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ORIGINAL AFRICAN AMERICAN CHEMIST PERCY LAVON JULIAN VERY RARE SIGNATURE For Sale
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ORIGINAL AFRICAN AMERICAN CHEMIST PERCY LAVON JULIAN VERY RARE SIGNATURE:
$6508.98
An extremely rare autograph of probably one of the greatest Chemists of the 20th century - Percy L. Julian from 1951 on acard measuring 3.5x4.5 inches signed by this genius and legendary African American Academic, Civil Rights Activist, Chemist, Scientist and Medical Professional. Signed boldly in blue ink.A steroid chemist and an entrepreneur, Percy Julian ingeniously figured out how to synthesize important medicinal compounds from abundant plant sources, making them more affordable to mass-produce.In the 1930s chemists recognized the structural similarity of a large group of natural substances—the steroids. These include the sex hormones and the cortical hormones of the adrenal glands. The medicinal potential of these compounds was clear, but extracting sufficient quantities of them from animal tissue and fluids was prohibitively expensive. As with other scarce or difficult-to-isolate natural products, chemists were called upon to mimic nature by creating these steroids in the lab and later by modifying them to make them safer and more effective as drugs. Chemists found their starting materials in certain plant substances that were also steroids. Percy Lavon Julian (1899–1975) was among the many scientists, including Russell Earl Marker, Carl Djerassi, and George Rosenkranz, who participated actively in the synthesis and large-scale production of steroids from plant compounds.
bio-julian-stamp.jpgPercy Julian was honored on this stamp issued by the U.S. Postal Service in 1993. Courtesy United States Postal Service.Percy Julian was honored on this stamp issued by the U.S. Postal Service in 1993.Courtesy United States Postal Service.Education and Early CareerJulian was born in Montgomery, Alabama, the son of a railway mail clerk and the grandson of slaves. In an era when African Americans faced prejudice in virtually all aspects of life, not least in the scientific world, he succeeded against the odds. Inadequately prepared by his high school, he was accepted at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, as a sub-freshman, meaning that he had to take high-school courses concurrently with his freshman courses. Majoring in chemistry, he graduated as valedictorian of his class in 1920. After graduation he taught chemistry at Fisk University for two years before winning an Austin Fellowship to Harvard University, where he completed a master’s degree in organic chemistry. After Harvard he returned to teaching at West Virginia State College and Howard University.
Physostigmine for GlaucomaIn 1929 Julian traveled to the University of Vienna, Austria, to begin doctoral studies on the chemistry of medicinal plants. Two years later, with degree in hand, he and a Viennese colleague, Josef Pikl, took positions back in the United States at Howard and two years later moved to DePauw. There they accomplished the first total synthesis of physostigmine, the active principle of the Calabar bean, used since the end of the 19th century to treat glaucoma. Physostigmine, an alkaloid, eases the constriction of outflow channels from the eye’s aqueous humor to relieve high pressure there, which, if left untreated, damages the retina and eventually causes blindness.
Steroids from Soybeans: ProgesteroneMeanwhile researchers in many countries were seeking innovative and cost-effective ways to synthesize steroids, including cortisone and the sex hormones. German chemists discovered that the steroid stigmasterol, which Julian had obtained as a by-product of the physostigmine synthesis but was also obtainable from soybeans, could be used in the synthesis of certain sex hormones, including progesterone, a female sex hormone that was important in helping pregnant women avoid miscarriages. In pursuit of this lead, in 1936 Julian wrote to the Glidden Company in Chicago, requesting samples of their soybean oil. Through a series of events he wound up being hired by Glidden instead, as their director of research in the Soya Division, where he set about figuring out ways to make new products from soybeans.
bio-julian1.jpgPercy Julian. Gift of Ray Dawson, CHF Collections.Percy Julian.Gift of Ray Dawson, CHF Collections.Three years after arriving at Glidden, Julian learned from plant workers that water had leaked into a tank of purified soybean oil and formed a solid white mass. Immediately identifying the substance as stigmasterol, he realized he had stumbled upon a method for producing large amounts of the steroid from soybeans. Though scientists already knew how to synthesize progesterone from stigmasterol, they didn’t have a method for doing it on a massive scale. Now with large quantities of stigmasterol at hand, he was able to develop an innovative industrial process for converting it to progesterone in bulk, producing five to six pounds of progesterone per day (worth thousands of dollars in those days). Soon other sex hormones were in production.
Cortisone and HydrocortisoneIn 1948 scientists at the Mayo Clinic announced their landmark discovery of cortisone, which had remarkable effects on rheumatoid arthritis, and Julian jumped into the exciting competition to synthesize cortisone inexpensively (see also Carl Djerassi). Cortisone is a cortical hormone of the adrenal gland. In 1949 Julian developed a new synthesis for a related substance (called “Substance S”) also present in the adrenal cortex and differing from cortisone by only an oxygen atom. From this substance he was able to synthesize both cortisone and hydrocortisone. Hydrocortisone and its derivatives today are more widely prescribed than cortisone products, and most industrial syntheses still begin along the same route that Julian pioneered.
Later LifeJulian remained at Glidden until 1954, when he founded his own company, Julian Laboratories of Franklin Park, Illinois, and Mexico City (which he eventually sold to Smith, Kline and French). Throughout his life he was socially active in groups seeking to advance conditions for African Americans, helping to found the Legal Defense and Educational Fund of Chicago and serving on the boards of several other organizations and universities.
In 1935, in Minshall Laboratory, DePauw alumnus Percy L. Julian (1899-1975) first synthesized the drug physostigmine, previously only available from its natural source, the Calabar bean. His pioneering research led to the process that made physostigmine readily available for the treatment of glaucoma. It was the first of Julian’s lifetime of achievements in the chemical synthesis of commercially important natural products.
ContentsPercy L. Julian and Chemistry at DePauw UniversityPercy Julian’s ScienceBiography of Percy Lavon JulianFurther ReadingLandmark Designation and AcknowledgmentsCite this Page“Synthesis of Physostigmine” commemorative booklet“Synthesis of Physostigmine” commemorative booklet produced by the National Historic Chemical Landmarks program of the American Chemical Society in 1999 (PDF).Percy L. Julian and Chemistry at DePauw UniversityThe early 1930s was a time of great chemical research productivity at DePauw. It was in this decade that William M. Blanchard, Dean of the University, hired Percy Julian as a research fellow. Blanchard, who also served as head of the chemistry department, had been Julian\'s mentor during his undergraduate years at DePauw. Julian had received a Ph.D. degree in Vienna in 1931 and was in need of a position in which he could continue his research career. The DePauw chemistry program he joined in 1933 had roots that extended back to 1839 when the university was Asbury College and chemistry was offered as a natural science course taught by the president, Matthew Simpson. Chemistry became a distinct department in 1881 under the direction of Phillip S. Baker. The department prospered and a chemistry major was established in 1896. Percy Julian graduated from this program in 1920.
As a research fellow from 1932 to 1935, Julian, working with his colleague from Vienna, Josef Pikl, and several DePauw students, produced a phenomenal number of high-quality research papers. One such paper appeared in the April 1935 issue of the Journal of the American Chemical Society. This paper, entitled \"Studies in the Indole Series V. The Complete Synthesis of Physostigmine (Eserine),\" which explained how Julian synthesized physostigmine, is undoubtedly the most significant chemical research publication to come from DePauw. The student and faculty collaborative approach, promoted by Julian, has continued to the present, and today most of the research at DePauw is done in collaboration with students.
After the grant funding Julian\'s position expired, Blanchard wanted to appoint Julian to the teaching staff. Despite Julian\'s achievements, the Board of Trustees did not allow it. Julian left DePauw to pursue a distinguished career in industry.
In 1967, Julian was appointed to the DePauw University Board of Trustees. Also that year, planning began for a new science building, which would replace the 65-year-old Minshall Laboratory, and construction commenced in 1968. The Science and Mathematics Center was dedicated in September 1972, with Percy Julian giving the dedication address, \"Science and the Good Life of Man.\" Following Julian\'s death, DePauw University named the Percy L. Julian Science and Mathematics Center in his honor.
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Percy Julian\'s ScienceWhen Percy Julian returned to the DePauw University campus in 1932, he embarked on the project that would forever secure his reputation as a world-class researcher the first total synthesis of the anti-glaucoma drug physostigmine, an alkaloid found in the Calabar bean. Glaucoma, a disorder in which the pressure in the eyeball increases when the aqueous humor does not drain normally, can cause damage to the optic nerve and a loss of vision. Physostigmine promotes drainage of this fluid by easing the constriction of outflow channels. 65 years later, Julian\'s achievement still remains important as derivatives and optically pure forms of physostigmine continue to show therapeutic promise for the treatment of Alzheimer\'s disease and for combating the effects of chemical weapons.
Starting from phenacetin, Julian and Josef Pikl, who was working as an assistant in chemistry, assembled physostigmine in 11 synthetic steps. The project, which took three years to complete, was reported in a series of papers in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. During the project, while the two chemists were working toward the synthesis of d,l-eserethole (a key intermediate compound two steps removed from physostigmine), a group of chemists, also working to synthesize physostigmine, under the direction of Sir Robert Robinson at Oxford University in England, reported their synthesis of d,l-eserethole. Unlike today, when chemists can rely on modern analytical methods such as nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, mass spectrometry, and X-ray crystallography to determine unequivocally the composition and structure of a compound, chemists in the 1930s relied on simpler, indirect, physicochemical methods for their analysis. As it happened in the case of d,l-eserethole, the physicochemical parameters of Robinson\'s d,l-eserethole were not in agreement with those of Julian and Pikl. Firm in his conviction that his synthetic strategy was sound, Julian risked his yet-unproven reputation and boldly wrote in the fourth paper in the series that the work of Robinson was in error.
Subsequently, in the much celebrated fifth paper in the series, \"Studies in the Indole Series V. The Complete Synthesis of Physostigmine (Eserine),\" Julian summarized his and Pikl\'s work on the most challenging total synthesis project of its time with the following:
\"Physostigmine, the principal alkaloid of the Calabar bean, and long used as a drug, has, since its isolation by Jobst and Hesse 70 years ago, been the subject of numerous investigations. The determination of its constitution was rendered particularly difficult since its peculiar chemical structure found no analog in other plant products of known composition.
“Shortly after promising experiments in the direction of (its synthesis) were underway (in our laboratory) the work had to be interrupted and could only be resumed recently. In the meantime, the first of a series of ten papers dealing with the synthesis of physostigmine, by Robinson and his collaborators, appeared and seemingly proved convincingly that the (course) suggested in our formulas could not be realized in practice. Our experiments, nevertheless, were continued and ... led to the successful synthesis of d,l-eserethole.
“To our surprise, our d,l-eserethole exhibited entirely different properties than those of a compound synthesized by Robinson and his coworkers and called d,l-eserethole. Likewise were all derivatives different. Inasmuch as our (optically) inactive material subjected to characteristic reactions of eserethole of natural origin yielded perfectly analogous results, we expressed the belief that our product was the real d,l-eserethole and that of the English chemists must be assigned another constitution.
“This is now proved conclusively by synthesis of l-eserethole, identical with the product of natural origin.”
Following the total synthesis of physostigmine and the separation of physostigmine into its optical isomers, Julian was to make another discovery at DePauw that not only would enhance his stature as a chemist but also greatly improve the lives of many. It was in the course of isolating geneserin, a companion alkaloid of physostigmine from the Calabar bean, that Julian discovered small crystals of the hydrate of stigmasterol in the acid-washed oil extracted from the beans. Molecules such as stigmasterol possess a central structural unit composed of 17 carbon atoms arranged into four fused rings that is also found in many biologically significant compounds such as cholesterol and the sex hormones, estradiol and testosterone. More generally known as steroids, these compounds cover a broad range of form and function and in many cases are of great value as therapeutic agents.
It was four years after this serendipitous discovery of the stigmasterol crystals that Percy Julian, then the director of research in the Soya Products Division of the Glidden Co., was summoned to a 100,000 gallon soybean oil storage container. Water seeping into the oil had resulted in the formation of a white solid material that had collected at the bottom of the tank. Remembering his DePauw experience, Julian realized that the extremely small amounts of sterols contained in soybean oil had been concentrated and isolated in the white solid. Subsequent modification of this \"accidental procedure\" led to the daily production of 100 pounds of mixed soya sterols worth more than $3.6 million annually. These sterols were then easily converted using methods and equipment designed by Julian to produce commercial quantities of a variety of sex hormones, including progesterone, all at a greatly reduced cost to the public but still with a healthy profit for Glidden.
Later in his career at Glidden and at his own research institute, the Julian Laboratories, Percy Julian continued to make important contributions to the field of medicinal chemistry. His 1948 synthesis of Reichstein\'s Substance S is still the most widely used route to the production of hydrocortisone and its derivatives, which are used in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis. He developed efficient syntheses for whole families of steroids including 4,5-epoxy steroids, 16,17-epoxy steroids, 21- iodo steroids, 17-hydroxy steroids, 4-halo steroids, and numerous steroids containing the diosphenol structure. In later years, he worked on the synthesis of the yohimbine alkaloids and in uncovering the metabolism of tryptophan, one of the nine amino acids essential for healthy living.
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Percy Julian in the Minshall Laboratory at DePauw University during his tenure as a research fellow.Courtesy DePauw University Archives.Biography of Percy Lavon JulianIn a lifetime of continual striving, Percy L. Julian (1899-1975) succeeded against the prejudices and discrimination of his time to become a pathbreaking synthetic chemist, a successful industrial research director, and a wealthy businessman.
