Perkin, William Henry

William Henry Perkin

British chemist Sir William Henry Perkin (1838–1907) created the first synthetic dye (aniline purple, or mauveine) in 1856. Recognizing its commercial potential, he patented his discovery and set about manufacturing it. Perkin's continued research went on to find other aniline dye colors and synthetic scents. His findings lent newfound respectability to the field of chemistry and proved invaluable to medical research as well.

Early Life and Education

Perkin was born on March 12, 1838, in London, England. His father was a builder, and the family lived in fairly prosperous circumstances in an otherwise rather disreputable neighborhood in London's East End. As a boy, Perkin's innate curiosity prompted early interests in the arts, sciences, photography, and engineering. But it was a chance stumbling upon a run–down, yet functional, laboratory in his late grandfather's home that solidified the young man's ardor for chemistry.

As a student at the City of London School, Perkin became immersed in the study of chemistry. His talent and devotion to the subject were perceived by Perkin's teacher, Thomas Hall, who encouraged him to attend a series of lectures given by eminent scientist Michael Faraday at the Royal Institution. Those speeches fired the young chemist's enthusiasm further, and he became determined to attend the Royal College of Chemistry. Perkin's father balked at first, hoping to convince his bright young son to follow his older brother's footsteps into the more respectable field of architecture, but pressure from Hall and the wishes of his son won out. Perkin entered the Royal College of Chemistry in 1953, at the age of 15.

At the time of Perkin's enrollment, the Royal College of Chemistry was headed by noted German chemist August Wilhelm Hofmann. Perkin's scientific gifts soon caught Hofmann's attention, and within two years, he became Hofmann's youngest assistant. Not long after that, Perkins made the discovery that would render him both famous and wealthy.

First Synthetic Dye Created by Accident

In 1856, quinine was the only viable medical treatment for malaria. Derived from the bark of the cinchona tree native to South America, demand for the drug was surpassing the available supply. (Not incidentally, England was also still embroiled in the Crimean War at the time). Thus, when Hofmann made some passing comments about the desirability of a synthetic substitute for quinine, it is unsurprising that his star pupil was moved to take up the challenge.

During his Easter vacation from school in 1856, Perkin spent his time in the laboratory on the top floor of his family's house. He was attempting to manufacture quinine from aniline, an inexpensive and readily available coal tar waste product. Despite his best efforts, however, he did not end up with quinine. Instead, he produced a mysterious dark sludge. Luckily, Perkin's scientific training and nature prompted him to investigate the substance further. Incorporating potassium dichromate and alcohol into the aniline at various stages of the experimental process, he finally happened upon a deep purple solution. And proving the truth of famed scientist Louis Pasteur's words, "chance favors only the prepared mind," Perkin saw the potential of his unexpected find.

Historically, textile dyes were made from such natural sources as lichens, mollusks, bat guano, and Madder root. Some of these, such as guano, were unappealing on principle; others, such as the glandular mucus of snails, were difficult to obtain and outrageously expensive. Indeed, the purple color extracted from snails was once so dear that only the very highest echelons of society could afford it. Further, natural dyes tended to be muddy in hue and fade quickly. It was against this backdrop that Perkin's discovery was made.

Perkin quickly grasped that his purple solution could be used to color fabric, thus making it the world's first synthetic dye. Just as rapidly realizing the significance of this breakthrough, he lost no time in patenting it. But perhaps the most fascinating of all Perkin's reactions to his find was his nearly instant recognition of the commercial possibilities the new dye presented.

Mauve's Debut

Perkin originally named his dye Tyrian Purple (also called aniline purple and mauveine), but it later became commonly known as mauve (from the French for the plant used to make the color violet). He asked advice of Scottish dye works owner Robert Pullar, who assured Perkin that manufacturing the dye would be well worth it if the color remained fast and the cost was not prohibitive. So, over the fierce objections of his mentor, Hofmann (who saw his student as "selling out"), Perkin left college to give birth to the modern chemical industry. He was only eighteen years old.

With the help of his father and brother, Perkin set up a factory on a six–acre site near the Grand Union Canal in Greenford Green, not far from London. Utilizing the cheap and plentiful coal tar that was an almost unlimited byproduct of London's gas street lighting, the dye works began producing the world's first synthetically dyed material in 1857. Already historic in its very founding, the company received an unexpected commercial boost from the Empress Eugenie of France when she decided the new color flattered her. In short order, mauve was the necessary shade for all the fashionable ladies of France. Not to be outdone, England's Queen Victoria also appeared in public wearing a mauve gown, thus making it the rage of England as well. The dye was bold and fast, and the public clamored for more. Perkins went back to the drawing board.

