C  O  N  T  E  N  T  S

Noyes Laboratory:
One Hundred Years of Chemistry

A Century of Accomplishment
The Bare Facts
Nobel Prize Winners
ACS Presidents
Priestley Medal Winner

Fine Chemicals

The Illinois State Water Survey

Chemists and Chemistry at Noyes:
Roger Adams: "The Chief"
Ludwig F. Audrieth and Synthetic Sweeteners
John C. Bailar Jr. and Coordination Chemistry
St. Elmo Brady: Pioneer
George L. Clark and High-Intensity X-Ray Tubes
Willis H. Flygare and Microwave Spectrometry
Reynold C. Fuson: Teaching Chemistry
Herbert S. Gutowsky and NMR Spectroscopy
B. Smith Hopkins and the Chemistry of Rare Earths
Henry Fraser Johnstone and the Study of Air Pollution
Herbert A. Laitinen and Analytical Chemistry
Carl "Speed" Marvel: Advances in Polymer Chemistry
William A. Noyes: The Department Comes of Age
Arthur W. Palmer: The Early Years
Samuel W. Parr and Applied Chemistry
Charles C. Price III and Antimalarials
Worth H. Rodebush and Physical Chemistry
William C. Rose and Amino Acids
George F. Smith and the Aerosol Can
Harold R. Snyder and Antimalarials
Marion Sparks and Chemical Information

Landmark Designation

Roger Adams has a special place in the history of chemistry in the United States. As head of the Department of Chemistry at the University of Illinois for nearly thirty years and through his close contacts with industry, "The Chief" promoted the development of chemistry in the United States and cooperation with industry and government. In addition, Adams trained a generation of chemists, serving as research director for 198 doctoral degree recipients and many more postdoctoral research associates and fellows.

Adams completed his undergraduate and graduate education at Harvard University, receiving his B.A. in 1909 and Ph.D. in 1912. He then spent a year in Germany studying under the leading experts in synthetic organic chemistry and the chemistry of natural products. In 1913 Adams returned to Harvard as a postdoctoral fellow, with the apparent intention to pursue a career in research, which at that time meant working in industry. But in 1914, a sudden vacancy led to his appointment as an instructor in organic chemistry at Harvard. In 1916 he accepted an offer from William Noyes of an assistant professorship at Illinois. He stayed for fifty-six years. He was promoted to professor in 1919, and upon Noyes’ retirement in 1926 he became department head. Under Noyes’ leadership Illinois became the foremost school of chemistry in the United States. Under Adams’ stewardship, Illinois expanded and became the leading institution training chemists for the chemical industry.

Adams helped to break down the distinction between the worlds of the academy and industry. Before the First World War, two separate traditions existed in chemistry: the world of "pure" science competing with that of applied, technological science. At Illinois, the first tradition was represented by Noyes, the second by Samuel Parr. In the 1920s this sharp distinction began to break down, in part because of the demand for research chemists in industry. Industry not only demanded chemists; it demanded chemists with Ph.D.’s. For chemists, a career in industry became attractive. Adams became head of the department at Illinois at the precise time these trends were occurring, and he helped smooth the merging of the academic and industrial worlds.

During the First World War, Adams transformed a summer project to produce chemicals for classroom use into a pilot program for the production of organic chemicals for war and industrial use, to replace German sources no longer available. The program continued after the war as Organic Chemical Manufactures, with bulletins issued on synthetic methods developed at Illinois. In 1921 this became the academic monograph series Organic Syntheses, which Adams edited, and in 1942 he helped found Organic Reactions.

The demand for industrial chemists in the 1920s led to a rapid expansion of the department of chemistry and to changes in the curriculum. Emphasis was placed on learning the fundamentals of chemistry, with the assumption that specific areas were best learned in industrial laboratories. A Ph.D. program in chemical engineering was instituted. Under Adams, academic training became more sensitive to the needs of industry and industrial training became more scientific. As Adams-trained students assumed prominent positions in industry, the demand for Illinois chemists increased. One of Adams’ most famous students was Wallace Carothers who invented nylon at DuPont.

Adams served as a director of the American Chemical Society for two separate terms and as president in 1935. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1929. From 1941 to 1946 he served on the National Defense Research Committee, responsible for organizing war research in chemistry and chemical engineering. From 1954 to 1960, he was a member of the board of directors of the National Science Foundation.

Adams contributed many recipes to Organic Syntheses and Organic Reactions over his long career. His synthetic work as a researcher focused on aromatic compounds, important in the dye industry. The "Adams Catalyst," a colloidal platinum oxide, became standard for hydrogenations. In the 1920s and 1930s, Adams investigated the stereochemistry of substituted biphenyl and biaryl compounds, which can be resolved into optical isomers. This research raised questions about the relationship between steric and electronic effects, an issue of concern among physical organic chemists. Adams’ best-known work on natural products is his research on marijuana alkaloids, which he undertook in the late 1930s at the behest of the Narcotics Bureau. He isolated and synthesized tetrahydrocannabinol and several of its analogues.

Adams received ten honorary degrees, twenty-four medals and awards from American and foreign scientific societies, and honorary membership in nine chemical societies. His historical importance can probably best be measured by the number of his students who assumed leading roles in the university and in industry. His contributions to the University of Illinois were acknowledged by the naming of the "east chemistry" building in his honor, Roger Adams Laboratory, in 1972.

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