Forty-second Annual Meeting. 29 



a roll. Enormous heat effects were obtained by this current, 

 so much so that Silliman in 1823 was enabled to demonstrate 

 the fusion and volatilization of carbon, a result of great in- 

 terest. Using a battery of this type. Hare in 1831 made the 

 first application of electricity to blasting under water. 



We must not be too critical in our judgment of these papers 

 of Silliman, Hare and their associates. From the standpoint 

 of pure synthetic research they doubtless will be found want- 

 ing, but they had their place, and a most impo^rtant one, in 

 the development of scientific knowledge and spirit in America. 



The third member of this illustrious trio, Josiah Parsons 

 Cooke, began his work in the '50's, just at the close of the 

 active labors of Silliman and Hare. As Philadelphia and New 

 Haven had each made its contribution to science, so now it 

 was the turn of Cambridge to carry on the tor-ch of progress. 

 Professor Cooke's interest in chemistry received its stimulus 

 from the public lectures of Silliman, delivered on the Lowell 

 Foundation. These were listened to with great eagerness, and 

 the young lad supplemented these lectures by working through 

 all the experiments in Turner's bulky volume in a small labora- 

 tory fitted up in his own home. His undergraduate days, 

 which ended in 1848, offered him no opportunity to increase 

 his store of chemical knowledge, because the only instructions 

 given in that subject were a few desultory lectures of Profes- 

 sor Webster, of lamented fame. 



In the fall of 1849 he was appointed tutor in mathematics, 

 being transferred the same year to an instructorship in chem- 

 istry, thus giving him the eagerly desired opportunity. The 

 next fall, at the age of twenty-three, he was made Eirving 

 professor of chemistry and mineralogy. The other candidate 

 for the position was David A. Wells, later the great political 

 economist, the first graduate in chemistry of the Lawrence 

 Scientific School. Why the untrained man was chosen in 

 place of Wells we do not know, but for once the choice was 

 a most fortunate one. The secret of the success of this young 

 man was his ability, his store of common sense, and an in- 

 sistent persistency which overcame in time all obstacles. 



Cooke was essentially a self-taught man. He had, it is true, 

 heard a few lectures from Regnault and Dumas in Paris, but 

 only for a short time. He was, however, characterized by 

 his ability to "keep abreast of the times" and to recognize 

 the important fields of chemistry as they developed and to add 