Other Achievements and Awards

Although Perkin's fame was achieved and fortune assured by his first discovery, the chemist continued his research. Among the other dyes he developed and introduced were aniline red (1859), aniline black (1863), and alkalate magenta (1864). In the late 1860s, Britannia Violet and Perkin's Green were added to the line. Then, in 1869, Perkin succeeded in improving on the work of German chemists Carl Graebe and Carl Liebermann by synthesizing a commercially viable version of alizarin (the Germans' process having been too expensive to be feasible), the vibrant red shade previously derived from the Madder root. By the 1870s, however, Germany had begun to pull ahead in the dye industry and Perkin's fertile mind was moving in other directions. In 1874, he sold the factory to Brooke, Simpson, and Spiller and retired from the chemical manufacturing business at the age of 36. It is important to note that Perkin's synthetic dye discoveries had ramifications far beyond the merely decorative. The dyes also became vital to medical research in many ways. For instance, they were used to stain previously invisible microbes and bacteria, allowing researchers to identify such bacilli as tuberculosis, cholera, and anthrax.

After Perkin's retirement from the industry he helped create, he discovered a way to change the structure of organic compounds on a molecular level, which method came to be known as the "Perkin synthesis." Using this technique, he began to create synthetic perfume and fragrances and, with partner B.F. Duppa, started another career in simulated scents. Perkin also spent time researching more serious matters, studying, for instance, the relationship between chemical constitution and rotation of the plane of polarization in a magnetic field. The result of that research was his articulation of a law that described the variation of the investigated rotation in bodies belonging to homologous series, and eventually won him a Davy Medal from the Royal Society in 1889.

Perkin remained active in his field in other ways, such as being secretary of the Chemical Society in 1869, and president in 1883. He also sat on the boards of several scientific journals. His many accolades (in addition to the Davy Medal) include the Royal Medal of the Royal Society in 1879, the Longstaff Medal of the Chemical Society in 1889, and the Albert Medal of the Society of Arts in 1890. In 1906, there was an international celebration of Perkin's mauve discovery, during which he traveled to the United States. There, he was awarded the inaugural SCI Perkin Medal, an honor that came to be regarded as the highest possible in the American chemical industry. The medal was largely in recognition of scientific research as the key to industrial innovation, so it was hardly surprising that it bore Perkin's name or that he was its first recipient. That same year, Perkin was also knighted back home for his contributions to science, industry, and his country.

For all his unprecedented innovations, accolades, and ongoing curiosity, however, Perkin remained an unassuming man who shunned the limelight. Churchgoing and unpretentious, he was perhaps too quick to give credit where it was not in fact due. Nonetheless, he had captured the attention and imagination of the world. Nearly a century and a half after Perkin's discovery, Arnold Thackray, president of the Chemical Heritage Foundation, summarized the great chemist's contributions in Chemical & Engineering News. "In the spring of 1856, 18–year–old William Henry Perkin was in his lab attempting to synthesize quinine. Instead, he created the first synthetic dyestuff: aniline purple, or mauve. Realizing the significance of what he had done, Perkin moved quickly to patent his invention and to establish its commercial possibilities. Not only that, but he risked the family fortune to set up a manufacturing plant, and all the while continued his seminal research."

Perkin died on July 14, 1907, in Sudbury, England. His astounding legacy lived on through his son and namesake, who followed in his father's footsteps through the City of London School and the Royal College of Science. The younger Perkin went on to study in Germany before becoming a professor of chemistry at the Heriot–Watt College in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1887 and then professor of organic chemistry at Owens College in Manchester, England in 1892. Like his father before him, he won the Davy Medal from the Royal Society (1904), just three years before the man who discovered both a substance and an industry passed away.

Books

World of Chemistry, 2 vols., Gale Group, 1999.

Online

"Color Me with Good Fortune," Molecular Interventions, http://molinterv.aspetjournals.org/cgi/content/full/2/3/186 (January 5, 2005).

"Innovation Day," Chemical & Engineering News, http://pubs.acs.org/cen/editor/print/8237edit.html (September 13, 2004).

"Mauveine: The First Industrial Organic Fine–Chemical," Imperial College London, Chemistry Department, http://www.ch.ic.ac.uk/perkin.html (January 4, 2005).

"Mauve's the Word," Scarlet Pixel, http://www.scarletpixel.com/zoct00.html (January 5, 2005).

"Perkin, Sir William Henry," infoplease, http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/people/A0838455.html (January 4, 2005).

"Polymers & Serendipity Case Studies," Bakken Library and Museum, http://www.thebakken.org/education/SciMathMN/polymers-serendipity/polymer1.htm#Dyes (January 5, 2005).

"Sir William Henry Perkin," LoveToKnow 1911 Online Encyclopedia, http://48.1911encyclopedia.org/P/PE/PERKIN–SIR–WILLIAM–HENRY.htm (January 4, 2004).

"William Henry Perkin," Chandler Chemical Museum, http://www.mcah.columbia.edu/chandler–museum/perkin.html (January 5, 2005).

"William Henry Perkin," Chemical Heritage Foundation, http://www.chemheritage.org/EducationalServices/chemach/cssb/whp.html (January 4, 2005).

"William Henry Perkin (1838–1907)," Yale University, http://classes.yale.edu/chem220a/studyaids/history/chemists/perkin.html (January 4, 2005).