parents. He received the B.S. degree in Chemistry in 1931 at the Michigan College of Mining and Technology, and the Ph.D. degree in Chemistry from the University of Minnesota in 1935. He spent the academic years 1935-1937 at the University of…

Lars Onsager was born in Oslo, Norway, November 27, 1903 to parents Erling Onsager, Barrister of the Supreme Court of Norway, and Ingrid, née Kirkeby. In 1933 he married Margarethe Arledter, daughter of a well-known pioneer in the art of paper making, in Cologne, Germany. They have sons Erling Frederick, Hans Tanberg, and Christian Carl,…

Gerhard Herzberg was born in Hamburg, Germany, on 25 December, 1904. He was married in 1929 to Luise Herzberg neé Oettinger and has two children. He was widowed in 1971. Herzberg received his early training in Hamburg and subsequently studied physics at the Darmstadt Institute of Technology where in 1928 he obtained his Dr.Ing. degree…