Bull. Hist. Chem., VOLUME 25, Number 2 (2000) 73

THE 1999 DEXTER AWARD ADDRESS A PLACE IN HISTORY: WAS LINUS PAULING A REVOLUTIONARY CHEMIST?

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In 1998 the American Chemical Society published the 1975. That poll sought to assess readers' images and 75th anniversary issue of Chemical and Engineering stereotypes of scientists by asking open-ended questions

News (l). In preparation for the anniversary issue, the such as, "When I think of a scientist, I think of ... The journal provided the opportunity for approximately poll received approximately 1600 responses, of which 175,000 ACS members to 119 came from professional nominate their choices for the chemists. Of the scientists, "Top 75 Distinguished Con- past and present, who were tributors to the Chemical Enter- most frequently mentioned prise" since 1923, using a bal- in readers' responses, lot published in the magazine. Pauling's name was the fif- Readers could nominate up to teenth most cited. Others in- twenty people, living or dead, cluded Darwin and Einstein, American or non-American. Galileo, Newton and Pas- teur, and, among contempo- The result was a list of rary scientists, Jacob more than 1,200 individuals, Bronowski, Fred Hoyle, and giving a top-75 group in which Peter Medawar (4). four chemists far outpolled the next 71. The top four were In the Scientist Linus Pauling, Robert B. Wood- poll, professional and popu- ward, Glenn Seaborg, and lar-science readers seem to Wallace Carothers (2). The con- have mentioned Panting, tributions for which Linus like Bronowski and Pauling was cited in the poll Medawar, on the basis of were the nature of the chemical public image and public bond; valence bond theory; fame in the 1970s, whereas concepts of electronegativity, the Chem. Eng. News poll resonance and hybridization; Mary Jo Nye more clearly reflects judg- and the application of structural ments by Pauling's profes- chemistry to biological molecules (3). sional peers in the field of chemistry. Both polls point to a generalization that we hardly need to prove: that A different kind of poll was taken by the British Linus Pauling is perceived both among chemists and journals New Scientist and New Society some twenty among members of the general public as one of the most years earlier, using a questionnaire published in May important figures in twentieth-century science. 74 Bull. Hist. Chem., VOLUME 25, Number 2 (2000)

Yet, we may ask, was Linus Pauling what may be Black for Black's theory of fixed air "that seems to pre- called a revolutionary figure in the history of chemistry, pare a revolution in physics and chemistry (9)." and in the history of science more generally? Is his role The next generations of chemists after Lavoisier in twentieth century science comparable to Galileo in certainly thought of him as a founding father of a new the seventeenth century or Lavoisier in the eighteenth chemistry, but the idea received a new twist from the century or Pasteur in the nineteenth century? What French Alsatian chemist Adolphe Wurtz in 1869, on the makes a revolutionary reputation in science and who de- eve of the Franco-Prussian War. In what became an un- fines it: scientists, historians, or the wider public? The derstandably controversial statement, Wurtz wrote that actors or the observers? "Chemistry is a French science. It was founded by By way of addressing these questions, I will begin Lavoisier, of immortal memory . . . . he was at once the by describing some recent interpretations of the eigh- author of a new theory and the creator of the true method teenth-century Chemical Revolution and its embodiment in chemistry (10)." in the historical figure of Antoine Lavoisier. I then will As France's Third Republic was established in the turn to a discussion of the aims and achievements of mid-1870s, Lavoisier was reclaimed by French scien- Linus Pauling, beginning with his earliest plans and am- tists and politicians as a symbol explicitly of the mod- bitions in the 1920s. I shall conclude by re-opening the ern, moderate, and scientistic French Republic. Lavoisier question of Pauling's place in history, as defined by sci- had been a member of the liberal wing of civil servants entists, historians, and the public. and political activists in the ancien régime. Lavoisier had been a reformist member of Louis XVI's tax-col- Revolutions, Revolutionaries, and Lavoisier lecting agency, the Ferme Générale. He had been an in- novative