Chairman: Prof John W Nicholson, 52 Buckingham Road, Hampton Middlesex TW12 3JG, England. E-mail: jwnicholson01@gmail.com
Secretary: Dr Mike Leggett E-mail: leggett189@btinternet.com
Treasurer: Stanley Langer, 31 Hallswelle Way, Temple Fortune, London NW11 0DH, England. E-mail; stanley1910@yahoo.co.uk
Membership: Dr Alice Halman. E-mail: alicehalman@yahoo.com
Newsletter Editor: Dr Anna Simmons, Epsom Lodge, La Grande Route de St Jean, St John, Jersey, JE3 4FL a.simmons@ucl.ac.uk
The Historical Group exists to encourage an interest in the history of chemistry and chemical industry among members of the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) and others. Membership is open to non-members of the RSC and embraces a wide range from those whose interest in the history of chemistry is a hobby to teachers of chemistry at all levels and professional historians.
The Group holds twice yearly meetings when academic papers are read and discussed. Summaries of papers read at these meetings are included in the Historical Group Newsletter along with reviews of recent books in the subject and news of other meetings and forthcoming events. The Newsletter is published twice yearly. Contributions of around 2,500 words on topics of current interest in the history of chemistry are invited for inclusion at the discretion of the Editor. The Editor is very happy to discuss possible contributions prior to submission. The contents of the last issue, Summer 2023, are given below with a link to the PDF (0.9 MB).
The next meeting will be on Astrochemistry at Burlington House, Piccadilly, London, W1J 0BA [Click here for a map of the location of Burlington House and Royal Society of Chemistry.
Details are available in the Summer 2025 Newsletter
Please register for this free meeting by emailing the Secretary of the Historical Group, Mike Leggett, at leggett189@btinternet.com.
For further information please go to
If you are a member of the RSC you should contact the Membership Department (membership@rsc.org or ring 01223 432141) quoting your name and membership number. If you have any problems or queries, please contact the RSCHG Membership Secretary, Dr Mike Leggett leggett189@btinternet.com. All members of the Group can download the Newsletter as a PDF on www.rsc.org/historical or https://rschg.qmul.ac.uk/; no password is needed.
The Group maintains contact with colleagues in the Division of the History of Chemistry of the American Chemical Society and the European Association for Chemical and Molecular Sciences.
The Library & Information Centre, Historical Chemistry Information Service.
The Chemical Heritage Foundation.
The Society for the History of Alchemy and Chemistry.
Details of Nobel Prize winners; portraits; and other details.
List of Nobel Prize winners for Chemistry.
The History of Chemical Engineering.
Historic samples and specimens from the Chemistry Department, Imperial College, London.
History of chemistry in Heidelberg
Science & Civilisation in China Project (Needham Research Institute).
There is a History of Chemistry Mail List or email chem-hist-request@mailman.uni-regensburg.de
To send messages email chem-hist@mailman.uni-regensburg.de
Short articles on the history of chemistry for the Newsletter are welcome and should be sent to the editor, Dr Anna Simmons, Epsom Lodge, La Grande Route de St Jean, St John, Jersey, JE3 4FL a.simmons@ucl.ac.uk. Please consult the Instructions for Authors.
For a PDF copy of the Newsletter (1 MB) click here
Contents
From the Editor (Anna Simmons)
RSC HISTORICAL GROUP NEWS
RSC HISTORICAL GROUP MEETINGS
TRIBUTES
THE BROCK COLLECTION
BOOK REVIEWS
14th INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY, VALENCIA (Martin Bigg)
REPORTS OF RSCHG WEBINARS
EVENTS, EXHIBITIONS AND OUTREACH
MEMBERS’ PUBLICATIONS
PUBLICATIONS OF INTEREST
SOCIETY NEWS
ROYAL SOCIETY OF CHEMISTRY HISTORICAL GROUP WEBSITE
10.00 am Registration, tea and coffee Session One (chair John Nicholson) 10.20 am Welcome from John Nicholson, Chair of the Historical Group 10.25 am Ileana Chinnici Early History of Astronomical Spectroscopy 10.55 am Helge Kragh Element Abundances in the Stars and Beyond, ca. 1925-1940 11.25 am Simon Mitton Seven Steps to Element Synthesis: B2FH 11.55 am Jonathan Hare Carbon Astrochemistry and the Discovery of Buckminsterfullerene 12.25 pm lunch (not provided for audience) Session Two (chair: Jeremy Shears) 1.45 pm John Black Alexander Dalgarno and the Growth of Astrochemistry 2.15 pm Jonathan Rawlings First Detection of Molecules in Space 2.45 pm Glenn White The Development of Submillimetre Astronomy in the UK and Elsewhere 3.15 pm tea and coffee Session Three (chair: Peter Morris) 3.40 pm Mike Edmunds A History of the Chemical Analysis of Extragalactic Systems 4.20 pm David Carty Laboratory Astrochemistry 4.50 pm Closing remarks by Peter Morris 5.00 pm Meeting ends
How to join the Historical Group
Other Useful Web pages
Historical Group Newsletter and Summary of Papers
and Occasional PapersNo 88. Summer 2025 Newsletter
New committee members
Joe Stanley
Linnea Soler
Martin Bigg
Message from the Membership Secretary
History of Astrochemistry Meeting
Meetings in 2026 and 2027
Professor William Hodson (“Bill”) Brock (Peter Morris)
SHORT ESSAYS
Two Books that Markedly Influenced My Chemical Career (Alan Dronsfield)
The Haldanes and Oxford (Mike Williams)
Open House on Piccadilly (Anna Coyle)
Mystery Object Identified – At Last! (John Nicholson)
Umberto Zardi and the Revival of Ammonia Casale (Anthony S. Travis)
Peter J.T. Morris and Peter Reed, Henry Enfield Roscoe: The Campaigning Chemist. (Anna Simmons)
Pills, Potions and Poisons: Researching a 17th Century Apothecary (Helen Cooke)
Three Important Collections of Chemicals at the Science Museum (Peter Morris)
The History of the RSC Historical Group (Peter Morris)
Two Centuries of Aromatic Hydrocarbons (David E Lewis)
Dying for Work: Dangerous Trades for Women (Geoff Rayner-Canham)
The Shades of Industrial Hydrogen: Grey/Blue/Green (Tony Travis)
RSC YouTube Channel
Contents of Newsletters (1996-2025)
PDFs of Newsletters (2010-2025)
PDFs of Occasional Papers 6-10
Biographies of Chemists including Confusing Names 1-3 from Newsletters 1998-9
Return to Royal Society of Chemistry home page.