science newsletter: Newsletter for Tuesday 6 November

Newsletter - November 6 - Today in Science History

TODAY IN SCIENCE HISTORY

NEWSLETTER - NOVEMBER 6

Before you look at today's web page, see if you can answer some of these questions about the events that happened on this day. Some of the names are very familiar. Others will likely stump you. Tickle your curiosity with these questions, then check your answers on today's web page.

On 6 Nov 1913, W.H. Preece died, a major contributor to the development and introduction of wireless telegraphy and the telephone in Great Britain. Today's Science Store pick is History of the Wireless Telegraphy, by J. Fahie. Preece's work, and that of many others, is included of this history of the subject. Fahie's 1901 original publication is reproduced in this 1991 book. Though out of print, some copies are available used.
Yesterday's pick: Beriberi, White Rice, and Vitamin B: A Disease, a Cause, and a Cure. For picks from earlier newsletters, see the Today in Science Science Store home page.

Browse the new Science Store pages of Science Titles in Bargain Books.

Quotations for Today

"Let anyone who possesses a vivid imagination and a highly-wrought nervous system, even now, in this century, with all the advantages of learning and science, go and sit among the rocks, or in the depths of the wood, and think of immortality, and all that that word really means, and by-and-by a mysterious awe will creep into the mind, and it will half believe in the possibility of seeing or meeting something -- something -- it knows not exactly what." (from "World's End") - Richard Jefferies, English naturalist and essayist (born 6 Nov 1848)

"The limitations of archaeology are galling. It collects phenomena, but hardly ever can isolate them so as to interpret scientifically; it can frame any number of hypotheses, but rarely, if ever, scientifically prove." - David George Hogarth, English archaeologist (died 6 Nov 1927)

"The discovery of the telephone has made us acquainted with many strange phenomena. It has enabled us, amongst other things, to establish beyond a doubt the fact that electric currents actually traverse the earth's crust. The theory that the earth acts as a great reservoir for electricity may be placed in the physicist's waste-paper basket, with phlogiston, the materiality of light, and other old-time hypotheses." - William Henry Preece, Welsh electrical engineer (born 6 Nov 1913)

QUIZ

Births

Alois Senefelder, born 6 Nov 1771, was a German inventor. To publish his own work, he needed a less expensive and more efficient printing alternative to relief printed hand set type or etched plates. His invention was the biggest revolution in the printing industry since Gutenberg's movable type. Today it is used to print magazines and books.
What is the printing method he invented?

Deaths

David Marine (1888-1976) was an American pathologist whose substantial research on the treatment of goiter. He ran a trial during 1917-22 to show that the incidence of the disease could be dramatically reduced with a certain dietary supplement. Its success led him promote a solution that is now present on kitchen shelves around the world.
What substance is now added to which grocery item because of his research?

Claude Louis Berthollet (1748-1822) was a chemist who was the first to note that the completeness of chemical reactions depends in part upon the masses of the reacting substances (1803); he thus came close to formulating the law of mass action. Though he incorrectly concluded that elements unite in all proportions, his resulting controversy with the chemist Joseph-Louis Proust led to the establishment of the law of definite proportions.
What was his nationality?

Events

On 6 Nov 1981, a black-footed animal was found in Wyoming, previously thought extinct. An animal of North America's arid, shortgrass prairies, it lived primarily with, and on, prairie dogs. Wide-scale poisoning programs to eradicate prairie dogs and the destruction of grassland habitat also killed off this animal. It takes about 100 acres of prairie dog colony to support one family (a female and her young) of this animal. .
Can you name this animal?

Answers

When you have your answers ready to all the questions above, you'll find all the information to check them, and more, on the November 6 web page of Today in Science History.

Or, try this link first for just the brief answers.

Fast answers for the previous newsletter for November 5: "dirty snowball"; Oort Cloud; James Clerk Maxwell; the decade containing the year 1895; Marie Curie.

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