Julian was born in Montgomery, Ala., on April 11, 1899, the son of a railway clerk and the grandson of slaves. From the beginning, he did well in school, but there was no public high school for African Americans in Montgomery. Julian graduated from an all-Black normal school inadequately prepared for college. Even so, in the fall of 1916, at the age of 17, he was accepted as a sub-freshman at DePauw. This meant that in addition to his regular college courses he took classes at a nearby high school. He also had to work in order to pay his college expenses. Nevertheless, he excelled.
Julian was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and graduated with a B.A. degree in 1920 as valedictorian of his class. His chosen path of chemistry would prove to be a rocky one. With no encouragement to continue his education, based on the lack of future job opportunities, Julian found a position as instructor in chemistry at Fisk University, in Nashville, TN.
After two years at Fisk, Julian won an Austin Fellowship to Harvard and received his M.A. degree in 1923. Again, he faced disappointment when no job offer was forthcoming. In succeeding years, he served on the staff of predominantly Black institutions — first at West Virginia State College, and in 1928, as head of the department of chemistry at Howard University, Washington, D.C. In 1929, Julian received a Rockefeller Foundation grant and the chance to earn his doctorate in chemistry. He elected to study natural products chemistry with Ernst Späth at the University of Vienna. He received his Ph.D. in 1931 and returned to Howard, accompanied by his friend, Josef Pikl. After two years there, internal politics forced them to leave.
In 1933, through the efforts of his former professor William Blanchard, Julian returned to DePauw University as a research fellow. He directed research projects for senior and graduate students. It was here in Minshall Laboratory in 1935, in collaboration with Pikl, that he completed the research that would result in the total synthesis of physostigmine. This work established Julian’s reputation as a world-renowned chemist at the age of 36.
Despite his accomplishments as a recognized and published researcher, Percy Julian was denied a faculty position at DePauw. Frustrated in his efforts to gain an academic post, Julian turned to industry. One research job fell through because of a town law forofferding “housing of a Negro overnight.” Then, in 1936, a door opened when Julian was offered a position as director of research for soya products for Glidden in Chicago. Over the next 18 years, the results of his soybean protein research produced numerous patents and successful products for Glidden, among them a paper coating and a fire-retardant foam used widely in WWII to extinguish gasoline fires. His biomedical research made it possible to produce large quantities of synthetic progesterone and hydrocortisone at low cost.
In 1953, he established Julian Laboratories, a successful enterprise that he sold for more than $2 million in 1961. He later formed Julian Research Institute, a nonprofit research organization. Among his many lifetime honors was election, in 1973, to the National Academy of Sciences. He was also widely recognized as a steadfast advocate for human rights. Julian continued his private research studies and served as a consultant to major pharmaceutical companies until his death on April 19, 1975.African-American chemist Percy Julian was a pioneer in the chemical synthesis of medicinal drugs such as cortisone, steroids and birth control pills.Synopsis
Born in Alabama in 1899, pioneering chemist Percy Julian was not allowed to attend high school but went on to earn his Ph.D. His research at academic and corporate institutions led to the chemical synthesis of drugs to treat glaucoma and arthritis, and although his race presented challenges at every turn, he is regarded as one of the most influential chemists in American history.
Early Life
Percy Lavon Julian was born April 11, 1899, in Montgomery, Alabama, the grandson of former slaves. He attended school through the eighth grade but there were no high schools open to black students. He applied to DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, where he had to take high school-level classes in the evening to get him up to the academic level of his peers. In spite of this challenging beginning, he graduated first in his class, with Phi Beta Kappa honors.
Life in Academia
After college, Julian accepted a position as a chemistry instructor at Fisk University. He left in 1923 when he received a scholarship to attend Harvard University to finish his master’s degree, though the university would not allow him to pursue his doctorate. He traveled for several years, teaching at black colleges, before obtaining his Ph.D. at the University of Vienna in Austria in 1931.
With his doctorate in hand, he returned to DePauw to continue his research. In 1935 he earned international acclaim by synthesizing physostigmine from the calabar bean to create a drug treatment for glaucoma, but in spite of his success, the university refused to make him a full professor because of his race.
Later Career
Desiring to leave academia, Julian applied for jobs at prominent chemical companies, but was repeatedly rejected when hiring managers discovered that he was black. Ultimately, he obtained a position at Glidden Company as the lab director. There he invented Aero-Foam, a product that uses soy protein to put out oil and gas fires and was widely used in World War II, as well as other soybean-based inventions.
Julian continued his biomedical work as well, and discovered how to extract sterols from soybean oil and synthesize the hormones progesterone and testosterone. He was also lauded for his synthesis of cortisone, which became used in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis.
Julian left Glidden in 1953 and established his own laboratory, Julian Laboratories, in 1954. He sold the company in 1961, becoming one of the first black millionaires, before founding Julian Research Institute, a nonprofit organization that he ran for the rest of his life.
He died of liver cancer on April 19, 1975.
Recognition
Julian was the first black chemist elected to the National Academy of the Sciences, in 1973. In 1990 he was elected to the National Inventors Hall of Fame, and in 1999 his synthesis of physostigmine was recognized by the American Chemical Society as “one of the top 25 achievements in the history of American chemistry.”
Personal Life
Julian met his wife, Anna Roselle, while employed at Howard University, and the two were accused of having an affair while she was married to one of his colleagues. A scandal ensued and Julian was fired, but he and Anna married in 1935 and had two children.
\"The right of a people to live where they want to, without fear, is more important than my science.\" - Percy JulianIn 1950, Julian and his family moved to Oak Park, Illinois. After they purchased their home but before they moved in, the house was firebombed on Thanksgiving Day. It was attacked again in June, 1951.
Julian’s life was the subject of a documentary film made for PBS’s Nova series, entitled Forgotten Genius.
Percy Lavon Julian (April 11, 1899 – April 19, 1975) was an African American research chemist and a pioneer in the chemical synthesis of medicinal drugs from plants.[1] He was the first to synthesize the natural product physostigmine, and a pioneer in the industrial large-scale chemical synthesis of the human hormones progesterone and testosterone from plant sterols such as stigmasterol and sitosterol. His work laid the foundation for the steroid drug industry\'s production of cortisone, other corticosteroids, and birth control pills.[2][3][4]
He later started his own company to synthesize steroid intermediates from the wild Mexican yam. His work helped greatly reduce the cost of steroid intermediates to large multinational pharmaceutical companies, helping to significantly expand the use of several important drugs.[5][6]
Julian received more than 130 chemical patents. He was one of the first African Americans to receive a doctorate in chemistry. He was the first African-American chemist inducted into the National Academy of Sciences, and the second African-American scientist inducted (behind David Blackwell) from any field.[5]
Contents [hide]1 Early life and education2 Private sector work: Glidden3 Steroids4 Oak Park and Julian Laboratories5 National Academy of Sciences6 Legacy and honors6.1 Nova documentary6.2 Archive7 Patents8 Publications9 See also10 References11 Further reading12 External linksEarly life and education[edit]Percy Lavon Julian was born in Montgomery, Alabama, as the first child of six born to James Sumner Julian and Elizabeth Lena Julian, née Adams. Both of his parents were graduates of what was to be Alabama State University. His father, James, whose own father had been a slave, was employed as a clerk in the Railway Service of the United States Post Office, while his mother, Elizabeth, worked as a schoolteacher.[7][8][9] Percy Julian grew up in the time of racist Jim Crow culture and legal regime in the southern United States. Among his childhood memories was finding a lynched man hanged from a tree while walking in the woods near his home. At a time when access to an education beyond the eighth grade was extremely rare for African-Americans, Julian\'s parents steered all of their children toward higher education.
Julian attended DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana. The college accepted few African-American students. The segregated nature of the town forced social humiliations. Julian was not allowed to live in the college dormitories and first stayed in an off-campus boarding home, which refused to serve him meals. It took him days before Julian found an establishment where he could eat. He later found work firing the furnace, waiting tables, and doing other odd jobs in a fraternity house; in return, he was allowed to sleep in the attic and eat at the house. Julian graduated from DePauw in 1920 as a Phi Beta Kappa and valedictorian.[10] By 1930 Julian\'s father would move the entire family to Greencastle so that all his children could attend college at DePauw. He still worked as a railroad postal clerk.[7]
After graduating from DePauw, Julian wanted to obtain his doctorate in chemistry, but learned it would be difficult for an African-American to do so. Instead he obtained a position as a chemistry instructor at Fisk University. In 1923 he received an Austin Fellowship in Chemistry, which allowed him to attend Harvard University to obtain his M.S. However, worried that Euro-American students would resent being taught by an African-American, Harvard withdrew Julian\'s teaching assistantship, making it impossible for him to complete his Ph.D. at Harvard.
In 1929, while an instructor at Howard University, Julian received a Rockefeller Foundation fellowship to continue his graduate work at the University of Vienna, where he earned his Ph.D. in 1931. He studied under Ernst Späth and was considered an impressive student. In Europe, he found freedom from the racial prejudices that had stifled him in the States. He freely participated in intellectual social gatherings, went to the opera and found greater acceptance among his peers.[11][12] Julian was one of the first African Americans to receive a Ph.D. in chemistry, after St. Elmo Brady and Dr. Edward M.A. Chandler.[5][13]
After returning from Vienna, Julian taught for one year at Howard University. At Howard, in part due to his position as a department head, Julian became caught up in university politics, setting off an embarrassing chain of events. At university president Mordecai Wyatt Johnson\'s request,[14] he goaded white Professor of chemistry, Jacob Shohan (Ph.D from Harvard [15]), into resigning.[16][17] In late May 1932, Shohan retaliated by releasing to the local African-American newspaper the letters Julian had written to him from Vienna. The letters described \"a variety of subjects from wine, pretty Viennese women, music and dances, to chemical experiments and plans for the new chemical building.\"[16] In the letters, he spoke with familiarity, and with some derision, of specific members of the Howard University faculty, terming one well-known Dean, an \"ass\".[16][18]
Around this same time, Julian also became entangled in an interpersonal conflict with his laboratory assistant, Robert Thompson. Julian had recommended Thompson for dismissal in March 1932.[19] Thompson sued Julian for \"alienating the affections of his wife\",[16] Anna Roselle Thompson, stating he had seen them together in a sexual tryst. Julian counter-sued him for libel. When Thompson was fired, he too gave the paper intimate and personal letters which Julian had written to him from Vienna. Dr. Julian\'s letters revealed \"how he fooled the [Howard] president into accepting his plans for the chemistry building\"[18] and \"how he bluffed his good friend into appointing\" a professor of Julian\'s liking.[18] Through the summer of 1932, the Baltimore Afro-American published all of Julian\'s letters. Eventually, the scandal and accompanying pressure forced Julian to resign. He lost his position and everything he had worked for.[5]
Some happiness for Dr. Julian, however, was to come from this scandal. On December 24, 1935 he married Anna Roselle (Ph.D. in Sociology, 1937, University of Pennsylvania). They had two children: Percy Lavon Julian, Jr. (August 31, 1940 – February 24, 2008), who became a noted civil rights lawyer in Madison, Wisconsin;[20] and Faith Roselle Julian (1944– ), who still resides in their Oak Park home and often makes inspirational speeches about her father and his contributions to science.[21]
At the lowest point in Julian\'s career, his former mentor, William Blanchard, threw him a much-needed lifeline. Blanchard offered Julian a position to teach organic chemistry at DePauw University in 1932. Julian then helped Josef Pikl, a fellow student at the University of Vienna, to come to the United States to work with him at DePauw. In 1935 Julian and Pikl completed the total synthesis of physostigmine and confirmed the structural formula assigned to it. Robert Robinson of Oxford University in the U.K. had been the first to publish a synthesis of physostigmine, but Julian noticed that the melting point of Robinson\'s end product was wrong, indicating that he had not created it. When Julian completed his synthesis, the melting point matched the correct one for natural physostigmine from the calabar bean.[5]
Julian also extracted stigmasterol, which took its name from Physostigma venenosum, the west African calabar bean that he hoped could serve as raw material for synthesis of human steroidal hormones. At about this time, in 1934, Butenandt and Fernholz, in Germany,[22][23] had shown that stigmasterol, isolated from soybean oil, could be converted to progesterone by synthetic organic chemistry.
Private sector work: Glidden[edit]In 1936 Julian was denied a professorship at DePauw for racial reasons. DuPont had offered a job to fellow chemist Josef Pikl but declined to hire Julian, despite his superlative qualifications as an organic chemist, apologizing that they were \"unaware he was a Negro\".[10] Julian next applied for a job at the Institute of Paper Chemistry (IPC) in Appleton, Wisconsin. However, Appleton was a sundown town, forofferding African Americans from staying overnight, stating directly: \"No Negro should be bed or boarded overnight in Appleton.\"
Meanwhile, Julian had written to the Glidden Company, a supplier of soybean oil products, to request a five-gallon sample of the oil to use as his starting point for the synthesis of human steroidal sex hormones (in part because his wife was suffering from infertility). After receiving the request, W. J. O\'Brien, a vice-president at Glidden, made a telephone call to Julian, offering him the position of director of research at Glidden\'s Soya Products Division in Chicago. He was very likely offered the job by O\'Brien because he was fluent in German, and Glidden had just purchased a modern continuous countercurrent solvent extraction plant from Germany for the extraction of vegetable oil from soybeans for paints and other uses.[5]
Julian supervised the assembly of the plant at Glidden when he arrived in 1936. He then designed and supervised construction of the world\'s first plant for the production of industrial-grade, isolated soy protein from oil-free soybean meal. Isolated soy protein could replace the more expensive milk casein in industrial applications such as coating and sizing of paper, glue for making Douglas fir plywood, and in the manufacture of water-based paints.