administrator in charge of the nation's gunpow- In Bernard Cohen's book Revolution in Science, Profes- der Arsenal. He had been an alternate deputy to the States sor Cohen traces the changing meaning of the word General when it convened in 1789 (11). Yet, as a former "revolution," from the sense of "turn" or "return," as in member of the Ferme Générale and a prominent mem- "turn of the wheel" or "turn of Fortune," to the implica- ber of the academic elite, Lavoisier had been personally tion of a historical break and transformation. In the po- disliked and under suspicion by some members of the litical realm, eighteenth century writers used the new Revolutionary Committee. Arrested in 1793, he was meaning of "revolution" in reinterpreting England's re- executed in 1794. Letters removed from his home in- bellion or civil war of 1688 as a "Glorious Revolution," cluded an unsigned letter to Mme. Lavoisier with the and eighteenth-century Frenchmen soon applied the prescient and damning words, if evidence were needed word "revolution" to political events of the 1790s in of disloyalty: "This most beautiful revolution will make France (5). our streams run with blood and plunge us into total an- In the realm of the sciences, Bernard Le Bovier de archy (12)." Fontenelle wrote in the early 1700s of the recent revolu- By fortuitous coincidence, the 1889 centenary com- don in mathematics and mechanics associated with the memoration of the French Revolution was also the cen- name of Isaac Newton (6). More to our immediate con- tenary of the publication of Lavoisier's textbook, the cern, Antoine Baumé wrote in 1773 of a revolution in Elements of Chemistry. Edouard Grimaux, a chemist at chemistry which had begun with the discovery of fixed the Ecole Polytechnique, published a biography of air (7). That same year of Baumé's printed remark, Lavoisier (13), as did Marcellin Berthelot, chemist at Antoine Lavoisier wrote privately in a laboratory note- the College de France and member of the French Sen- book that his work on the fixation and release of airs ate. It was Berthelot who applied the phrase "chemical seemed "destined to bring about a revolution in physics revolution" to Lavoisier's achievements alone, attribut- and in chemistry (8)." At that moment, as Larry Holmes ing to one heroic figure what often had been described has stressed, Lavoisier likely thought of himself as par- as a collective transformation of ideas (14). ticipating in a revolutionary movement begun by oth- ers, not of himself as initiating a revolution. We have By the end of the nineteenth century, then, evidence of Lavoisier's view in a letter of 1774 that he Lavoisier's image had become firmly an image of sci- sent to the Royal Society of Edinburgh, along with a entific hero and political martyr. The latter image only gift of his Opuscules physiques et chymiques. In the enhanced the former one. The iconography of Lavoisier's letter, Lavoisier lauded the "illustrious savant" Joseph memory clearly demonstrates this double image (15). Bull. Hist. Chem., VOLUME 25, Number 2 (2000) 75

It includes sketches of Lavoisier in the laboratory and a on, Pauling rarely had the chemical bond far from his magnificent portrait by Jacques-Louis David of mind. Nor did he relinquish the fascination with mo- Lavoisier and Mme. Lavoisier. There is also a contem- lecular form and structure that first engaged him in a poraneous sketch made of Lavoisier while in prison and course on the crystallography of metals with Samuel a newer dramatic painting of 1876 by L. Langenmantel Graf. This focus on structure and on the chemical bond commemorating became perma- "The Arrest of nent leitmotifs Lavoisier (16)." for Pauling's chemical career. Further, the in- tegration of the sci- During the entific and the politi- summer of 1922 cal revolutions is ab- before entering solutely faithful to graduate school the historical record, at the California as registered in the Institute of Tech- well-known letter nology, Pauling from Lavoisier to worked for the Benjamin Franklin Oregon High- in February of 1790. way eame A "revolution ... has ea Asoia. By taken place in .. . this time, he had human knowledge proposed mar- since your departure riage to Aa from Europe," ee Mie, a Lavoisier wrote to sue i is Franklin, describing "e Aes o aoisie" y . agemae (86. Couesy a cemisy class opposing camps of emissio o Secia Coecios, Uiesiy iaies, Uiesiy o of the previous phlogistonists and esyaia spring. anti-phlogistonists, Pauling's