1910's Science and Technology | Richards, Theodore William 1868-1928

CHEMIST, NOBEL LAUREATE

Life in Academia.

Theodore William Richards was born on 31 January 1868 in German-town, Pennsylvania. His mother, who educated him at home until he was fourteen, was a writer and poet, and his father was a painter. At fourteen he enrolled at Haverford College, and he graduated first in his class three years later. He took a second undergraduate degree summa cum laude from Harvard University in 1886 and completed the Ph.D. at Harvard two years later at the age of twenty. During the 1888-1889 academic year Richards studied in several European laboratories while on a fellowship from Harvard. In 1901 he was made professor of chemistry at Harvard, and he was director of the Wolcott Gibbs Lab there from 1912 until his death.

Precision in Atomic Weight.

Richards's fascination with the precise calculation of atomic weights led to his painstaking measurement of the atomic weight of water....