At the start of World War II, Glidden sent a sample of Julian\'s isolated soy protein to National Foam System Inc. (today a unit of Kidde Fire Fighting), which used it to develop Aer-O-Foam,[24][25] the U.S. Navy\'s beloved fire-fighting \"bean soup.\" While it was not exactly Julian\'s brainchild, his meticulous care in the preparation of the soy protein made the fire fighting foam possible. When a hydrolyzate of isolated soy protein was fed into a water stream, the mixture was converted into a foam by means of an aerating nozzle. The soy protein foam was used to smother oil and gasoline fires aboard ships and was particularly useful on aircraft carriers. It saved the lives of thousands of sailors and airmen.[25] Citing this achievement, in 1947 the NAACP awarded Julian the Spingarn Medal, its highest honor.
Steroids[edit]Julian\'s research at Glidden changed direction in 1940 when he began work on synthesizing progesterone, estrogen, and testosterone from the plant sterols stigmasterol and sitosterol, isolated from soybean oil by a foam technique he invented and patented.[2][26] At that time clinicians were discovering many uses for the newly discovered hormones. However, only minute quantities could be extracted from hundreds of pounds of the spinal cords of animals.
In 1940 Julian was able to produce 100 lb of mixed soy sterols daily, which had a value of $10,000 ($80,000 today)[27] as sex hormones. Julian was soon ozonizing 100 pounds daily of mixed sterol dibromides. The soy stigmasterol was easily converted into commercial quantities of the female hormone progesterone, and the first pound of progesterone he made, valued at $63,500 ($509,000 today),[27] was shipped to the buyer, Upjohn,[28] in an armored car.[4] Production of other sex hormones soon followed.[29]
His work made possible the production of these hormones on a larger industrial scale, with the potential of reducing the cost of treating hormonal deficiencies. Julian and his co-workers obtained patents for Glidden on key processes for the preparation of progesterone and testosterone from soybean plant sterols. Product patents held by a former cartel of European pharmaceutical companies had prevented a significant reduction in wholesale and retail prices for clinical use of these hormones in the 1940s. He saved many lives with this discovery.[30][31][32]
On April 13, 1949, rheumatologist Philip Hench at the Mayo Clinic announced the dramatic effectiveness of cortisone in treating rheumatoid arthritis. The cortisone was produced by Merck at great expense using a complex 36-step synthesis developed by chemist Lewis Sarett, starting with deoxycholic acid from cattle bile acids. On September 30, 1949, Julian announced an improvement in the process of producing cortisone.[33][34][35][36] This eliminated the need to use osmium tetroxide, which was a rare and expensive chemical.[33] By 1950, Glidden could begin producing closely related compounds which might have partial cortisone activity. Julian also announced the synthesis, starting with the cheap and readily available pregnenolone (synthesized from the soybean oil sterol stigmasterol) of the steroid cortexolone (also known as Reichstein\'s Substance S), a molecule that differed from cortisone by a single missing oxygen atom; and possibly 17α-hydroxyprogesterone and pregnenetriolone, which he hoped might also be effective in treating rheumatoid arthritis,[33][34][35][36][37] but unfortunately they were not.[36]
On April 5, 1952, biochemist Durey Peterson and microbiologist Herbert Murray at Upjohn published the first report of a fermentation process for the microbial 11α-oxygenation of steroids in a single step (by common molds of the order Mucorales). Their fermentation process could produce 11α-hydroxyprogesterone or 11α-hydroxycortisone from progesterone or Compound S, respectively, which could then by further chemical steps be converted to cortisone or 11β-hydroxycortisone (cortisol).[38]
After two years, Glidden abandoned production of cortisone to concentrate on Substance S. Julian developed a multistep process for conversion of pregnenolone, available in abundance from soybean oil sterols, to cortexolone. In 1952, Glidden, which had been producing progesterone and other steroids from soybean oil, shut down its own production and began importing them from Mexico through an arrangement with Diosynth (a small Mexican company founded in 1947 by Russell Marker after leaving Syntex). Glidden\'s cost of production of cortexolone was relatively high, so Upjohn decided to use progesterone, available in large quantity at low cost from Syntex, to produce cortisone and hydrocortisone.[36]
In 1953, Glidden decided to leave the steroid business, which had been relatively unprofitable over the years despite Julian\'s innovative work.[39] On December 1, 1953, Julian left Glidden after 18 years, giving up a salary of nearly $50,000 a year (equivalent to $450,000 in 2016)[27] to found his own company, Julian Laboratories, Inc., taking over the small, concrete-block building of Suburban Chemical Company in Franklin Park, Illinois.[40][41][42]
On December 2, 1953, Pfizer acquired exclusive licenses of Glidden patents for the synthesis of Substance S. Pfizer had developed a fermentation process for microbial 11β-oxygenation of steroids in a single step that could convert Substance S directly to 11β-hydrocortisone (cortisol), with Syntex undertaking large-scale production of cortexolone at very low cost.[36]
Oak Park and Julian Laboratories[edit]Circa 1950, Julian moved his family to the Chicago suburb of Oak Park, becoming the first African-American family to reside there.[43] Although some residents welcomed them into the community, there was also opposition. Before they even moved in, on Thanksgiving Day, 1950, their home was fire-bombed. Later, after they moved in, the house was attacked with dynamite on June 12, 1951. The attacks galvanized the community, and a community group was formed to support the Julians.[44] Julian\'s son later recounted that during these times, he and his father often kept watch over the family\'s property by sitting in a tree with a shotgun.[5]
In 1953, Julian founded his own research firm, Julian Laboratories, Inc. He brought many of his best chemists, including African-Americans and women, from Glidden to his own company. Julian won a contract to provide Upjohn with $2 million worth of progesterone (equivalent to $16 million today).[27] To compete against Syntex, he would have to use the same Mexican yam Mexican barbasco trade as his starting material. Julian used his own money and borrowed from friends to build a processing plant in Mexico, but he could not get a permit from the government to harvest the yams. Abraham Zlotnik, a former Jewish University of Vienna classmate whom Julian had helped escape from the Nazi European holocaust, led a search to find a new source of the yam in Guatemala for the company.
In July 1956, Julian and executives of two other American companies trying to enter the Mexican steroid intermediates market appeared before a U.S. Senate subcommittee. They testified that Syntex was using undue influence to monopolize access to the Mexican yam.[32][45] The hearings resulted in Syntex signing a consent decree with the U.S. Justice Department. While it did not admit to restraining trade, it promised not to do so in the future.[32] Within five years, large American multinational pharmaceutical companies had acquired all six producers of steroid intermediates in Mexico, four of which had been Mexican-owned.[32]
Syntex reduced the cost of steroid intermediates more than 250-fold over twelve years, from $80 per gram in 1943 to $0.31 per gram in 1955.[32][45] Competition from Upjohn and General Mills, which had together made very substantial improvements in the production of progesterone from stigmasterol, forced the price of Mexican progesterone to less than $0.15 per gram in 1957. The price continued to fall, bottoming out at $0.08 per gram in 1968.[32][36]
In 1958, Upjohn purchased 6,900 kg of progesterone from Syntex at $0.135 per gram, 6,201 kg of progesterone from Searle (who had acquired Pesa) at $0.143 per gram, 5,150 kg of progesterone from Julian Laboratories at $0.14 per gram, and 1,925 kg of progesterone from General Mills (who had acquired Protex) at $0.142 per gram.[46]
Despite continually falling bulk prices of steroid intermediates, an oligopoly of large American multinational pharmaceutical companies kept the wholesale prices of corticosteroid drugs fixed and unchanged into the 1960s. Cortisone was fixed at $5.48 per gram from 1954, hydrocortisone at $7.99 per gram from 1954, and prednisone at $35.80 per gram from 1956.[32][46] Merck and Roussel Uclaf concentrated on improving the production of corticosteroids from cattle bile acids. In 1960 Roussel produced almost one-third of the world\'s corticosteroids from bile acids.[36]
Julian Laboratories chemists found a way to quadruple the yield on a product on which they were barely breaking even. Julian reduced their price for the product from $4,000 per kg to $400 per kg.[5] He sold the company in 1961 for $2.3 million (equivalent to $18 million today).[27] The U.S. and Mexico facilities were purchased by Smith Kline, and Julian\'s chemical plant in Guatemala was purchased by Upjohn.
In 1964, Julian founded Julian Associates and Julian Research Institute, which he managed for the rest of his life.[47]
National Academy of Sciences[edit]He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1973 in recognition of his scientific achievements.[5] He became the second African-American to be inducted, after David Blackwell.
Legacy and honors[edit]In 1950, the Chicago Sun-Times named Percy Julian the Chicagoan of the Year.[21]Since 1975, the National Organization for the Professional Advancement of Black Chemists and Chemical Engineers has presented the Percy L. Julian Award for Pure and Applied Research in Science and Engineering.[48]In 1975, Percy L. Julian High School was opened on the south side of Chicago, Illinois as a Chicago public high school.In 1980, the science and mathematics building on the DePauw University campus was rededicated as the Percy L. Julian Mathematics and Science Center. In Greencastle, Indiana, where DePauw is located, a street was named after Julian.In 1985, Hawthorne School in Oak Park, Illinois, was renamed Percy Julian Middle School.[49]Illinois State University, where Julian served on the board of trustees, named a hall after him.[50]A structure at Coppin State University is named the Percy Julian Science Building.In 1990, he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.[51]In 1993 Julian was honored on a stamp issued by the United States Postal Service.[52][53]In 1999, the American Chemical Society recognized Julian\'s synthesis of physostigmine as a National Historic Chemical Landmark.[54]In 2002, scholar Molefi Kete Asante listed Percy Lavon Julian on his list of 100 Greatest African-Americans.[55]In 2011, the qualifying exam preparation committee at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine was named for Percy Julian.In 2014, Google honored him with a Doodle.[56][57][58]Nova documentary[edit]Ruben Santiago-Hudson portrayed Percy Julian in the Public Broadcasting Service Nova documentary about his life, called \"Forgotten Genius\". It was presented on the PBS network on February 6, 2007, with initial sponsorship by the Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation and further funding by the National Endowment for the Humanities. Approximately sixty of Julian\'s family members, friends, and work associates were interviewed for the docudrama.[5][59]
Production on the biopic began at DePauw University\'s Greencastle campus in May 2002 and included video of Julian\'s bust on display in the atrium of the university\'s Percy Lavon Julian Science and Mathematics Center. Completion and broadcasting of the documentary program was delayed in order for Nova to commission and publish a matching book on Julian\'s life.[60]
According to University of Illinois historian James Anderson in the film, \"His story is a story of great accomplishment, of heroic efforts and overcoming tremendous odds...a story about who we are and what we stand for and the challenges that have been there and the challenges that are still with us.\"[59]
Archive[edit]The Percy Lavon Julian family papers are archived at DePauw University.[61]
Patents[edit]U.S. Patent 2,218,971, October 22, 1940, Recovery of sterolsU.S. Patent 2,373,686, July 15, 1942, Phosphatide product and method of makingU.S. Patent 2,752,339, June 26, 1956, Preparation of cortisoneU.S. Patent 3,149,132, September 15, 1964, 16-aminomenthyl-17-alkyltestosterone derivativesU.S. Patent 3,274,178, September 20, 1966, Method for preparing 16(alpha)-hydroxypregnenes and intermediates obtained thereinU.S. Patent 3,761,469, September 25, 1973, Process for the manufacture of steroid chlorohydrins; with Arnold Lippert HirschAfrican American chemist Percy Julian was a pioneer in the chemical synthesis of medicinal drugs such as cortisone, steroids and birth control pills.Who Was Percy Julian?Percy Julian was a pioneering chemist who was not allowed to attend high school but went on to earn his Ph.D. His research at academic and corporate institutions led to the chemical synthesis of drugs to treat glaucoma and arthritis, and although his race presented challenges at every turn, he is regarded as one of the most influential chemists in American history.
Early LifePercy Lavon Julian was born April 11, 1899, in Montgomery, Alabama, the grandson of former slaves. He attended school through the eighth grade but there were no high schools open to Black students. He applied to DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, where he had to take high school-level classes in the evening to get him up to the academic level of his peers. In spite of this challenging beginning, he graduated first in his class, with Phi Beta Kappa honors.
Life in AcademiaAfter college, Julian accepted a position as a chemistry instructor at Fisk University. He left in 1923 when he received a scholarship to attend Harvard University to finish his master’s degree, though the university would not allow him to pursue his doctorate. He traveled for several years, teaching at Black colleges, before obtaining his Ph.D. at the University of Vienna in Austria in 1931.With his doctorate in hand, he returned to DePauw to continue his research. In 1935, he earned international acclaim by synthesizing physostigmine from the calabar bean to create a drug treatment for glaucoma, but in spite of his success, the university refused to make him a full professor because of his race.
Later Career and DeathDesiring to leave academia, Julian applied for jobs at prominent chemical companies but was repeatedly rejected when hiring managers discovered that he was Black. Ultimately, he obtained a position at Glidden Company as the lab director. There he invented Aero-Foam, a product that uses soy protein to put out oil and gas fires and was widely used in World War II, as well as other soybean-based inventions.
Julian continued his biomedical work as well and discovered how to extract sterols from soybean oil and synthesize the hormones progesterone and testosterone. He was also lauded for his synthesis of cortisone, which became used in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis.
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SCIENTISTSMarie M. Daly(1921–2003)
SCIENTISTSPatricia Bath(1942–2019)
INVENTORSOtis Boykin(1920–1982)
Julian left Glidden in 1953 and established his own laboratory, Julian Laboratories, in 1954. He sold the company in 1961, becoming one of the first Black millionaires, before founding Julian Research Institute, a nonprofit organization that he ran for the rest of his life.