sum- but "having brought you up to date o what is going on mer letters to Aa ee gie isigs io e aims a in chemistry, it would be well to speak to you aou ou ambitions of the young chemical engineering graduate. oiica eouio (." Not surprisingly, he was "anxious to get to California in order to find how long it will take me to get my Ph.D. Linus Pauling and the Remaking of Modern and to see how well I'll get along with really good men Chemistry in the realm of science." Indeed, he wondered whether he might be a "second A.A. Noyes (2." (oyes was I will return to Lavoisier and the eighteenth-cen- ieco o Caecs chemistry division.) At summer's tury chemical revolution, but let me turn now to Linus end, Pauling wrote Ava Helen of his desire to live up to Pauling, the son of a pharmacist, born in Portland, Or- his ambitions and her expectations. He wrote that he egon in 1901. In January 1917 he entered Oregon Agri- aspired to the Nobel Prize, "something which connotes cultural College, where he quickly attracted the atten- a lifetime of unselfish effort, as does the Perkin's [sic] tion of his college instructors, who enlisted him to teach Medal (22)." In later years, a very elderly Pauling freshman- and sophomore-level chemistry courses while penned a note drawing attention to his youthful refer- he was still a student (18). ence to the Nobel Prize. The Perkin Medal, in fact, eluded him (23). While preparing his chemistry lectures in 1920, Pauling ran across Irving Langmuir's papers of 1919 on After he arrived at Caltech in the fall of 1922, the structure of atoms and the new electron theory of Pauling's coursework included thermodynamic chem- valence (19). Langmuir's publications led Pauling back istry with Noyes; statistical mechanics and atomic struc- to the 1916 paper of G. N. Lewis, whose work and per- ture with Richard Chace Tolman; kinetic theory with son he admired for the rest of his life (20). From then Robert Millikan; advanced dynamics with Arnold 76 Bull. Hist. Chem., VOLUME 25, Number 2 (2000)

Sommerfeld's student Paul Epstein; and statistical me- compounds like carbon dioxide, benzene, and methane. chanics and quantum theory with the visiting Austrian He also began writing a series of papers on "The Chemi- theoretical physicist Paul Ehrenfest (24). cal Bond," published during 1931 to 1933, some of the papers being co-authored with Albert Sherman and Pauling wrote Ava Helen of his ambition to "lead George Wheland (30). my classes, except radiation" where he intended merely "to get along." He was ecstatic following his first meet- Pauling and his collaborators at Caltech were by ing with the Physics and Astronomy Club in October no means the only ones working along these lines. 1922. He wrote his fiancée that the clubroom had held Harvard University's John Slater, whom Panting first a collection of physicists who are "the best in the coun- met in Cambridge in 1929, was using the same Heitler- try." Even though he was a new graduate student, fresh London approach, while Robert Mulliken was taking from Corvallis, Pauling bragged to Ava Helen that he up the strategy of Friedrich Hund and Erich Hückel for "argued a moment with Tolman and thus felt puffed up assuming that electrons of the outer shells of atoms can (25)." Ambitious and conscious of his ambition, Palling move in molecular orbitals spanning an array of atoms moved ahead in his studies. as a whole, rather than behaving as single electrons or- biting one atomic nucleus alone (31). They all were Pauling's first paper with Roscoe Dickinson ap- devising methods for creation of a new mathematical peared in 1923, on the structure of the mineral molyb- chemistry. But Pauling's first paper in the "Chemical denite (MoS 2). In the next three years, Pauling authored Bond" series was pathbreaking William Lipscomb later or co-authored a dozen crystal-structure publications said, simply, that this paper "changed chemistry (32)." (26). His 1926 application for a Guggenheim Founda- tion Fellowship focused on something different, how- In July 1935 Pauling and E. Bright Wilson, Jr. com- ever. Pauling aimed to take up Professor Sommerfeld's pleted the highly technical Intrdtn t Qnt M challenge for (27): hn th Appltn t Chtr. The claims they wokig ou a comee ooogy o e ieio o make at the beginning of the rigorously mathematical e aom a, eyo is, a sysem o maemaica book are modest, but profound (33): cemisy, a is, oe wic wi e us e eac e suec o quaum mecaics cosiues e osiio o e eecos i e