Science
Born: 1/17/1924
Birthplace: Chicago, Ill.
Jewel Plummer Cobb has had wide-ranging influence in the sciences. Awarded a Ph.D. in cell physiology from New York University in 1950, she has served as a researcher, a college professor and administrator, as well as a staunch supporter for greater minority participation in scientific careers. Much of Cobb’s research has been focused on the skin pigment melanin, and her most significant research has been with testing new chemotherapeutic drugs in cancer cells, the impact of which continues. She has held several teaching and administrative positions at major universities. From 1960 to 1969, she was a professor at Sarah Lawrence College. From 1969 to 1976 she served as Dean and Professor of Zoology at Connecticut College. From 1976 to 1981, Cobb served as Dean and Professor of Biology at Douglass College, the women’s college at Rutgers University. From 1981 to 1990 Cobb was President of California State University at Fullerton where she spearheaded efforts to increase the quality and diversity of both the student population and the faculty. A supporter of equal access to educational and professional opportunity, Cobb has written often about racial and sexual discrimination in the sciences, and has raised funds to allow more minorities to enter into the field. Since her retirement, Cobb, who was named President and Professor of Biological Science, Emerita at California State University at Fullerton and Trustee Professor at California State University at Los Angeles, has continued her research.
Science
1914 – 1995
As chair of the Department of Physics at Howard University, Herman Branson helped the scientific community gain new insight into organic molecules and biological systems. His collaboration with Robert B. Corey and Nobel laureate Linus B. Pauling led to the identification of the alpha and gamma helical structures of proteins. An innovative researcher, Branson formed cross-disciplinary research teams of physicians, engineers, mathematicians, biologists, chemists, and physicists to facilitate study. After more than two decades of trailblazing research, Branson went on to serve as president at two historically black colleges, Central State University in Ohio (1968-1970) and Lincoln University in Pennsylvania (1970-1985).
Science
Dr. Bernard Harris, Astronaut, Physician, and Businessman. After receiving his diploma from Sam Houston High School in San Antonio, Texas, Dr. Harris began his formal education by earning a Bachelor of Science in Biology from the University of Houston. He obtained his Doctorate of Medicine from Texas Tech University School of Medicine in 1982, and completed a Residency in Internal Medicine at the Mayo Clinic in 1985. In addition, Dr. Harris completed a National Research Council Fellowship in Endocrinology at the NASA Ames Research Center in 1987, and trained as a Flight Surgeon at the Aerospace School of Medicine, Brooks Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas in 1988. In 1996, he received a Master of Medical Science from the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston and received an Honorary Doctorate of Science from Morehouse School of Medicine. Dr. Harris earned a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the University of Houston in 1999. While working on his fellowship at the Ames Research Center in 1986, Dr. Harris conducted research in the field of musculoskeletal physiology and disuse osteoporosis. Later, as Project Manager of the Exercise Countermeasure Project, he conducted clinical investigations of space adaptation and developed countermeasures for extended duration space flight at the Johnson Space Center. In addition, he is the author and co-author of numerous scientific publications. Throughout his life, Dr. Harris has received numerous awards and recognition, including election as Fellow of the American College of Physicians. He holds several faculty appointments including, Associate Professor in internal medicine at the University of Texas Medical Branch and Assistant Professor at Baylor College of Medicine. Dr. Harris serves on several federal, state, and corporate boards. He is also a licensed private pilot. Selected by NASA in January 1990, Dr. Harris became an astronaut in July 1991. He was a Mission Specialist on the Space Shuttle Columbia STS-55/Spacelab D-2, (1993), marking the Shuttle’s one year of total flight time. As Payload Commander on the Space Shuttle Discovery STS-63 (1995), the first flight of the joint Russian-American Space Program, Dr. Harris accomplished his childhood dream by completing his first walk in space. A veteran of space for over nine years, he has logged more than 438 hours in space and traveled over 7.2 million miles. In 1996, Dr. Harris became Vice President of SPACEHAB, Inc., where he was involved in business development and marketing of the company’s space-based products and services. He also served as Vice President of Business Development for Space Media, Inc., establishing an international space education program for students. In addition, he is a member of the board of some of the leading technology companies and institutions. Currently, Dr. Harris is President and Founder of the Harris Foundation, which supports math/science education and crime prevention programs for America’s youth. He was the recipient of the 2000 Horatio Alger Award for his accomplishments.
Science
Frederick M. Jones held more than 60 patents in a variety of fields, but refngeration was his specialization. In 1935, he invented the first automatic refrigeration system for long-haul trucks.
Later. the system was adapted to a variety of other carriers, including ships and railway cars. His first practical refrigeration unit helped to completely change the food transport industry. Consequently, it eliminated the problem of food spoilage and changed America’s eating habits in addition, Jones developed an air conditioning unit for military field hospitals (which was needed to keep blood serum for transfusions and medicines at exact temperatures), a portable x-ray machine, and a refrigerator for military field kitchens.
Born in Ohio, Jones served in France during World War I. After the war, he worked as a garage mechanic and. from the knowledge gained in this early experience, developed a self-starting gasoline motor. In the late 1920 s, Jones designed a series of devices for the growing movie industry, adapting silent movie projectors to accommodate talking films, and developing the box-office equipment that delivers tickets and spills out change.
In 1949, the U.S. Thermo Control Company, founded jointly by Jones and his former boss, J.A. Numero, had boomed to a $3,000,000 a year business. They manufactured automatic air coolers for trains, ships and airplanes so that foodstuffs could be kept fresh for long periods of time. And Jones was behind it all.
