Babcock, Stephen Moulton

Babcock, Stephen Moulton

(b. Bridgewater, New York, 22 October 1843; d. Madison, Wisconsin, 1 July 1931)

agricultural chemistry.

Babcock, the son of Pelig and Mary Scott Babcock, received the B.A. from Tufts College in 1866. His engineering studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute were cut short when he had to manage the family farm after his father’s death. However, he was soon taking chemistry courses at Cornell University, and in 1875 was made an instructor in the subject. In 1877 Babcock began graduate studies at the University of Göttingen under Hans Hübner, receiving the Ph.D. in 1879. He resumed his instructorship at Cornell in 1881 but left in 1882 to become chief chemist at the New York Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva. He moved to an equivalent position at the Wisconsin Agricultural Experiment Station in 1888 and was also appointed professor of agricultural chemistry at the University of Wisconsin. Both positions were held until his retirement as emeritus professor in 1913. He married May Crandall in 1896.

Babcock is best known for his test for butterfat in milk, introduced in 1890. By using sulfuric acid to release the fat from its normal suspension and centrifuging and diluting, it was possible to measure directly the percentage of fat by observing it in the neck of a specially designed test bottle. The simplicity of the test permitted its use by persons without scientific training. Its use altered the economics of dairying and stimulated growth of the dairy industry.

With the bacteriologist Harry L. Russell, Babcock developed the process for cold curing of cheese in 1900. The great improvement in the quality of cheese led to wide acceptance of the process in the dairy industry.

Babcock’s most important contribution arose from his skepticism regarding the biological equivalency of chemically similar feeds from different crops. In 1907 four of his younger associates—E.B. Hart, E.V. McCollum, H. Steenbock, and G. Humphrey began a cattle-feeding experiment using chemically equivalent rations, each derived from a different plant. The experiment not only confirmed Babcock’s skepticism but led to studies that helped develop the vitamin concept.

Babcock also studied metabolic water in insects and, in his later years, sought to investigate the structure of matter and its relation to energy.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

I. Original Works. Babcock had an aversion to writing and published very little. Most of his work is described in bulletins and annual reports of the New York and Wisconsin Agricultural Experiment Stations. The fat test was originally published as “A New Method for the Estimation of Fat in Milk, Especially Adapted to Creameries and Cheese Factories,” in Bulletin of the University of Wisconsin Experiment Station, no.24 (July 1890). The studies with H.L. Russell on cold curing of cheese appeared in Bulletin, no.94(1902). Research Bulletin no. 22 (1912) is entitled Metabolic Water: Its Production and Role in Vital phenomena. The single-grain feeding experiments, under the authorship of E.B. Hart, E.V. McCollum, H. Steenbock, and G. Humphrey, are reported in Research Bulletin no.17 (1911).

Babcock’s unpublished papers are held by the State Historical Society of Wisconsin.

II. Secondary Literature. Paul de Kruif has a perceptive biographical sketch of Babcock in Hunger Fighters (New York, 1928), ch.9; and Aaron J. Ihde has a short sketch in Eduard Farber, ed., Famous Chemists (New York, 1961), pp. 808–808, with a bibliography of other biographical sketches on pp.828–828. The history of the fat test is described by J.L. Sammis, The Story of the Babcock Test, Circular 172, Extension Services of the College of Agriculture, University of Wisconsin (Madison, 1924).

Aaron J. Ihde