aomic eeoe a mos ece se i e ey o seac o e ge ow is quaiies e aom o om moecues a o ea aws goeig e moio o mae. . . . i is ee io cemica comous. ow eaie a e comiig owe o aoms a, He wanted to take part in a new reductionist and math- i ac, a e cemica oeies o aoms a mo ematical program for chemistry. ecues ae eicae i ems o e aws goeig e moios o e eecos a ucei comosig Returning in late 1927 from eighteen months in em. Munich, Copenhagen, and Zurich, Pauling became an While the Intrdtn t Qnt Mhn is highly assistant professor in theoretical chemistry. He published mathematical, Pauling's tr f th Chl nd an explanation in Chl v of Walter Heitler nd th Strtr f Mll nd Crtl is not. This and Fritz London's application of quantum mechanics book is based on lectures he gave at Cornell University, to the hydrogen molecule, as well as treatments of the and it first appeared in 1939. Here Pauling laid out in a hydrogen molecular ion by Oyvind Burrau and Friedrich largely nonmathematical way the theory of the electron Hund (28. y 1928 Pauling had begun to sketch out valence-bond, including the concept of resonance in con- his own novel ideas for theoretical treatment of the jugated molecules, linking the theory of the chemical chemical bonds for methane. The notion was to do away bond to explanations of molecular structure. with the distinction between 2s and 2p energy sublevels for the four shared electron-pair bonds in methane, in Like Lavoisier's textbook on Elnt f Ch order to get the identical tetrahedral valences of the car- tr, Pauling's textbook on h Chl nd changed bon atom (2. the way scientists thought about chemistry, presenting chemistry as a disciplinary field unified by an underly- Pauling lectured at Berkeley and Caltech during ing theory. By demonstrating how the characteristics 1929 to 1934, developing for students and faculty the of the chemical bond determined the structure of mol- notion of "changed quantization" of electron energy lev- ecules and how the structure of molecules determined els in the carbon atom and setting up wave functions to their properties, Pauling showed for the first time, as represent classical valence, or electron-pair bonds, in Max Perutz said, "that chemistry could be understood

Bull. Hist. Chem., VOLUME 25, Number 2 (2000) 77

rather than being memorized (34)." In a fiftieth anni- and his collaborators in studying the structures of versary tribute to Pauling's Chemical Bond in 1989, polypeptides, proteins, and other molecules, including, Eugene Garfield noted that this fifty-year old scientific by the early 1950s, DNA. The models were designed book ranked in the top ten scientific publications cited by Pauling, Robert Corey, Verner Schomaker, and J. H. in the ISI database since 1945, and that it ranked among Sturdivant (42). the top five most cited books. Remarkably, in the year As has often been recounted in histories of the DNA 1988 alone, The Chemical Bond received over 600 cita- "double helix," news circulated at Caltech in 1951 that tions, while only around 30 publications received 60 or Pauling's team was constructing protein models precise more citations (35). This is an extraordinary record for to the finest details. There are several accounts of any scientific book. Pauling's dramatic announcement of the protein struc- Pauling pioneered the use of drawings and diagrams in chemical textbooks. His innovations can be seen in the first versions of a general chemistry textbook which Pauling began making available in 1941 to freshmen at Caltech as a lithographed volume. Pauling's General Chemistry, finally published by William Freeman in 1947, included a profusion of illustrations ranging from X-ray and electron-diffraction photographs, to graphi- cal constructions of atoms and molecules, to cartoon- like pictures of electron densities drawn as fuzzy orbital clouds around central atoms. The pictures were designed by the professional artist and licensed architect Roger Hayward, who began making illustrations for Pauling's lectures as early as 1933 (36). There is yet another way in which Pauling helped transform chemistry in the late 1930s and 1940s. In the fall of 1938 Pauling initiated correspondence with Jo- seph Hirschfelder about the usefulness of three-dimen- sional molecular models for teaching and research: the so-called "space-filling" models (37). As Eric Francoeur has noted, the German chemist H. A. Stuart had begun ius auig wi aaei moe o oei, cica . om e Aa ee a ius auig aes, designing this new