He died of liver cancer on April 19, 1975.
RecognitionIn 1973, Julian became the first Black chemist elected to the National Academy of the Sciences. In 1990, he was elected to the National Inventors Hall of Fame, and in 1999 his synthesis of physostigmine was recognized by the American Chemical Society as “one of the top 25 achievements in the history of American chemistry.”
Personal LifeJulian met his wife, Anna Roselle, while employed at Howard University, and the two were accused of having an affair while she was married to one of his colleagues. A scandal ensued and Julian was fired, but he and Anna married in 1935 and had two children.
In 1950, Julian and his family moved to Oak Park, Illinois. After they purchased their home but before they moved in, the house was firebombed on Thanksgiving Day. It was attacked again in June 1951.
Julian’s life was the subject of a documentary film made for PBS’s Nova series, entitled Forgotten Genius.
n 1935, in Minshall Laboratory, DePauw alumnus Percy L. Julian (1899-1975) first synthesized the drug physostigmine, previously only available from its natural source, the Calabar bean. His pioneering research led to the process that made physostigmine readily available for the treatment of glaucoma. It was the first of Julian’s lifetime of achievements in the chemical synthesis of commercially important natural products.
ContentsPercy L. Julian and Chemistry at DePauw UniversityPercy Julian’s ScienceBiography of Percy Lavon JulianFurther ReadingLandmark Designation and AcknowledgmentsCite this Page“Synthesis of Physostigmine” commemorative booklet“Synthesis of Physostigmine” commemorative booklet produced by the National Historic Chemical Landmarks program of the American Chemical Society in 1999 (PDF).Percy L. Julian and Chemistry at DePauw UniversityThe early 1930s was a time of great chemical research productivity at DePauw. It was in this decade that William M. Blanchard, Dean of the University, hired Percy Julian as a research fellow. Blanchard, who also served as head of the chemistry department, had been Julian\'s mentor during his undergraduate years at DePauw. Julian had received a Ph.D. degree in Vienna in 1931 and was in need of a position in which he could continue his research career. The DePauw chemistry program he joined in 1933 had roots that extended back to 1839 when the university was Asbury College and chemistry was offered as a natural science course taught by the president, Matthew Simpson. Chemistry became a distinct department in 1881 under the direction of Phillip S. Baker. The department prospered and a chemistry major was established in 1896. Percy Julian graduated from this program in 1920.
As a research fellow from 1932 to 1935, Julian, working with his colleague from Vienna, Josef Pikl, and several DePauw students, produced a phenomenal number of high-quality research papers. One such paper appeared in the April 1935 issue of the Journal of the American Chemical Society. This paper, entitled \"Studies in the Indole Series V. The Complete Synthesis of Physostigmine (Eserine),\" which explained how Julian synthesized physostigmine, is undoubtedly the most significant chemical research publication to come from DePauw. The student and faculty collaborative approach, promoted by Julian, has continued to the present, and today most of the research at DePauw is done in collaboration with students.
After the grant funding Julian\'s position expired, Blanchard wanted to appoint Julian to the teaching staff. Despite Julian\'s achievements, the Board of Trustees did not allow it. Julian left DePauw to pursue a distinguished career in industry.
In 1967, Julian was appointed to the DePauw University Board of Trustees. Also that year, planning began for a new science building, which would replace the 65-year-old Minshall Laboratory, and construction commenced in 1968. The Science and Mathematics Center was dedicated in September 1972, with Percy Julian giving the dedication address, \"Science and the Good Life of Man.\" Following Julian\'s death, DePauw University named the Percy L. Julian Science and Mathematics Center in his honor.
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Percy Julian\'s ScienceWhen Percy Julian returned to the DePauw University campus in 1932, he embarked on the project that would forever secure his reputation as a world-class researcher the first total synthesis of the anti-glaucoma drug physostigmine, an alkaloid found in the Calabar bean. Glaucoma, a disorder in which the pressure in the eyeball increases when the aqueous humor does not drain normally, can cause damage to the optic nerve and a loss of vision. Physostigmine promotes drainage of this fluid by easing the constriction of outflow channels. 65 years later, Julian\'s achievement still remains important as derivatives and optically pure forms of physostigmine continue to show therapeutic promise for the treatment of Alzheimer\'s disease and for combating the effects of chemical weapons.
Starting from phenacetin, Julian and Josef Pikl, who was working as an assistant in chemistry, assembled physostigmine in 11 synthetic steps. The project, which took three years to complete, was reported in a series of papers in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. During the project, while the two chemists were working toward the synthesis of d,l-eserethole (a key intermediate compound two steps removed from physostigmine), a group of chemists, also working to synthesize physostigmine, under the direction of Sir Robert Robinson at Oxford University in England, reported their synthesis of d,l-eserethole. Unlike today, when chemists can rely on modern analytical methods such as nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, mass spectrometry, and X-ray crystallography to determine unequivocally the composition and structure of a compound, chemists in the 1930s relied on simpler, indirect, physicochemical methods for their analysis. As it happened in the case of d,l-eserethole, the physicochemical parameters of Robinson\'s d,l-eserethole were not in agreement with those of Julian and Pikl. Firm in his conviction that his synthetic strategy was sound, Julian risked his yet-unproven reputation and boldly wrote in the fourth paper in the series that the work of Robinson was in error.
Subsequently, in the much celebrated fifth paper in the series, \"Studies in the Indole Series V. The Complete Synthesis of Physostigmine (Eserine),\" Julian summarized his and Pikl\'s work on the most challenging total synthesis project of its time with the following:
\"Physostigmine, the principal alkaloid of the Calabar bean, and long used as a drug, has, since its isolation by Jobst and Hesse 70 years ago, been the subject of numerous investigations. The determination of its constitution was rendered particularly difficult since its peculiar chemical structure found no analog in other plant products of known composition.
“Shortly after promising experiments in the direction of (its synthesis) were underway (in our laboratory) the work had to be interrupted and could only be resumed recently. In the meantime, the first of a series of ten papers dealing with the synthesis of physostigmine, by Robinson and his collaborators, appeared and seemingly proved convincingly that the (course) suggested in our formulas could not be realized in practice. Our experiments, nevertheless, were continued and ... led to the successful synthesis of d,l-eserethole.
“To our surprise, our d,l-eserethole exhibited entirely different properties than those of a compound synthesized by Robinson and his coworkers and called d,l-eserethole. Likewise were all derivatives different. Inasmuch as our (optically) inactive material subjected to characteristic reactions of eserethole of natural origin yielded perfectly analogous results, we expressed the belief that our product was the real d,l-eserethole and that of the English chemists must be assigned another constitution.
“This is now proved conclusively by synthesis of l-eserethole, identical with the product of natural origin.”
Following the total synthesis of physostigmine and the separation of physostigmine into its optical isomers, Julian was to make another discovery at DePauw that not only would enhance his stature as a chemist but also greatly improve the lives of many. It was in the course of isolating geneserin, a companion alkaloid of physostigmine from the Calabar bean, that Julian discovered small crystals of the hydrate of stigmasterol in the acid-washed oil extracted from the beans. Molecules such as stigmasterol possess a central structural unit composed of 17 carbon atoms arranged into four fused rings that is also found in many biologically significant compounds such as cholesterol and the sex hormones, estradiol and testosterone. More generally known as steroids, these compounds cover a broad range of form and function and in many cases are of great value as therapeutic agents.
It was four years after this serendipitous discovery of the stigmasterol crystals that Percy Julian, then the director of research in the Soya Products Division of the Glidden Co., was summoned to a 100,000 gallon soybean oil storage container. Water seeping into the oil had resulted in the formation of a white solid material that had collected at the bottom of the tank. Remembering his DePauw experience, Julian realized that the extremely small amounts of sterols contained in soybean oil had been concentrated and isolated in the white solid. Subsequent modification of this \"accidental procedure\" led to the daily production of 100 pounds of mixed soya sterols worth more than $3.6 million annually. These sterols were then easily converted using methods and equipment designed by Julian to produce commercial quantities of a variety of sex hormones, including progesterone, all at a greatly reduced cost to the public but still with a healthy profit for Glidden.
Later in his career at Glidden and at his own research institute, the Julian Laboratories, Percy Julian continued to make important contributions to the field of medicinal chemistry. His 1948 synthesis of Reichstein\'s Substance S is still the most widely used route to the production of hydrocortisone and its derivatives, which are used in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis. He developed efficient syntheses for whole families of steroids including 4,5-epoxy steroids, 16,17-epoxy steroids, 21- iodo steroids, 17-hydroxy steroids, 4-halo steroids, and numerous steroids containing the diosphenol structure. In later years, he worked on the synthesis of the yohimbine alkaloids and in uncovering the metabolism of tryptophan, one of the nine amino acids essential for healthy living.
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filePercy Julian in the Minshall Laboratory at DePauw University during his tenure as a research fellow.Courtesy DePauw University Archives.Biography of Percy Lavon JulianIn a lifetime of continual striving, Percy L. Julian (1899-1975) succeeded against the prejudices and discrimination of his time to become a pathbreaking synthetic chemist, a successful industrial research director, and a wealthy businessman.
Julian was born in Montgomery, Ala., on April 11, 1899, the son of a railway clerk and the grandson of slaves. From the beginning, he did well in school, but there was no public high school for African Americans in Montgomery. Julian graduated from an all-Black normal school inadequately prepared for college. Even so, in the fall of 1916, at the age of 17, he was accepted as a sub-freshman at DePauw. This meant that in addition to his regular college courses he took classes at a nearby high school. He also had to work in order to pay his college expenses. Nevertheless, he excelled.
Julian was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and graduated with a B.A. degree in 1920 as valedictorian of his class. His chosen path of chemistry would prove to be a rocky one. With no encouragement to continue his education, based on the lack of future job opportunities, Julian found a position as instructor in chemistry at Fisk University, in Nashville, TN.
After two years at Fisk, Julian won an Austin Fellowship to Harvard and received his M.A. degree in 1923. Again, he faced disappointment when no job offer was forthcoming. In succeeding years, he served on the staff of predominantly Black institutions — first at West Virginia State College, and in 1928, as head of the department of chemistry at Howard University, Washington, D.C. In 1929, Julian received a Rockefeller Foundation grant and the chance to earn his doctorate in chemistry. He elected to study natural products chemistry with Ernst Späth at the University of Vienna. He received his Ph.D. in 1931 and returned to Howard, accompanied by his friend, Josef Pikl. After two years there, internal politics forced them to leave.
In 1933, through the efforts of his former professor William Blanchard, Julian returned to DePauw University as a research fellow. He directed research projects for senior and graduate students. It was here in Minshall Laboratory in 1935, in collaboration with Pikl, that he completed the research that would result in the total synthesis of physostigmine. This work established Julian’s reputation as a world-renowned chemist at the age of 36.
Despite his accomplishments as a recognized and published researcher, Percy Julian was denied a faculty position at DePauw. Frustrated in his efforts to gain an academic post, Julian turned to industry. One research job fell through because of a town law forofferding “housing of a Negro overnight.” Then, in 1936, a door opened when Julian was offered a position as director of research for soya products for Glidden in Chicago. Over the next 18 years, the results of his soybean protein research produced numerous patents and successful products for Glidden, among them a paper coating and a fire-retardant foam used widely in WWII to extinguish gasoline fires. His biomedical research made it possible to produce large quantities of synthetic progesterone and hydrocortisone at low cost.
In 1953, he established Julian Laboratories, a successful enterprise that he sold for more than $2 million in 1961. He later formed Julian Research Institute, a nonprofit research organization. Among his many lifetime honors was election, in 1973, to the National Academy of Sciences. He was also widely recognized as a steadfast advocate for human rights. Julian continued his private research studies and served as a consultant to major pharmaceutical companies until his death on April 19, 1975.
A steroid chemist and an entrepreneur, Percy Julian ingeniously figured out how to synthesize important medicinal compounds from abundant plant sources, making them more affordable to mass-produce.
In the 1930s chemists recognized the structural similarity of a large group of natural substances—the steroids. These include the sex hormones and the cortical hormones of the adrenal glands. The medicinal potential of these compounds was clear, but extracting sufficient quantities of them from animal tissue and fluids was prohibitively expensive. As with other scarce or difficult-to-isolate natural products, chemists were called upon to mimic nature by creating these steroids in the lab and later by modifying them to make them safer and more effective as drugs. Chemists found their starting materials in certain plant substances that were also steroids. Percy Lavon Julian (1899–1975) was among the many scientists, including Russell Earl Marker, Carl Djerassi, and George Rosenkranz, who participated actively in the synthesis and large-scale production of steroids from plant Percy Julian in a lab 1930sPercy Julian working in a DePauw University lab, ca. 1930.From the collection of the Historical Society of Oak Park and River ForestEducation and Early CareerJulian was born in Montgomery, Alabama, the son of a railway mail clerk and the grandson of slaves. In an era when African Americans faced prejudice in virtually all aspects of life, not least in the scientific world, he succeeded against the odds. Inadequately prepared by his high school, he was accepted at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, as a sub-freshman, meaning that he had to take high-school courses concurrently with his freshman courses. Majoring in chemistry, he graduated as valedictorian of his class in 1920. After graduation he taught chemistry at Fisk University for two years before winning an Austin Fellowship to Harvard University, where he completed a master’s degree in organic chemistry. After Harvard he returned to teaching at West Virginia State College and Howard University.