At fifty years of age, Frederick Jones was one of the outstanding authorities in the field of refrigeration in the United States. In 1944, he was elected to membership in the American Society of Refrigeration Engineers. During the l950’s, he was called to Washington to give advice on problems having to do with refrigeration. He was a consultant to both the Defense Department and the United States Bureau of Standards.
As an inventor, he was never satisfied with the improvements he had made in his cooling units. He developed ways that kept the air around the food at a constant temperature. He created other devices that produced special atmospheric conditions to keep strawberries and other fruits from drying out or becoming too ripe before reaching the supermarkets. Still other methods controlled the moisture in the air and air circulation. Jones’ inventions made it possible for the first time to transport meat, fruit, vegetables, eggs, butter, and other produce that needed refrigeration over long distances during any season of the year.
When Frederick McKinley Jones passed away in Minneapolis in 1961, his inventions were serving people throughout the world. He was a behind-the-scenes contributor to many of the luxuries of modern living.
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Born 1/4/1890, black educator and agricultural researcher. George Washington Carver was one of the best-known African Americans of his era. He was born in the Missouri town of Diamond. His mother and older brother were the only slaves of Moses and Susan Carver, successful, small-scale farmers. His mother disappeared, presumed kidnapped by slave raiders, while George was an infant. He became both free and orphaned at about the same time.
The childless Carvers raised him and his brother as their own children. Being a sickly child, George was not required to do hard labor but helped around the house. Very early his intellect and knowledge of nature awed those around him, but he was not allowed to attend the neighborhood school because of his color. Thus, at a young age, he began a series of moves through the Midwest, seeking further education. He supported himself cooking, doing laundry, and homesteading before finally enrolling at Simpson College in Indianola, Iowa, in 1890.
At Simpson Carver majored in art, but a teacher convinced him to transfer to Iowa State College to study agriculture. By the time he completed a master’s degree in agriculture in 1896, Carver had impressed the faculty as an extremely talented student in horticulture and mycology as well as a gifted teacher of freshman biology. Had he been white, he probably would have stayed at Iowa and concentrated on research in one of those fields. Instead he accepted an offer from Booker T. Washington to head the agricultural department at the all-black-staffed Tuskegee Institute in Alabama.
For nearly 20 years (1896-1915) Carver labored in the shadow of Washington. He taught classes and operated the only all-black agricultural experiment station, but he proved inept at administration, provoking frequent clashes with the principal. He was engaged, however, in some of his most significant work–seeking solutions to the burden of debt and poverty that enmeshed landless black farmers. Carver’s research and innovative educational extension programs were aimed at inducing farmers to utilize available resources to replace expensive commodities. He published bulletins and gave demonstrations on such topics as using native clays for paints, increasing soil fertility without commercial fertilizers, and growing alternative crops along with the ubiquitous cotton. To enhance the attractiveness of such crops as cow peas, sweet potatoes, and peanuts, Carver developed a variety of uses for each. Peanuts especially appealed to him as an inexpensive source of protein that did not deplete the soil as much as cotton did.
Carver’s work with peanuts drew the attention of the National Association of Peanut Growers, which invited him to testify at congressional tariff hearings in 1921. That testimony as well as several honors brought national publicity to the “Peanut Man.” A wide variety of groups adopted the professor as a symbol of their causes, including religious groups, New South boosters, segregationists, and those working to improve race relations. Some white publicists exploited Carver’s humble demeanor and apolitical posture to provide a “safe” symbol of black advancement; many, however, seem to have been genuinely captivated by his compelling personality. Carver’s fame increased and led to numerous speaking engagements, taking him away from campus frequently.
By the late 1920s much of Carver’s time was devoted to lecture tours of white college campuses, sponsored by the Commission on Interracial Cooperation and the YMCA. With his warm personality, he cultivated close personal relationships with dozens of young whites, opening their eyes to racial injustice, and continued to serve as a mentor and father figure to black students.
Carver developed numerous products from the peanut and sweet potato, including plastics, lubricants, facial cream, and tapioca. His ideas of sustainable agriculture based on renewable resources were out of step with his times, but perhaps not with the future. His early work enriched the lives of countless sharecroppers, and later in life he was a potent source of inspiration as a symbol of African-American achievement.
Carver died on his birthday, January 5, 1943.
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Meredith C. Gourdine was born in Newark, New Jersey on September 26, 1929. He received a B.S. in Engineering Physics from Cornell University in 1953 and a Ph.D. in Engineering Physics from the California Institute of Technology in 1960. Dr. Gourdine pioneered the research of electrogasdynamics. He was responsible for the engineering technique termed Incineraid for aiding in the removal of smoke from buildings. His work on gas dispersion developed techniques for dispersing fog from airport runways. Dr. Gourdine served on the Technical Staff of the Ramo-Woolridge Corporation from 1957-58. He then became a Senior Research Scientist at the Caltech Jet Propulsion Laboratory from 1958-60. He became a Lab Director of the Plasmodyne Corporation from 1960-62 and Chief Scientist of the Curtiss-Wright Corporation from 1962 to 1964. Dr. Gourdine established a research laboratory, Gourdine Laboratories, in Livingston, New Jersey, with a staff of over 150. Dr. Gourdine has been issued several patents on gasdynamic products as a result of his work. Dr. Gourdine served as president of Energy Innovation, Inc. of Houston, Texas.