kind of molecular model in 1934 (38). Secia Coecios, Oego Sae Uiesiy. Hirschfelder and Pauling corresponded about the diam- eters to be used for representation of the atoms, partly ture to a packed lecture room at Caltech in 1951. These on the basis of Pauling's work with Lawrence Brockway accounts, like other on-the-spot descriptions of Pauling's on covalent radii and bond-angle values from electron lectures, helped create at the time a powerful image of diffraction studies of carbon compounds (39). By 1939 Pauling as master strategist of molecular structure, a the Fischer Scientific Company was selling kits of the presumption that James Watson, for example, acknowl- models, with advertisements suggesting their use not edged in describing his and Francis Crick's success in only for studying spatial relationships and steric hin- 1953 in solving the DNA structure by using Pauling's drance, but also for testing hypotheses about molecular methods (43): structure (40). We cou ... see o easo wy we sou o soe By this time Pauling's research was moving away A i e same way. from further technical development of quantum chem- At Caltech in the spring of 1951, Pauling entered the istry and toward the study of the structure and function biology lecture room flanked by assistants carrying, of large, biologically significant molecules, by use of among other things, something tall wrapped in cloth and both physical methods of instrumentation and chemical bound with string, like a piece of statuary. Everyone methods of modeling (41). By the late 1940s Pauling's knew that this was "the Model." In Tom Hager's ac- chemistry laboratory was making space-filling models, count (44): as well as other molecular models, for the use of Pauling 8 u. is. Cem., OUME 2, ume 2 (2000

He held up a child's set of soft plastic pop-beads and ages quie is cowokes, eigos, a Caec snapped them together to show how amino acids con- amiisaos, ookig oug is Caec esoe nected. After a suitable introduction, he started mov- ie o eec ay sigs a auig was a commuis ing toward the Model . . . [and] unveiled it with a symaie (48. e eoeica cemis wose eso grand flourish: a beautiful, multicolored model of ace eoy o cemica oig was ue aack y his tight spiral, the alpha helix. It was the first time many in the audience had seen a space-filling mol- Soie ieoogiss ow ou imse susece o com ecule.... It looked 'real,' .... it had depth and weight muis symaies. Ceae o ay wogoig y a and density, a kind of visual impact that no other Caec commiee i eceme 0, auig was e model had ever approached. ie a US asso i 2, eeig is aeig a A Seeme issue o f magaie caie a age oya Sociey iscussio o oeis. is asso was ooga o a giig auig oiig o is sace esoe, e eie agai (4. We eos came iig moe o e aa ei, wi e eaie ou i e sig o 4 o aiaio oisoig o aa "Cemiss Soe a Gea Mysey"—esumay e ese iseme oowig e US eosio o a yo mysey o ie (4. ge om a ikii Ao, auig coece e o em o aiaio oisoig a geeic amage om Linus Pauling and Matters of Politics aou o is ow ece eseac ieess i A a uceic acis as caies o ieie caaceisics, i cuig muaios i gees (0. iscussios wi i Aoug f magaie a a ioiig aiue oogis ay Commoe a ysicis Ewa Coo owa auig i , is iew wou cage i e esue i e iea o a wie wowie aea o a couse o e e ecae. I , f aise e a o e esig o ucea weaos. I eay 8, accomismes o auig, wo wou eceie e ius a Aa ee auig esee a eiio wi oe ie i Cemisy i 4. f eios aso ,000 sigaues o ag ammasko a e Uie eesse symay i wi e cemis auig aios. I esose, f magaie caie a egaie wose eoy o cemica esoace was cuey a soy aou auig, igigig ciicism om ysi suec o iiicaio om Soie "oicias" o is a cis Ewa ee a a aays Ae ae a ege ougeois ieaism (46. owee, y 62 i was "e wowie aou is as ageous o uma ea f eios emsees wo wee as eig oe ouce oe iiyig ius auig. Wa a weig (." ee a ee? auig a ecome a o auig eae eac oe i iica igue. oowig Wo Wa ie coeage o KQE ee II, auig, ike may scieiic isio i Sa acisco, wi coeagues, oie ogaiaios o cea esouio o eci cocee wi aomicsciece a ca issues o iewes (2. y aomicom issues. e gae i 60 e Seae Iea Se ie aks mosy o oca Caio cuiy Commiee, wic a ia gous, icuig a ewig ae auig a eow a ogaiaio o aiss a ieec ee i 6, suoeae im uas i oywoo a ecame a o eai ossie commuis age o e ouse uAmeica ioeme i e ucea Aciiies Commiees iesiga es a moeme (. io o commuism i e moio icue iusy (4. I e a o 6, we i was aouce a ius I ae 4 a aoymous auig wou eceie e meme o e Ameica Cemica 62 oe eace ie, f Sociey coace e eea u magaie, cayig e e eau o Iesigaio (I wi aoiay eaie "A Wei coces aou e oiica iews Isu om oway," sae o e Socieys ew esieeec. Linus Pauling with a model of the sulfanilamide a e imie esa eay I 48, wie auig was o a molecule, circa 1954. From the Ava Helen and a oig wasoee o o isiig aoime i Oo, I Linus Pauling Papers, Special Collections, Oregon State University. Bull. Hist. Chem., VOLUME 25, Number 2 (2000) 79