Physostigmine for GlaucomaIn 1929 Julian traveled to the University of Vienna, Austria, to begin doctoral studies on the chemistry of medicinal plants. Two years later, with degree in hand, he and a Viennese colleague, Josef Pikl, took positions back in the United States at Howard and two years later moved to DePauw. There they accomplished the first total synthesis of physostigmine, the active principle of the Calabar bean, used since the end of the 19th century to treat glaucoma. Physostigmine, an alkaloid, eases the constriction of outflow channels from the eye’s aqueous humor to relieve high pressure there, which, if left untreated, damages the retina and eventually causes blindness.
bio-julian-stamp.jpgPercy Julian was honored on this stamp issued by the U.S. Postal Service in 1993.Percy Julian was honored on this stamp issued by the U.S. Postal Service in 1993.United States Postal ServiceSteroids from Soybeans: ProgesteroneMeanwhile researchers in many countries were seeking innovative and cost-effective ways to synthesize steroids, including cortisone and the sex hormones. German chemists discovered that the steroid stigmasterol, which Julian had obtained as a by-product of the physostigmine synthesis but was also obtainable from soybeans, could be used in the synthesis of certain sex hormones, including progesterone, a female sex hormone that was important in helping pregnant women avoid miscarriages. In pursuit of this lead, in 1936 Julian wrote to the Glidden Company in Chicago, requesting samples of their soybean oil. Through a series of events he wound up being hired by Glidden instead, as their director of research in the Soya Division, where he set about figuring out ways to make new products from soybeans.
Three years after arriving at Glidden, Julian learned from plant workers that water had leaked into a tank of purified soybean oil and formed a solid white mass. Immediately identifying the substance as stigmasterol, he realized he had stumbled upon a method for producing large amounts of the steroid from soybeans. Though scientists already knew how to synthesize progesterone from stigmasterol, they didn’t have a method for doing it on a massive scale. Now with large quantities of stigmasterol at hand, he was able to develop an innovative industrial process for converting it to progesterone in bulk, producing five to six pounds of progesterone per day (worth thousands of dollars in those days). Soon other sex hormones were in production.
bio-julian1.jpgPercy Julian. Gift of Ray Dawson, the Institute Collections.Percy Julian.Science History InstituteCortisone and HydrocortisoneIn 1948 scientists at the Mayo Clinic announced their landmark discovery of cortisone, which had remarkable effects on rheumatoid arthritis, and Julian jumped into the exciting competition to synthesize cortisone inexpensively (see also Carl Djerassi). Cortisone is a cortical hormone of the adrenal gland. In 1949 Julian developed a new synthesis for a related substance (called “Substance S”) also present in the adrenal cortex and differing from cortisone by only an oxygen atom. From this substance he was able to synthesize both cortisone and hydrocortisone. Hydrocortisone and its derivatives today are more widely prescribed than cortisone products, and most industrial syntheses still begin along the same route that Julian pioneered.
Later LifeJulian remained at Glidden until 1954, when he founded his own company, Julian Laboratories of Franklin Park, Illinois, and Mexico City (which he eventually sold to Smith, Kline and French). Throughout his life he was socially active in groups seeking to advance conditions for African Americans, helping to found the Legal Defense and Educational Fund of Chicago and serving on the boards of several other organizations and universities.
Deep in the intricate country of the mindI took a twisting path that led me stumblingTo a wind-racked hill.Those thickets, briary, tough to breakAnd swampy sometimes underfootWere well behind me nowLost to sight and for the momentLost to mind.The hill I had reached was high enoughTo look on distances that dropped away fold upon foldMelting far to the Westward into a dim horizonThey beckoned me.And my feet, so heavy as I had begun to climb the hillWere now uplifted to lighter pace,What land is this, I asked, in taking breath,What lies behind that seventh fold?Take heart, I told myself,Go farther on.DONALD ADAMSThe Seventh FoldWHENEVER PERCY JULIAN told his friends about his life,and how he had overcome all the obstacles from hisbeginning as the grandson of a slave, born “at the cornerof Jeff Davis Avenue and South Oak Street in Montgomery,4 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSAlabama, the Capital in the cradle of the confederacy,”* toscientist, inventor, business leader, humanist, protagonist ofhuman rights, he liked to illustrate this long arduous climbby Donald Adams’ The Seventh Fold:My dear friends, who daily climb uncertain hills in the countries oftheir minds, hills that have to do with the future of our country and of ourchildren, may I humbly submit to you, the only thing that has enabled meto keep doing the creative work, was the constant determination: Takeheart! Go farther on!†This imperative, go on!, characterizes not only his life buthis research, where each answer created at least two newquestions and led to the exponential growth of science asPercy experienced it in his lifetime. With this growth, helater realized the concomitant responsibility and questionsof ethics.Percy Julian was born on April 11, 1899, the oldest of sixchildren of James Sumner Julian, a railway mail clerk, andhis wife, Elizabeth Lena Adams. Since 1976 his birthday hasbeen a holiday for the Village of Oak Park, a fashionablesuburb of Chicago where the Julian family has resided since1950, initially under precarious conditions (the Julian home,the first in the neighborhood to be owned by a black family,was the victim of arsonists on Thanksgiving Day, 1950, andthe target of a dynamite bomb on June 12, 1951), and whereother famous people, such as Ernest Hemingway and FrankLloyd Wright, had their residences. Because Percy’s fatherwas a federal employee, the family held a higher status thanmost blacks of that day. This advantage, and the fact thathis well-read father had a great love for mathematics andphilosophy, helped him on the way to a formal education.*Percy Julian, “Response,” in Percy Lavon Julian, A Tribute (Jacksonville, Illinois:MacMurray College, 1972), p. 23.†Ioffer., p. 28.PERCY LAVON JULIAN 5Clearly, his must have been “a mind forever voyagingthrough strange seas of thought” (Wordsworth), or “a restless curiosity about things which he cannot understand”(Pascal), but the cultural and, above all, religious traditionin his family provided not only a repository of substantivevalues, but also a coding device for new ideas and achievements. That “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of allpractical wisdom” was taught him, and not in Latin, by hisrevered paternal great-grandfather.My children and my friends all know him as Grandpa Cabe becausethey’ve heard me speak about him so many times. My great-grandfather,with the rest of us that day, was singing in the cotton field, where wechildren, particularly Dr. James Julian, my next brother, and I were sent tomy grandfather’s farm to work during the summer. We were singing onthat day a beautiful spiritual, “There is a balm in Gilead to make thewounded whole. There is a balm in Gilead to heal the sin-sick soul.”“Grandpa Cabe,” I asked, “what’s a balm in Gilead?”“Well, Sonny, you see, Gilead was a famous town in Israel for themanufacture of salves to heal wounds and sores,” he told me. “And theycalled these salves balms. Now one day Jeremiah was having a hard timetrying to lead his people the right way. Everything was going wrong forJeremiah, and he cried out in anguish, ‘Is there no balm in Gilead?’ Yousee, what he was saying was, ‘Ain’t there no way out?’ I want you to knowthat, Sonny, because I believe there is always a way out.”It was then that I made my vow—that I would forever fight to keephope alive because there is always a way out . . . .His optimism was one of the most pertinent lessons I learned as ayoungster. Next to my parents and my grandparents, I owe my eternaloptimism to my students and my co-workers, who over the past forty yearshave worked with me, and to my great-Grandpa Cabe.*Respect for the dignity of the poor and survival with dignitycame naturally to the Julian family as the results of hardwork, family pride, love, acceptance, belonging, high moral*Ioffer., pp. 24-25.6 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSstandards, good parental example, decent food, discipline,respect for authority, and God-centeredness. The majorweapon for liberation was faith in education, the door thatled from alienation to emancipation.Percy often compared his fortunate family and his upbringing with the situation today:The kind of hope I grew up with is missing in today’s ghetto youthbecause of a breakdown in family life. It has its roots in slavery when oftenthe father of the family was uprooted and sold down the river. The sonwould grow up and get married and, when he was unable to get a jobbecause there were not jobs for a black man, he would get embarrassedthat he could not support his family and walk out thinking, “my mother didit alone and my wife is no better.” Well, that went on generation aftergeneration, and it’s no better today. There still are no jobs and welfareencourages the man to leave the family. One of the greatest problemsfacing the country is how to reconcile the young ghetto dweller with therest of America. We have a large problem of ignorance, lack of opportunity, and divided families. I worry about how we are going to solve it. It’snot just trying to persuade people to be nice and understanding. I’ve beenas angry as anyone else. But most people define the end of anger as whenyou become well-off. I think as we resolve the breakdown of the blackfamily, caused by slavery and continued by welfare, the problem will comecloser to its solution.*Public education for blacks in Alabama stopped at theeighth grade. Traveling on an empty stomach, Percy madethe long trip from Montgomery, Alabama to Greencastle,Indiana, where “because of the meager quality of my earlytraining I was enrolled at DePauw University as a ‘subfreshman’ until nearly my senior year in college. On myfirst day in College,” Percy liked to tell, “I remember walking in and a white fellow stuck out his hand and said, ‘Howare you?—Welcome!’ I had never shaken hands with a white*Quoted in: William Montague Cobb, First Percy L. Julian Memorial Lecture,DePauw University, April 28, 1977.PERCY LAVON JULIAN 7boy before and did not know whether I should or not. Butyou know,” he added smilingly, “in the shake of a hand mywhole life was changed, I soon learned to smile and act likeI believed they all liked me, whether they wanted to ornot.”*He lived in the attic of a fraternity house. His supportand tuition came from his earnings as a waiter. Often heworked as a ditchdigger during the day and attended classesin the evening.Percy often related this early college experience with loving detail. Much later he started writing his memoirs inwhich the journey to Greencastle and his entry into DePauwforms the first and, alas, last chapter of an autobiographythat would never be completed.Later the entire family moved to Greencastle, and histwo brothers, James and Emerson, and each of his threesisters, Mattie, Irma, and Elizabeth, in due turn graduatedfrom DePauw University.Before he received his A.B. in 1920, he had been electedto Phi Beta Kappa and became the valedictorian. Then hisrespected teachers informed him there were no opportunitiesfor those of his color, and they could not help. Percyresponded by going first to Fisk University, from 1920 to1922, as an instructor in chemistry and then to Harvard,where as an Austin fellow, he obtained his master of arts in1923. Through Harvard Fellowships for Studies in Biophysics and Organic Chemistry, he was able to investigate thechemistry of conjugated unsaturated systems with ProfessorE. P. Kohler. But even Harvard in those days was unable, orunwilling, to offer a Negro a faculty position. To Percy, therealization of this failure was not only discouraging, it was*Ioffer.8 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRStraumatic. Instead, he went to West Virginia State College,at that time an all-black institution, to teach as a professorof chemistry from 1926 to 1927. John W. Davis was president of the College at the time.Little did Percy know that forty-five years later, on May12, 1972, he would meet his old “boss,” then three timesretired, at the dedication of the Percy Lavon Julian Laboratoryat MacMurray College in Jacksonville, Illinois. It was a festiveoccasion that none of the participants would ever forget.Davis, whom Percy called “a great educator, one of thegreatest men I’ve ever known,” had come to the dedicationfrom Englewood, New Jersey, where he headed a fund forthe training of Negro lawyers in the South, in honor of hisformer colleague’s greatest moment. Dr. Davis related thatat the end of his tenure, West Virginia State College hadturned from 100 percent black to 70 percent white—completely and happily integrated. Percy at this point turned toa young assertive black student:I am telling you that this is a wonderful time to be living—a day ofgreat opportunity. The country has changed course. Don’t nurse your anger,but get together and help make this a really united nation.You know, I first spoke at MacMurray College in 1948. After my lectureeveryone went to the Dunlap Hotel for the night. I was late getting awayfrom the auditorium and by the time I joined the others, the managementmet me at the entrance. “The others have rooms,” they said, “But we don’ttake coloreds. We have a train reservation for you back to Chicago.” But,the Dunlaps and I are old friends now and this time they are giving me aparty. I think it’s a kind of formal apology.