September 11, 2000
VOL. 30, NO. 2
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Ira Remsen: The Chemistry Was Right
He arrived as department head and then succeeded Gilman
as JHU's president
By James Stimpert
Special to The Gazette
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This is the third of an occasional series of historical pieces
that will appear in the year leading up to the 125th anniversary
of the founding of Johns Hopkins. Two previous biographical
sketches--on Henry Augustus Rowland and James Joseph
Sylvester--can be found at
www.jhu.edu/~125th
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Ira Remsen was born Feb. 10, 1846, in New York City, of
Dutch and Huguenot ancestry. Following education in the public
schools, he attended the College of Physicians and Surgeons, from
which he received the degree of Doctor of Medicine in 1867.
Although briefly a practicing physician, he had studied medicine
only to please his parents. After satisfying this family
obligation, Remsen left for Munich to pursue his real interest:
chemistry. He spent a year in Munich and then transferred to
Gottingen, where he studied under the prominent chemist Rudolph
Fittig and earned his doctorate in 1870. He then followed Fittig
to Tubingen, where he was an assistant for two years.
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Ira Remsen
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Returning to the United States, he took a position as
professor of chemistry and physics at Williams College. He found
Williams unsympathetic to scientific research, so he concentrated
on teaching. Shortly thereafter, he wrote
Theoretical
Chemistry
, in which he reduced fundamental principles to a
form simple enough for beginning students to understand. The book
received immediate recognition and was soon translated into
German and Italian. Perhaps more important, the book's success
brought its author to the attention of Daniel Coit Gilman, who
was searching for a candidate to occupy the chemistry chair at
the opening of The Johns Hopkins University.
Although just 30 years old in 1876, Remsen had made a
reputation for himself, both as a researcher and as a teacher,
despite the inhospitable environment at Williams College. He
jumped at the chance to equip and direct his own chemistry
laboratory in Baltimore, and soon his lab became a center for
chemical research, attracting graduate students who went on to
become outstanding figures in later years. His instinctive
teaching talents were developed and honed through experience, and
it was said of him that "nobody ever understood the beginner
better than Remsen." In 1879 he founded the
American Chemical
Journal
, which he edited for 35 years, and he contributed a
number of authoritative textbooks that remained standards for
many years.
While working with postdoctoral colleague Constantine
Fahlberg in 1878, they discovered a substance that became the
artificial sweetener saccharin. Remsen had little interest in the
practical application of this discovery, preferring research for
the sake of advancing learning, but Fahlberg saw commercial
potential and wasted little time in obtaining a patent on
saccharin. Remsen did not object to his colleague's actions, but
he became angry when Fahlberg tried to alter the account of the
discovery. Fahlberg first omitted mention of Remsen as a
participant in the research, then tried to make it appear that
he, not Remsen, had been the senior investigator.
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Remsen Hall: After Ira
Remsen's death in March 1927, the university's trustees named the
recently completed chemistry building on the Homewood campus in
his honor.
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When Gilman retired from the presidency in 1901, after 25
years, the trustees turned to Ira Remsen to lead the university.
He proved himself an adroit administrator, continuing Gilman's
policy of judicious expansion. The undergraduate course was
lengthened from three to four years, and a fund-raising drive
allowed building to begin on the Homewood campus. Remsen also
answered the call of President Theodore Roosevelt, heading a
national referee board considering questions relating to the
control of food products and their adulteration.
Ill health forced Remsen to resign from the presidency in
1912, but he recovered sufficiently to rejoin the professional
world, serving as a consultant to industry. He died on March 4,
1927. Upon Remsen's death, the Hopkins trustees named the
recently completed chemistry building on the Homewood campus in
his honor. His ashes are interred behind a plaque in the
building. During his lifetime, Remsen received a wealth of awards
and honorary degrees from universities and associations in the
United States and Europe.
James Stimpert, of MSEL Special Collections, is Homewood
archivist. For this piece, Stimpert is indebted to former
archivist Julia Morgan and Frederick H. Getman, each of whom
wrote biographical sketches of Remsen, upon which this sketch is
based
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