with Pauling or the 1958 petition to the UN (54). Pauling, as we have seen, Pauling did not set out to ini- Caltech's president, Lee Dubridge, praised Pauling's iae a revolution in science, but he was eager to partici- efforts for peace but publicly noted that many people in pate in the newest front of scientific advance. There Pasadena and the scientific community had disapproved was no crisis in chemistry in Pauling's youth, but there of his methods. Pauling resigned from Caltech (55). were puzzles and anomalies to be solved, for example, in understanding the bond structure of methane and ben- In the last decades of his life, Pauling's concerns zene, and the length and energy of aromatic and conju- with genetics, molecular structure, and medical chem- gated bonds. The application of quantum mechanics to istry once again propelled him into the public limelight chemical electron bonds was an exciting new frontier, as he began to use his fame in a public campaign to and Pauling and others succeeded in constructing a math- establish Vitamin C as a cure for the common cold and, ematical quantum chemistry rather quickly from the late in huge doses, for cancer. Controversy over the merits 1920s to the mid-1930s. Pauling, more than some of of vitamins and other anti-oxidants in the treatment of his colleagues, was concerned to integrate these results cancer embroiled Pauling with members of the Mayo with both the theoretical assumptions of classical or- Clinic and the broader medical community (56). Pauling ganic structure theory and the empirical applications of began to sound like a latter-day Anton Mesmer, fight- new physical instruments, like X-ray diffraction. Like ing an entrenched medical and academic elite for the Lavoisier, Pauling's work ranged broadly across phys- benefit of the public citizenry (57). His opponents, he ics and chemistry, chemical and physical methods, math- charged, feared "monetary losses that would be inflicted ematical and visual explanations, and biological and on pharmaceutical manufacturers, professional journals, physical chemistry (61). and doctors themselves" if the value of Vitamin C therapy were admitted (58). Pauling now spoke of a Like Lavoisier, too, Pauling saw clearly that the new revolutionary age, saying that scientists should be radi- chemistry he was helping to construct required a new cals and not conservatives in their service to humanity language, new representations, and new textbooks. New (59). principles had to be laid out at the beginning of chemi- cal education, namely the principle of the electron-va- Sntf vltn nd Sntf lence bond, including concepts of electronegativity, reso- vltnr nance and hybridization, and the principle of spatial ar- chitecture, with bonds, atoms, and molecules laid out As is well-known, Thomas Kuhn's analysis of The precisely in three-dimensional space. Structure of Scientific Revolutions insists upon puzzle- The General Chemistry, like The Chemical Bond, solving as an ordinary activity among scientists. defined a new chemistry, just as assuredly as did the Anomaly and crisis, followed by invention of a new para- molecular models and model-building techniques asso- digm or a new textbook tradition, are essential features ciated with Pauling's name. By the 1960s, the high of scientific revolution. Not everyone has agreed with school chemistry curriculum in the United States was Kuhn. In fact, most everyone has disagreed with some based on the chemical bond approach (CBA) of the 1959 aspect or another of Kuhn's analysis, often by way of high-school textbook Chemical Systems (62). The CPK, emphasizing histories of science as histories that are or Corey-Pauling Space Filling Models with Improved gradual transformations of ideas and disciplines rather Koltun Connectors, became as common in chemical than catastrophic ruptures with the past (60). Still there classrooms and laboratories as the periodic table (63). are markers of scientific change that seem to be a mat- As Hoffmann and Woodward wrote in Science in 1970, ter of common agreement among scientists and histori- a "revolution" had occurred "in our image of what