*Percy Julian’s commitment to the integrity of his groupremained undiminished, but time and again he gave usreason to admire him for overcoming and sublimating thetension between the particularist and the universalist ele-*Remarks on the occasion of the “Tribute,” MacMurray College.PERCY LAVON JULIAN 9ments in the value system of a man with such a steep andspectacular career. One of his closest friends, Archibald J.Carey, Jr., judge of the Circuit Court of Cook County inChicago, for this reason, in a eulogy at his funeral, describedhim as “the most complete human being I have ever known.A man who made contributions to healing, not only of thebody, but of our society where he has built bridges betweenmany people and groups.” His nineteen honorary degrees,his eighteen academic and civic citations, his twenty-nineinvolvements as a trustee, chairman, or member of educational, religious, and civic activities amplify and illustrateJudge Carey’s statement.Now comes a “change of venue,” to stay within judicialterminology, so unlikely and so unique that Percy Julianwas probably the only grandson of a slave who, in his time,not only went to Harvard from Montgomery, Alabama, buton to the former imperial capital of Vienna. This return tothe Old World was prompted by a fellowship from theRockefeller Foundation which he received while on the faculty of Howard University. Percy selected Vienna becausethe chemistry of natural products fascinated him, and ErnstSpäth’s research on alkaloids had attracted his attention.But in the back of his mind there must have been otherthoughts and associations: the historic tradition of the world’smusical capital, the elegance, the proverbial Viennese charm,the opera, and der Heurige. Percy never elaborated on hismethod of selection.There was of course the memory of that picture in thehouse of his youth. It showed a valley surrounded by highhills—in the middle of it stood an old man and a little boy.The man was pointing to the mountain and the title of thepicture was: There are people over those mountains. Percy, inlife and in science, was always driven by a holy curiosity toknow what is on the other side, in this case, of the Atlantic.10 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSWe are fortunate to be able to draw upon the personalmemories of his closest Viennese friend, Edwin Mosettig, afellow chemist, slightly younger than Percy, and brother ofErich Mosettig (1898–1962), both from Späth’s laboratory.Percy’s arrival in Vienna in the fall of 1929 had elementsof the story of the three Magi, he being the black king. Hebrought gold, in the form of dollars, to impoverished Austria.Instead of myrrh and frankincense, he had large cratesshipped to Späth’s laboratory on Währingerstrasse 38, thecontents of which were marveled at by all the students. Theboxes contained treasures of ground glass equipment, elaborate laboratory glassware (mostly made to order), electricstirrers, and other extravagances not known to the averagestudent. Percy’s good humor and friendly personality conquered all hearts in no time. His only reservation was towardEdwin Mosettig, later his most intimate friend, because insteady discussions with Percy’s predecessor, Stephen FosterDarling from Harvard University, Edwin had adorned hisEnglish with an American accent to such an extent that hearoused the suspicion of Percy. Edwin told him that hispredecessor had always defined “English as an Americandialect.”Percy perfected his German in no time. He even becamefluent in Viennese, a talent he used on the occasion of ataxi ride from the airport to his hotel when he revisitedVienna after the war. The taxi driver literally “took Percyfor a ride,” and first went on a great detour to the Prater.All of a sudden his American fare was heard to ask: “Jaherens, wo samma denn eigentli [Now listen, where are weactually]?” The driver was scared to death and immediatelyheaded for the Hotel Sacher.His linguistic perfection became known, and he receivedan invitation for a radio presentation. He chose a readingof poems and thoughts by Anton Wildgans (1881–1932),PERCY LAVON JULIAN 11director of the Burgtheater and noted poet, whose slightlymelancholic, socially perceptive and critical writings, andmelodious style impressed and attracted Percy. He feltWildgans’ Grosse Österreich-Rede addressed the notion thatAustria is not a nation of fiddlers and dancers, but a stepchild of history punished by wars, depressions, and unemployment. The sample poem which he read illustrates theother view, the blessings of this country:ÖSTERREICHISCHES LIEDWo sich der ewige Schnee wo durch der Ebene Goldspiegelt im Alpensee, silbern der Strom hinrollt,Sturzbach am Fels zerstäubt, Ufer von Früchten schwillt,eingedämmt Werke treibt, hügelan Rebe quillt,wo in der Berge Herz Pflügerschweiss, Städtefleissdämmert das Eisenerz, hat da die rechte Weis’Hammer Gestein zerstampft, was auch Geschick beschied,zischend die Schmelzglut dampft, immer noch blüht ein Lied.Österreich heisst das Land!Da er’s mit gnädiger Handschuf, und so reichbegabt,Gott hat es liebgehabt!*Franz Grillparzer’s (1791–1872) ominous prediction, “fromhumanity to nationality to bestiality,” set the fateful stagesin the sequence that culminated in the events of WorldWar␣ II. All this struck a familiar chord in Percy, even onedecade ahead of the events.Percy cultivated his musical talents by receiving pianolessons from Edwin Mosettig’s mother, a well-known teacherin the Theresienstrasse, where he was treated like a member*Ludwig Reiners, Der ewige Brunnen (München: Verlag-C. F. Beck, 1955), p. 485.12 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSof the family, participating in family outings, musical soirées,swimming in the Danube, tennis, and even one bold skiingexcursion to the Rax Mountains, not to be repeated. Percyfelt intimidated by all the proficient skiing experts. However, he practiced his tennis to the point where he defeatedhis friend Edwin more or less routinely.The place where Percy “held court” by giving very generousreceptions was an elegant apartment in a famous location:an der Strudlhofstiege, later the title of an 800-page bestselling novel by Heimito von Doderer (1896–1966) describing the social changes in Austria before, during, and afterWorld War I. From his dwelling he could easily walk withinminutes to the Boltzmann Gasse where the Chemische Institutwas. Equally close was Frau Dr. Neumann’s “Mittagstisch”where a select group of friends and prominent people usedto partake of an elaborate luncheon à la Viennoise.His social contacts were preferably with the leading intellectual and literary Jewish families of Vienna, such as thePolgars and the Lederers. Jewish solidarity and loyalty (ahavathYisra’el) probably reminded him of his own minority andtheir comparable determination to survive.His first opera was Die Zauberflöte. A normal student couldonly afford a stehsitz on the galerie, with no view. For musicfans this did not matter; they followed the miniaturizedscore with the help of a flashlight and hardly looked at thestage. But Percy had tickets for an expensive loge (box)and invited Edwin to share it, who in this way sat throughhis first opera. Percy was elegantly dressed in a long blackopera coat and homburg. He followed the complicated plotmost attentively and was very receptive to all the specialeffects, such as the three protective graces who descend tothe stage held by invisible ropes. “Well done, well done,”was his repeated enthusiastic response.To Edwin he confided many of his innermost thoughts,PERCY LAVON JULIAN 13for instance the traumatic memory of his disappointmentat Harvard, where instead of a teaching position he receiveda citation. Percy, in front of all the students, according toEdwin Mosettig, walked up to the dean, shook his fist andexclaimed: “I do not pray for mercy, I want justice!” Thisstory was told and retold many times with much anger andemotion. Whether this incident really happened that way,and there are doubts, or whether it was a projection of amind under stress, in the end probably makes little difference.Percy impressed his Viennese fellow students not onlywith the spirituals he played on the piano, but also with hispassion for hard work and study, his profound chemicalknowledge, and his astounding memory. Professor ErnstSpäth, a critical, pitiless examiner, a teacher who ignoredlazy or untalented students, characterized Percy in thesewords: “Ein ausserordentlicher Student, wie ich ihn in meinerLaufbahn als Lehrer niemals hatte [An extraordinary student,his like I have not seen before in my career as a teacher]!”The preparation for the Rigorosum, or Ph.D. examination, was done in clausura with Edwin Mosettig in the scenicWachau. His thesis was on the alkaloids of Corydalis cava, aplant growing in the Wiener Wald. This work had a decisiveinfluence on his extensive later studies, all synthetic, onindole alkaloids and tryptophan metabolites.In the postwar misery, Percy revisited Späth’s widow, whowas then eking out a marginal existence on a state pension.He managed to provide her with enough precious coal soher body—and her heart—kept warm all through the following winter.In the sixties he passed Vienna again on the way toBudapest to negotiate some patent matters. He was invitedto give an address over Radio Budapest. After a lengthyintroduction in Hungarian, Percy’s suspicion was aroused.He demanded a literal translation. After much hemming14 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSand hawing he guessed from their prevarications that hewas announced as one of the leading American Negro scientists, who was still disadvantaged and suppressed by hiscapitalist fellow countrymen. Percy replied that he had nointention to betray his country and withdrew his talk.Josef Pikl, another of his long-time Viennese friends andassociates, provided this perceptive summary in a personalletter to me:The time spent in Austria had a great influence in developing thepersonality of Julian. For the first time in his life, he was completely atease, no open or hidden barriers, really an equal among equals. He mayhave even enjoyed a standing a few notches higher than his friends. In thelaboratory at Vienna, he was particularly noticed for his neatness, the cleanlinessof his work bench, his ready and contagious laugh, completely uninhibited.All the fifteen other graduate students in the room were his friends. Heloved the freedom in Austria so much that a year after his graduation, hereturned for the Summer and we spent a few weeks cycling through partsof Carinthia and the bordering area of Yugoslavia. One incident from thistime he recited with much glee. When in a remote country village of Austria a boy about 8 years old slowly sneaked up to him and rubbed his handand then looked to see if the color came off. A group of boys who hadnever seen a black man, except a chimney sweep, wanted to know if thecolor rubbed off.Yet all this happened in the lull before the storm thatunleashed the furies of war and genocide.After he received his Ph.D. in Vienna in September 1931,Percy and his Viennese friend Josef Pikl sailed to Americaon the Queen Elizabeth and started their long-term collaboration at Howard University. Two years later, some unfortunateintrigue forced them to leave and go to DePauw University.At this juncture the steep career of Percy Julian, the scientist, began. The best account of this period was renderedby Max Tishler, one of his many friends and admirers, whenhe presented him with the Honor Scroll of the ChicagoPERCY LAVON JULIAN 15Chapter of the American Institute of Chemists on November 13, 1964.His important research work began at DePauw University, where hewas invited in 1933 by the late Dr. W. M. Blanchard, professor and dean ofthe College of Liberal Arts, to teach the senior courses in organic chemistry. With Prof. Blanchard’s aid and counsel, he inaugurated a programdesigned to help “bridge the gap between college and university.” In placeof the usual college senior courses in Qualitative Organic Analyses, OrganicSyntheses, Identification of Organic Compounds, or Literature Studies, heboldly attempted a synthesis of these disciplines in the Senior Student’straining. Each qualified Senior was given a fundamental research problem.The result was astounding, even to oldsters in such endeavors like HarryHolmes of Oberlin, who became a staunch friend. Thirty beautiful seniortheses resulted in a matter of 4 years, and 11 of these led to publications inthe Journal of the American Chemical Society. What is more significant, most ofthese publications read more like Doctoral dissertations than expandedsenior theses.At the same time that he was guiding this student work, he was setting a fast pace for his students in his own individual laboratory work.Together with a devoted friend and brilliant fellow-student from Vienna,Dr. Josef Pikl, whom he had invited and assisted in coming to America, hehad inaugurated a vigorous program of work on the constitution and syntheses of certain plant alkaloids having an indole nucleus. The first ofthese undertakings was the total synthesis of the alkaloid, physostigmine,an important drug. In a series of five papers, published in the Journal of theA.C.S. with Dr. Pikl, he reported this synthesis.*The pace of work and the research climate of that timecome through in Dr. Pikl’s memories:Throughout the six years of our collaboration, we made a good team.Percy generated ideas faster than half a dozen people could critically review and test them. He also did most of the writing, did practically all ofthe analytical work, such as carbon-hydrogen analyses, and determinationof active hydrogen with his Grignard machine, and helped with much ofthe dish-washing chores using a two foot diameter porcelain dish with hot*Max Tishler, “Percy L. Julian, the Scientist,” The Chemist, 42(1965):105-6.16 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSsulfuric acid and nitric acid, unaware of the dangers of this method, outside of acid burns. When we were celebrating some progress or the receiptof a nice letter, we drove out about six miles to the crossing of the Transcontinental Route 40 where there was a small snack restaurant. Usually,however, we stayed up to 11–12 o’clock in the laboratory so that we heardsome complaints of burning too much midnight oil!*Tishler continued:In a sense, this work was the turning point in his early career. Inthree papers, he had developed step by step the chemistry leading to hissynthesis. As the fourth paper, describing the next to the last step, entitled,“The Synthesis of d,1-Eserethole” was about to be posted to the Editor ofthe Journal, there appeared the last of a series of ten papers by Sir RobertRobinson of Oxford on the identical subject. Since the synthesis of eseretholevirtually completed, except for the resolution of the optical antipodes, thesynthesis of physostigmine, it looked as though Julian would come in “second best,” and no chemist likes to see the end goal of his most monumental effort achieved first by another, no matter how different the approachesand how equally novel the chemistry. What was more disturbing than theloss of priority was that Sir Robert’s “d,1-eserethole” was quite differentfrom the d,1-eserethole Julian was publishing—different in all its physicochemical parameters.Firm in his conviction that the logic of his synthesis left no room fordoubt, Julian altered his paper and added the following:In a series of ten beautiful papers, Robinson and his co-workershave described syntheses of compounds which they call“d,1-Eserethole,” and “d,1-Esermethole.” Their “d,1-Eserethole”is not the compound described in this communication asd,1-Eserethole, and the constitution of which can hardly be questioned. We believe that the English authors are in error, thatthe compound they describe as “d,1-Eserethole” is not the substance, and that we are describing for the first time the reald,1-Eserethole.