DDT Is Born 31 



enough, then grant him his degree. It was in just this rou- 

 tine fashion that Zeidler reacted chloral hydrate — known in 

 disreputable circles as knockout drops or Mickey Finn — and 

 chlorobenzene, in the presence of sulfuric acid, and obtained 

 the product he described^ He had completed his task; he 

 had added another organic compound to the rapidly growing 

 list — a list that now comprises several hundred thousand 

 compounds and is growing longer every day. 



To Zeidler, his product was just like many others, ex- 

 cept, of course, that the various atoms of carbon, hydrogen, 

 and chlorine were hooked up in a somewhat different pat- 

 tern than they were in any other compound. How could he 

 know that his particular pattern of atoms carried potential 

 death to many of man's most formidable enemies? Just 

 think how the course of events might have been changed if, 

 on that day in 1874, a fly buzzing around a laboratory in 

 Strasbourg had decided to investigate the nice white precipi- 

 tate that Zeidler had obtained! Suppose that a fly had lit on 

 this first sample of DDT. Do you believe that Zeidler 

 would have watched the curious creature stagger around like 

 a drunken sailor and then drop dead? No, he would prob- 

 ably have been so outraged at the presumptuousness of an 

 insect that dared to contaminate the product of his careful la- 

 bors that he would have smacked the little fly dead before it 

 had a chance to exhibit the symptoms of DDT poisoning. 

 So let's not blame Zeidler for not discovering the magical 

 ^wers of the suBstanceTie prepared. Undoubtedly, in other 

 dusty volumes~on th e shelves^ of our libraries, there^an^ 

 found the formulas of numerous other, and even more, magi- 

 cal substances — substances capable of curing the worst ills of 

 man — with properties as yet unrecognized. Perhaps some 

 day when the cure for cancer or tuberculosis is found, we may 