mol- ans. New languages are invented, new textbooks are ecules really look like and what we can conceive of them written, and new theories are superimposed on old theo- doing or not doing in the course of a chemical reaction ries, either ruling them out entirely, or limiting their (64)." applicability. New ways of seeing the world emerge. By and large, the terminology of "revolution", like the ter- An irony at the end of Pauling's career, as at the minology of "tradition," is common and ubiquitous end of Lavoisier's career, was the way in which politi- among scientists and historians. cal events turned him into a public figure about whom very strong emotions and judgments were elicited from What conclusions can be drawn in considering the both scientific colleagues and members of the body poli- legacies of Pauling and Lavoisier? In the case of Linus 80 Bull. Hist. Chem., VOLUME 25, Number 2 (2000) tic. In each case, the man's heroic status as scientist ig ois i e eeome o moe sciece, is a made him all the more controversial and, in the end, all guay aso e es eame we ae o a cassic eo the more visible as public figure and political victim. uio i sciece." A. ooa, "Ioucio," i "e The political turns in Pauling's life, like Lavoisier's, were Cemica eouio: Essays i_eieeaio," Osiris, 2 seies, 1988, 4, 2. partly of his own making. The accusations of patriotic 8. Quoe i . McKie, Antoine Lavoisier: Scientist, disloyalty were patently false, but allegations about in- Economist, Social Reformer, ey Scuma, ew Yok, tellectual arrogance and imprudent judgment were some- 2, 0 aso e. , 20. times fair enough. With Pauling, as with Lavoisier, his . See . . omes, Antoine Lavoisier—The Next Crucial long-term reputation as a revolutionary figure rests partly Year or The Sources of His Quantitative Method in Chem- in the political dimensions of his life, which set him apart istry, iceo Uiesiy ess, iceo, , 8. from many other scientists. Yet these political dimen- 0. A. Wu, A History of Chemical Theory, as. y . sions attract attention largely because his reputation as Was, Macmia uisig, oo, 86, . Aa a great scientist had already been well established. ocke agues a Wus emaks wee iece moe Pauling's place in history is firm. Whether he will be a is ow ec ias a a Gema oes. A. . ocke, The Quiet Revolution: Hermann Kolbe and the regarded as a revolutionary figure of twentieth-century Science of Organic Chemistry, Uiesiy o Caioia chemistry at the end of the twenty-first century is a mat- ess, ekeey, CA, , 46. ter that future generations of scientists and historians . A. ooa, Antoine Lavoisier: Science, Administra- will decide. tion, and Revolution, ackwe, Oo, as we as . . oiie, Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, ygmaio, ACKOWEGME ais, a e. 8. 2. e ees a e ees ae iscusse i e. 8, I am grateful to Clifford Mead, Head of Special 64. . E. Gimau, Lavoisier 1743-1794 d'après sa Collections at Oregon State University Libraries, for correspondance, ses manuscrits, ses papiers de famille permission to publish materials from the Ava Helen and et d'autres documents inédits, Aca, ais, 888. Linus Pauling Papers. Thanks, too, to D. Erik Ellis and Gimau use maeias om aoisies coece J. Christopher Jolly for research assistance and to Rob- Oeuvres, wic wee eig uise y e ec ert A. Nye for a critical reading of the preliminary draft goeme: A. aoisie, Oeuvres de Lavoisier publiées of my Dexter Award Lecture. par les coins de son Excellence le Ministre de l'Instruction Publique et des Cultes, .. umas a EEECES A OES E. Gimau, E., ais, 8628, 6 o. 4. M. eeo, La Révolution chimique—Lavoiser, Aca, 1. Chemical and Engineering News is aeae as e ais, 80. O is, see . . omes, Eighteenth-Cen- ews Eiio o Industrial and Engineering Chemistry tury Chemistry as an Investigative Enterprise, Oice o o auay 0, 2. See M. acos a . M. aum, e isoy o Sciece a ecoogy, ekeey, CA, "Eios age," Chem. Eng. News, auay 2, 8, 8, 2 aso, . esaueice, Lavoisier: 76, . Mémoires d'une révolution, ammaio, ais, , 2. "Coiuos o e Cemica Éeise: C&Es o 48 a . esaueice a I. Seges, A 75," Chem. Eng. News, auay 2, 8, 6, 8, History of Chemistry, as. y . a am, aa o . Uiesiy ess, Camige, MA, 6, 86, 0. . e. 2, 8. . O memoy a commemoaios, see . 4. . is a M. Sais, "Scieiss a ei Images," esaueice, "ewee isoy a Memoy: Ceeia a New Scientist, Augus 2, , 44 (4. I o iceeia Images o aoisie," Isis, 1996, 87, 48 e, om o : Acimees, e icioa "o. 4. aesawm," oowski, Maie Cuie, awi, 6. 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