*J. Pikl 1977: personal communication.PERCY LAVON JULIAN 17Dr. Pikl was quite unhappy, for those were hard depression days inAmerica, and if they were wrong, the sun would not soon shine upon twoyoung, brash neophytes having the audacity to challenge so eminent ascientist. Moreover, in Europe the prospects of a young man were usuallyirretrievably ruined in such a case. The paper went to press, and by thistime chemists on two continents held their breaths and many took sides.Even Prof. Kohler warned him, “I know you realize that you must be rightin this cordial polemic or else it might lead to grave doubts concerning theauthenticity of your future work.” Here is the outcome of this challenge aspublished in Julian’s fifth and last paper on the subject, entitled “TheComplete Synthesis of Physostigmine”:Physostigmine, the principal alkaloid of the Calabar bean,and long used as a drug, has, since its isolation by Jobst andHesse 70 years ago, been the subject of numerous investigations. The determination of its constitution was rendered particularly difficult since its peculiar chemical structure found noanalog in other plant products of known composition. . . . Shortlyafter promising experiments in the direction of (its synthesis)were under way (in our laboratories) the work had to be interrupted and could only be resumed recently. In the meantime,the first of a series of ten papers dealing with the synthesis ofPhysostigmine, by Robinson and his collaborators, appeared andseemingly proved convincingly that the (course) suggested inour formulas could not be realized in practice. Our experiments, nevertheless, were continued. . . led to the successfulsynthesis of d,1-Eserethole. . . .To our surprise, our (d,1-Eserethole) exhibited entirely different properties than those of a compound synthesized by Robinsonand his co-workers and called “d,1-Eserethole.” Likewise wereall derivatives different. Inasmuch as our (optically) inactivematerial subjected to characteristic reactions of Eserethole ofnatural origin, yielded perfectly analogous results, we expressedthe belief that our product was the real constitution. This isnow proved conclusively by synthesis of 1-Eserethole, identicalwith the product of natural origin.Telegrams of congratulations came from all parts of America, Europe,and Asia. A young chemist had made his mark, and how badly he needed18 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSit, for DePauw was hard up for funds. Julian needed a job and a living, andAmerican firms and universities with research facilities were reluctant tohire a man of color in those days.And then came one of those bits of “accidental chemistry” referred toby Prof. Wittig. In attempts to isolate Geneserin, a companion alkaloid ofPhysostigmine, from the Calabar bean (Physostigma venenosum), Julian hadfirst extracted the oil from this rather lovely bean. The oil had been washedwith dilute acid and then with water, and was set aside wet. On examiningit some weeks later, glistening small crystals had separated. They were carefully separated from the oil and found to be a hydrate, which upon losingits water, was again soluble in the oil. After careful recrystallization of theminute quantity of dehydrated material, microanalysis showed the formulaC29H48O. A literature search showed that it was the sterol, stigmasterol,named after the plant Physostigma venenosum, from which Windaus and Hauthhad separated it 29 years before.About the time of Julian’s isolation of the stigmasterol, Fernholz andButenandt were publishing the first of their epoch-making papers on thepreparation of certain sex hormones from this same stigmasterol whichthey had now separated from soybean oil. Julian wrote the Glidden Company asking for a 5-gallon sample of soybean oil. Imagine his surprise whena vice president of the Glidden Company called him on the long-distancephone, inviting him for an interview, and telling him he was being considered for a research position in Glidden’s Soya Products Division in Chicago.The circumstances surrounding this call are of historical significance:The late Mr. W. J. O’Brien, Glidden Vice-President, tells thestory that he had been attending a Board meeting of the Instituteof Paper Chemistry at Appleton, Wisconsin. Julian was beingdiscussed for a possible position on the research staff there,thanks to Dean Harry Lewis, who had accepted several of Julian’sDePauw students for the Doctorate in Paper Chemistry. Thehitch, however, was how he might fare in the community inview of an old statute on the Appleton city books that “NoNegro should be bedded or boarded in Appleton overnight.”After listening to the discussion, O’Brien said to himself, “If heis half as good as they say he is, I can use him at Glidden. Iwon’t say anything about who he is: I’ll just hire him. If I askabout it, get consent and he fails, it will be ‘We told you so,Billy.’ “ So O’Brien slipped out to the telephone and calledPERCY LAVON JULIAN 19Julian. After the interview, Julian was hired on the spot as Glidden’sAssistant Director of Research of the Soya Products Division.On arriving, in 1936, to take up his duties, Julian found that he hadbeen given the title of Director of Research of the Soya Products Divisionof Glidden. A new plant for the efficient and near quantitative extractionof oil from soybeans had been built by Electro-Chemie in Hamburg, Germany,and was being erected at the Glidden plant. Julian’s fluent German stoodhim in good stead as he had to consult with the large coterie of Germantechnicians, and he was on “24-hour call.” He had every reason to forgetforever his stigmasterol in the hectic few years following. Here was a stupendous pioneer effort to exploit every ingredient of the soybean. . . .In his more than 18 years at Glidden, all these problems were solvedand the Soya Products Division became Glidden’s most profitable singleentity. Soya phosphatides became a large commodity on the market andvirtually a monopoly of Glidden, culminating in Julian’s development of anoil-free granular product stabilized against rancidity, and widely sold todayas “Lecithin Granules,” a good supplement. Glidden’s soya oil became apreferred product. Durkee’s edible emulsifiers opened up a new era inliquid shortening, and Julian found himself one day also Director of Researchfor the Durkee Famous Foods Division of Glidden, an added job, and importantlysoybean meal became an ingredient of nearly all animal feed, poultry feednow containing as much as 35%. One of the most enthusiastic and hardhitting crews ever to man an industrial laboratory in a young enterprisesurrounded him. Names like Levinson, Wilhelm, Engstron, Oberg (now ofCarnation Milk), Karpel, Circle, Bain, Malter, Cole, Meyer, Magnani, Iveson,Herness, Ryden, Printy, and others appeared on the more than 100 patentsapplied for.O’Brien’s protein plant became a reality, with Julian in the early daysfunctioning as engineer, chemist, researcher, and salesman. Today thatplant (now owned by the Central Soya Co.) produces about 40 tons daily,and the protein has a world-wide sale. This remains the world’s first andlargest isolation and production of a relatively pure vegetable protein on amassive scale. And there was no small amount of chemistry involved, theultimate secret being Julian’s laboratory adjustment of the size of the soyaprotein micelle or molecule to fit particular applications, entailing countless electrophoresis and ultracentrifugal studies.But though it took Julian almost 4 years before he could return to hisstigmasterol, the dogged persistence prevailed. Soybean oil contains only20 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRS0.2 of 1% sterols, of which only 18% is stigmasterol—it would take 1000pounds of soybean oil to yield 2 pounds of stigmasterol. Obviously, somuch precious oil could not be destroyed just for this purpose.One day a worker in the plant called Julian, as chief “trouble shooter,”to counsel on what was to be done with a 100,000 gallon tank of “purified”soybean oil into which water had leaked. “The tank,” phoned the worker,“contains a mass of white solid.” Remembering his DePauw experience,Julian was there in a matter of minutes, had the whole tank centrifuged,and came out with an oily mass containing about 15% of mixed soya sterols.A modification of this accidental procedure introduced into the oil refiningsoon found Julian producing 100 pounds of mixed soya sterols daily. Thiswas in 1940, and the value of this daily by-product production, in terms ofthe sex hormones that might be obtained from it, was then about $10,000daily, but who could devise a facile industrial process for producing thesterols, for synthesizing the hormones, and who could possibly use so muchhormone—as much as 5 to 6 pounds daily?Julian, however, was soon ozonizing 100 pounds daily of mixed steroldibromides, the first time that so large an ozonizer had been industriallyemployed for a potentially dangerously explosive reaction. The result: thefemale hormone, Progesterone, was put on the American market in bulkfor the first time, and other sex hormones soon followed.If, at this time, Julian had yielded his innate desire to participatepersonally in research to the administrative duties of being director ofresearch for the Soya Products Division, manager of the Fine ChemicalDivision, and director of research for the Durkee Famous Food Division,he would have been remembered long for his scientific accomplishments.But these responsibilities did not stop this research chemist; instead, dramatic developments in the steroid field stimulated an even greater powerwithin him. In 1948, Hench and Kendall at the Mayo Clinic made theepochal discovery that cortisone, then called Kendall’s Compound E, reversedthe symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis, using cortisone synthesized for thefirst time by Sarett in the Merck Laboratories. Since cortisone is a steroid,Julian reacted quickly. Scarcely had the announcement of the Mayo Clinicbeen made, when Julian published a new synthesis for Reichstein’s SubstanceS, which is also present in the cortex of the adrenal gland and which differsfrom cortisone in lacking only an oxygen atom in position-11. In contrastto the previous synthesis, Julian’s procedure was practical and made Substance S available in commercial quantities. Substance S is still an important commodity, and Julian’s process, which starts with 16-dehydropregnenolone,PERCY LAVON JULIAN 21is probably the most widely used for the production of hydrocortisone. It ismarked by simplicity and high yields; I have been told that yields of 84%are obtainable.In a series of patent applications, Julian reported improved synthesesof a wide variety of substituted Substance S compounds, which in turn canbe converted microbiologically into the corresponding hydrocortisone derivatives. These include 16-Alkyl, 16-Hydroxy, 6-Alkyl and 6-Halogenatedderivatives of Substance S.*These were times of hectic activities, as a letter from Percydated September 28, 1949 attests:As you can no doubt imagine, during the past six months I haveworked an average of fourteen to fifteen hours daily including Saturdaysand Sundays on partial syntheses of cortical steroids. Most of my otherwork has received scant attention during this period, a circumstance whichI must remedy at the earliest possible moment. Our communication on thesynthesis of Reichstein’s Compound S will appear in the October Journal. Gallagher’spublication antedates ours as you have noticed from this month’s Journal.You will also note, however, that he starts with what Fieser would callepipregnanolone (pregnane-3α-ol-20-one) while we begin with the cheapand readily available pregnenolone (5-pregnene-3β-ol-20-one). I presumethat he secured his epipregnanolone from the accumulations from urineextracts. Theoretically it gives him an advantage in that he has somethingof a dress rehearsal for Compound E from desoxycholic acid (which ismore closely related to epipregnanolone than to pregnenolone). Nevertheless, I completed just about a month ago a new procedure for preparingepipregnanolone from pregnenolone so that the former substance wouldbe available in quantity, which is not the case at present. Our same synthesis has been applied to Cortisone, although we are not satisfied at thepresent time with certain phases of this latter synthesis so far as large-scaleproduction is concerned. We have sent out for clinical investigation oversix hundred grams of the three compounds, Compound S, and 4-Pregnene-17α,20β,21-triol-3-one (as wellas its 20α isomer). As you can well realize the production of these compounds in these quantities has been no small job, especially when vigorous*Max Tishler, “Percy Julian, the Scientist,” The Chemist, 42(1965):107-11.22 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSresearch was being prosecuted at the same time in order to clear up yields,and so forth, at every step.Tishler comments:In this course of his intensive steroid study, much new and valuablechemistry has been evolved, including new compounds and new reactions.Thus, in the synthesis of certain 16-Methyl-11-oxygenated corticoids (inwhich Merck has been interested) a valuable intermediate, 11-Keto-16-dehydropregnenolone, was first synthesized and patented by Julian. Hiscelebrated 16,17-Epoxy-steroids have found wide use in steroid chemistry.His facile preparation of 21-Iodo-compounds; his reduction of the latterwith sodium bisulfite; his chromous chloride dehalogenation of halogenated steroids; his reductive Raney Nickel dehalogenation of steroidbromohydrins, leading to new and widely-used methods of producing 17αHydroxy-steroids; his general method for introducing the diacetone sidechain into the steroid molecule; his early use of steroid ketals as protectedcenters within the steroid molecule, leading to his facile synthesis of Reichstein’sSubstance S; his preparation and study of 4,5-epoxy-steroids and their conversion to 4-Halo-derivatives; his variety of steroids containing the diosphenolstructure—these are but some of his “firsts” in the steroid field.*From his association with Glidden to the presidency ofan independent personal venture was a time of work andstrain, as a letter dated July 22, 1957 indicates:In the meantime—during the critical building years of Julian Laboratories, the last three years—I have had to become a businessman and havehad very little time to devote to any researches other than our steroidresearches with various clients, particularly with Smith, Kline and FrenchLaboratories. Now that Julian Laboratories have become a success (foryour confidential information our accountants have just given me our salesfor the first 10 months of our fiscal year ending August 31st, and they showclose to 1.5 million dollars), I am again able to turn back to some of thethings which have interested me, of course, most of my life. I still am farfrom being out of the woods. I need more men badly, among them a goodplant manager and good production superintendent, several research men,two more Ph.D.’s at least and three or four junior assistants, a new personal* Ioffer., pp. 111-12.PERCY LAVON JULIAN 23research assistant, etc, etc. Incidentally, in this connection, I would appreciate it if you know of any young men who might like to join our organization. As you can probably imagine, we have a very ambitious research programgoing on in the steroid field, some of which will, no doubt, be publishedshortly, now that the necessary patents and the necessary protections forour clients have all been cared for. You may also be interested to know thatwe import from our plantations and our factory in Central America, Dioscorearoot, process it into Diosgenin, and into 16-Dehydro-pregnenolone here atJulian Laboratories, and thus have become very competitive, and the fielda bit overcrowded, we have enjoyed a very good business, and are lookingforward to double our sales for the coming year, now that our raw materialsupply is adequate. I hope that in the not-too-distant future, you can visitour laboratories here and see our research and production set-up.Tishler continued:His studies on Yohimbine alkaloids include a facile synthesis of theYohimbine ring skeleton as well as syntheses of Yobyrine, Yobyrone,Tetrahydroyobyrine and Ketoyobyrine. . . . [He synthesized] for the firsttime the elusive Oxindole-Acetic Acid. . . . [He devoted much thought] tothe study of the metabolism of the amino acid Tryptophan in the animalorganism, by synthesizing Oxindole-Alanine and Dioxindole-Alanine, anddemonstrating that the latter is not an intermediate in the conversion ofTryptophan to Kynurenine. . . . his monograph on the Chemistry of Indoles,occupying most of Volume 3 of Heterocyclics, edited by Elderfield, is a classicreference work for students and investigators in this field. . . .The words of an eminent chemist complete my portrait of Julian theScientist: In presenting him for the honorary degree of D.Sc., at the OberlinCommencement in June [1964], Prof. Luke E. Steiner of Oberlin tenderedthe following citation:In these days in which specialization sometimes seems todominate, I have the privilege of presenting a man who illustrates the general usefulness of an educated mind. In sequenceas chemistry teacher, teacher and researcher, researcher andadministrator, and entrepreneur and researcher, Percy Julianjoined several careers through his continuing interest in natural materials from plants.He demonstrated his chemical competence and creative imagination in applied chemistry by securing a number of patents24 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSfor the making of desired substances from the plant products,but he also kept on publishing in pure chemistry an impressiveseries of papers on indoles, sterols and steroids, and conjugatedsystems. Finally, he founded two firms through which he couldapply his scientific knowledge, inventive skill, and judgment torecover large quantities of intermediate substances from soyabeans and other plants and to make from them hormones andother drugs at low cost. We honor him for his humane objectives.*The memorial prayer for the dead begins in the Sephardicrite: “A good name is better than precious oil.” Percy wouldhave smiled at this attempt to associate his worldly successin Glidden’s soybean oil operation with the sum of his qualities that made him a man of virtue, arete (excellence, valor,virtue, manliness, the sum of good qualities that make character), in the old sense, with an aoffering and infectious faithin the old values. His was a concept of life of activity, theAristotelian concept of eudaemonism, with reason formingthe basis of human felicity and little room for hedonismwhere happiness is pleasure. By dwelling on the experienceof his life we enhance our own.Percy Julian the businessman was lovingly praised andcharacterized by Benjamin M. Becker, his lawyer and business counselor since 1945:It is often said that business is rough, tough, ruthless and heartless.Percy, “the man who never gave up” proved the American dream fromobscurity to astounding business greatness, but with a heart. He helpedemployees with personal and financial problems and solved business problems without resorting to endless litigation; he never had a single lawsuitagainst his company. Charity knew no bounds in the hearts of Percy andhis admirable wife Anna. When a new product had been developed and themarketing and pricing was under consideration, Dr. Julian would say: “Well,let’s make it moderate, so that everyone who needs it may get it.” When wediscussed details with a buyer and Percy had made some over-generous*Ioffer., p. 112.PERCY LAVON JULIAN 25offer or concession, when we were alone, he would smile and say: “Ben, Idon’t mind making a profit, but I want them to make one too.” So hiscount was moderated by his compassion.*Percy’s dear friend, the great historian and humanist JohnHope Franklin, in his tribute at the Visitation (wake) preceding the funeral on April 23, 1975, gave moving expression to his admiration for Percy who in 1973 was honored,together with Anna Julian, for bringing to life the LegalDefense and Educational Fund in Chicago. “His wit andcharm and grace made him one of the most ‘clubbable’persons it has ever been my pleasure to know. He verymuch cherished the company of others, and others cherished his company even more, if such was possible.”Percy himself described his role as scholar and humanistin his acceptance address when he received the Chicago AICHonor Scroll. His own words are an eloquent plea that tohis friends and colleagues projects and preserves his memory.His body may be gone, but his spirit lives on in these wordsin which he expresses his apprehension on what AlbertEinstein called our age: “Eine Zeit vollkommener Mittelund verworrener Ziele [A time of perfected methods andconfused aims]”:Where should the Scholar liveIn solitude or in society?In the green stillness of the country,Where he can hear the heart of Nature beat,Or in the dark grey townWhere he can hear and feel?I’ll make the answer for himAnd say: In the dark grey town!H. W. LONGFELLOW*Benjamin Becker, remarks on the occasion of the Tribute to Percy Julian, MacMurrayCollege, May 12, 1972.26 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSAlmost forgotten and seldom quoted today, this prophetic little poemstrikes deep at the heart of the devoted scholar’s worries in this age ofmegaton bombs, short-sighted specialists, panacea thinking, status-quo paralysis,and philosophical void. If Longfellow in his day feared that the obsessionof the scholar with his particular discipline might make him deaf to theanguished cries of humanity for direction and purpose, he most certainlywould be appalled at the detached clichés of over-specialization and lack ofuniversal concern so pronouncedly characteristic of the “educated” men ofour times.If there were a time when we thought that our system of liberal artseducation would guarantee us the safeguard of future generations, trainedin the broad requirements for citizenship in a great democracy, our dreamsseem to have been shattered. There is no shadow of a doubt that theoverpowering motivation—and perhaps the creeping paralysis—in our education today is the development of marketable skills. It is indeed doubtful ifsuch an over-emphasis in an educational system can develop that scholarwho “can hear and feel that throbbing heart of man.” . . .Scientific research projects, some good and some poor, are beingspawned and supported by ample funds in nearly every college and university, large and small. I think the end result will be good for our nation. Myprime concern here is that the scientist, particularly the chemist, recognizes the magnitude of the responsibility resting upon his shoulders whenthe nation entrusts so much of its wealth in his hands. Shall we become, forexample, so deeply immersed in a sea of ‘sense reality’ that we sap thevitality of scholarly probing in the deeper well-springs of human destiny? Isit not our mission, particularly as teachers and even as members of industrial groups, to encourage, participate in where possible, indeed to give ofourselves and our energies something toward creative imagination in theworld of ideas concerning the Whole Man, man searching for that symphony of ideas about himself and human destiny, without which all ourefforts are but feeble ripples upon a turbulent sea of world confusion? . . .Dr. Robert Hutchins warns us that the grave problems facing humanitycannot be entrusted to men of fractional culture (scientists). Indeed, hecalls this fractional culture, pseudo-culture in essence. Father TheodoreHesburgh of Notre Dame, in a Saturday Review article entitled, “Science IsAmoral; Need Scientists Be Amoral Too?,” seriously poses the questionwhether “science and technology are getting out of hand,”PERCY LAVON JULIAN 27Historians of tomorrow may well ask why scientists did notjoin the human race in our time when the opportunities wereso great and the means at hand so magnificent.What does all this mean to you and me of the world of chemistry? Tobegin with, I cannot, and I hope you cannot, accept the blank statementthat “Science is Amoral.” While this may be said of its methodology andspecific aims at a given time, Science is something more than methodologies,symbolisms, and technological devices; it is vastly more than the creation ofmere things; computers and mechanical robots are only incidental by-productsof its spirit of inquiry. Science, like all man’s noble endeavors, involves thewhole personality of those who pursue it. To say flatly that Science is amoralis to separate this man-made discipline from man himself and from thedestiny of man. . . .The challenge to us in the great debate with Humanists is clear. Toomany of us have been satisfied to seek Truth only through the medium ofcertain facets of our discipline. We should have been the strong right armof the humanist, but for the most part, we have not carved a basic socialphilosophy out of our endeavors. And yet where would one find moreappropriate experience for such a philosophy than ours, where we liveamidst the incomparable beauty of Nature’s truth, Nature’s objectivity, Nature’ssolemn and honest justice, Nature’s grand nobility and bigness where nosmallness can prevail in either mind or matter, Nature’s understandingand tolerance where even the lowliest creation—whether it be the bee orthe lilies of the field—performs its functions with dignity and glory, Nature’sunderstanding and delicate balance, where on the one hand microorganismscan bring about the most dreaded disease, and on the other, bequeath tous the wonders of penicillin and aureomycin. The plea of Father Hesburghthat more of us should join the human race has some justification in fact.We must give more of our understanding to those who struggle to reinstatethe majesty of the human will in the conduct of man, even in the utilization of our own hewn-out Truth.Unless we, who know better than most world citizens the horror ofthe mushroom cloud that hangs ominously over us, become active Humanistsin word and in deed, we may well condemn our world to awake some daynever to view again the “green stillness of the country where we can hearthe heart of Nature beat,” but instead to crawl about and gasp for breathon limited terrain, surrounded by lakes and seas of molten lava, representing28 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSthe remnants of that which once we knew as Mother Earth. Then may we insad humility remember the words of the prophet:Behold this beautiful land which the Lord, thy God hath given thee!*I AM DIRECTLY and personally indebted to Mrs. Anna J. Julian, Dr.Julian’s widow; to Joan Bowman, his long-time secretary; to Dr. JosefPikl; to Dr. Edwin Mosettig, Vienna; to Judge Archibald J. Carey;and to Dr. Max Tishler, Wesleyan University, for giving their thoughts,memories, records, and devotion to this obituary. Too many of Percy’sclose friends and collaborators contributed indirectly, and only lackof space, but not lack of gratitude, prevents individual mention.The first Percy L. Julian Memorial Lecture was delivered by WilliamMontague Cobb, the distinguished educator, anthropologist, author,and humanitarian, at DePauw University on April 28, 1977, underthe title, “Onward and Upward.” The second Percy L. Julian Memorial Lecture, “The Humanist as a Chemist,” was given by B. Witkopon May 4, 1978.The magnificent portrait of “Grandpa Cabe” is part of PercyJulian’s “Response” to the tributes paid to him by educators andscientists on the occasion of the dedication of the Percy LavonJulian Laboratory at MacMurray College, May 12-13, 1972.“Percy L. Julian, the Scientist,” was the address delivered byMax Tishler when Percy Julian received the Honor Scroll of theChicago AIC Chapter, November 13, 1964, in Chicago (see The Chemist,42[1965]:105-13). In the same March issue is Percy Julian’s response,“The Chemist as Scholar and Humanist.” (pp. 101-4).W. Montague Cobb set a monument to his lifelong friend inMedical History, 63(1971):143-50; 162 references.*Percy L. Julian, “The Chemist as Scholar and Humanist,” The Chemist, 42:101-4.PERCY LAVON JULIAN 29HONORS AND DISTINCTIONSHONORARY DEGREESD.Sc., DePauw University, 1947D.Sc., Fisk University, November 1947D.Sc., West Virginia State College, 1948D.Sc., Northeastern University, Boston, October 1948D.Sc., Morgan State College, Baltimore, June 1950D.Sc., Howard University, Washington, D.C., June 1951D.Sc., Northwestern University, Evanston, June 1951D.Sc., Lincoln University, Philadelphia, April 1954D.Sc., Roosevelt University, Chicago, September 1961D.Sc., Virginia State College, Petersburg, May 1962D.Sc., Morehouse College, Atlanta, Georgia, June 4, 1963D.Sc., Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio, June 1964LL.D., Lafayette College, Easton, Pennsylvania, September 1968L.H.D., MacMurray College, Jacksonville, Illinois, June 1969D.Sc., Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, June 1969D.Sc., Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, June1972LL.D., Atlanta University, Atlanta, Georgia, May 1973LL.D., Illinois State University, Normal-Bloomington, Illinois, May1974D.Sc., Lincoln University of Missouri, Jefferson City, May 10, 1975(posthumously)ACADEMIC AND CIVIC HONORSSpingarn Medal Award, National Association for the Advancementof Colored People (NAACP), June 27, 1947Distinguished Service Award for 1949-50, Phi Beta KappaAssociation of Chicago Area, December 1949“Chicagoan of the Year” Award, The Chicago Sun-Times and JuniorChamber of Commerce, January 1950The Coveted “Old Gold Goblet” Award, DePauw University, 1951(For Distinguished Service as an Alumnus, given to only onealumnus annually)Centennial Distinguished Citizen Award, Centennial Convocation,Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, December 2, 195130 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRSDistinguished Merit Award for 1950, Decalogue Society of Lawyers,Chicago, March 3, 1951Social Action Churchmanship Award of the CongregationalChristian Churches of New Haven Conference, 1954Jesuit Centennial Award as One of One Hundred OutstandingChicagoans, December 12, 1957Layman of the Year Award, Church Federation of GreaterChicago, April 23, 1964Annual Silver Plaque Award, National Conference of Christiansand Jews, Chicago, May 27, 1965Founder’s Day Award, Loyola University, Chicago, October 31,1967Merit Award of the Chicago Technical Societies Council, Chicago,November 14, 1967Chemical Pioneer Award, American Institute of Chemists, Atlanta,May 11, 1968Citation from the Mennonite Hospital, Bloomington, Illinois forOutstanding Contributions and Services to Mankind,January 24, 1970Elected as a Laureate in the Lincoln Academy, Springfield,Illinois, May 20, 1972MacMurray College’s Chemistry Building named the Percy LavonJulian Hall of Chemistry, May 13, 1972 (Jacksonville,Illinois)Coppin State College’s Percy L. Julian Science Classroom Buildingdedicated May 3, 1968 (Baltimore, Maryland)Illinois State University, Normal, Illinois, Percy Julian Halldedicated October 26, 1975LEARNED SOCIETIESFellow, American Institute of ChemistsFellow, Chemical Society of LondonFellow, New York Academy of ScienceMember, American Chemical SocietyLaureate, Lincoln Academy, Springfield, Illinois, May 20, 1972Member, American Association for the Advancement of ScienceHonorary Member, Illinois State Academy of Sciences, electedApril 19, 1975Member, National Academy of SciencesPERCY LAVON JULIAN 31EDUCATIONAL, RELIGIOUS, AND CIVIC ACTIVITIESMember, Board of Trustees, DePauw University, Greencastle,IndianaMember, Board of Trustees, Roosevelt University, Chicago, IllinoisMember, Board of Directors, Chicago Theological SeminaryMember, Board of Trustees, Southern Union College, Wadley,AlabamaMember, Board of Governors, International House, University ofChicagoMember, Phi Beta Kappa AssociatesMember, Board of Directors, NAACP Legal Defense and EducationalFundVice President, Business Advisory Council of the Chicago UrbanLeagueChairman, Commonwealth Edison Environmental AdvisoryCouncilCo-Chairman, National Negro Business and ProfessionalCommittee of the Legal Defense and Educational FundEmeritus Member, Executive Committee of the Board of Trustees,Howard University, Washington, D.C.Emeritus Member, Board of Trustees, Fisk University, Nashville,TennesseePast Member, Board of Regents, State of Illinois Colleges andUniversitiesExtramural Counselor, National Institute of Arthritis and MetabolicDiseases, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MarylandPast Member, Board of Directors, Fund for the Republic, Centerfor the Study of Democratic InstitutionsRetired Member, Executive Board, Chicago Chapter, NationalConference of Christians and JewsPast President, Phi Beta Kappa Association of Greater ChicagoPast Director, Mental Health Association of Greater ChicagoPast Member, Illinois Advisory Committee, Commission on CivilRightsPast Chairman of the Council for Social Action, CongregationalChristian Churches of America (Now United Church ofChrist)Retired Deacon and Retir
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