James W. Mitchell, born November 16, 1943 in Durham, North Carolina, is a analytical chemist and materials engineer. He has made significant contributions to trace element analysis. He earned his BS in chemistry from North Carolina A&T State University in 1965. He received his PhD in analytical chemistry from Iowa State University in 1970.
He attained the position of Head of the Analytical Chemistry Research Department in 1975 at AT&T Bell Laboratories and became one of the founders for the Association of Black Laboratory Employees. He was the first black director and vice-president of research at AT&T.
Mitchell co-wrote a book Contamination Control in Trace Analysis and published over 60 scientific papers and patented several processes.
He received the Percy L. Julian Research Award and the Pharmacia Industrial Analytical Chemistry Award. In 1993 he was named Black Engineer of the Year by US Black Engineer. In 1999, he received the Lifetime Achievement in Industry Award from the National Society of Black Engineers.
Percy Lavon Julian, born April 11, 1899 in Montgomery, Alabama, was a research chemist and a pioneer in synthesizing medicinal drugs from plants. His work paved the way for the steroid drug industry's production of cortisone, and artificial hormones that led to birth controls.
He attended DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana, which only accepted a few African-Americans. He was not allowed to live in the dormitory, and at first, stayed in a boarding home, which refused to serve him meals. He was allowed to live in a fraternity house, in their attic (or basement, according to which source), and do servant work. He graduated from DePauw in 1920 as valedictorian.
In 1929, he received a Rockefeller Foundation to continue his education at the University of Vienna, where he earned his PhD. In Europe, he didn't have the racial prejudices that had stifled his opportunities in the states. However, his freedoms and liberties in Europe would cause trouble in the future back in the US. He admitted in letters about his dalliances with Viennese women, wine, dances, and also made some derisive remarks about members of Howard University's faculty, where he had been an instructor before he left for Vienna. The scandals led to his dismissal.
A former mentor offered him an organic chemistry teaching position at DePauw University in 1932, but he was denied a professorship in 1936 because of racism.
W. J. O'Brien, a vice-president at Glidden Company, supplier of soybean oil products, offered him a position of director of research at Glidden's Soya Products Division in Chicago. He discovered a way of producing large quantities of soy sterols on a daily basis. The soy stigmasterol could be converted into commercial quantities of progesterone, the female hormone. The large production of these hormones, reduced the cost of treating hormonal deficiencies.
Julian left Glidden in December 1953 after Glidden decided to leave the steroid business. He founded his own research firm, Julian Laboratories, Inc. in Chicago, and hired his best chemists including African Americans and women from Glidden. He continued his research and synthesis of hormones throughout his life He sold his company in 1961 for $2.3M, making him one of the first black millionaires.
He passed away of liver cancer in April 1975 in Waukegan, Illinois.
Isabella Aiona Abbot, born June 20, 1919 in Hana, Maui in Hawai'ian Territory, became the first Native Hawai'ian to receive a PhD in science. Growing up, her mother taught her about edible Hawai'ian seaweeds and native plants.
She received her undergraduate degree in Botany at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa in 1941, a MS in botany from the University of Michigan in 1942, and a PhD in botany from the University of California, Berkeley in 1950, becoming the first native Hawai'ian to receive a Doctor of Philosophy.
She became a leading expert on Pacific marine algae, and in 1972, Stanford University promoted her to full professor of Biology, the first woman and first person of color to hold this position. She authored eight books and more than 150 publications. She is credited with discovering over 200 species, and several are named after her.
Martha Bernal, born April 13, 1931 in San Antonio, Texas to Mexican immigrants. Overcoming racism about her ethnicity she received her Bachelor's Degree from Texas Western College, now University of Texas at El Paso in 1952. After getting her Master of Arts degree in 1955 from Syracuse, she transferred to Indiana University where she was faced with sexism. She wanted to quit her studies but a teacher persuaded her to finish her doctorate, which she did in 1962, becoming the first Latina in the U.S. to obtain a PhD in psychology.
She contributed significantly to the field, especially for her work on children's behavioral problems, and to develop organizations that focused on ethnic groups to combat issues of racism, sexism, discrimination, etc.
She passed away in September 2001 after losing her fourth battle with cancer.
Helen Sharman, born May 30, 1963 in Yorkshire, England, is the first British cosmonaut and first woman to visit the Mir space station. She launched aboard Soyuz TM-12 in May 1991. She was part of Project Juno, a cooperative project sponsored by private enterprises in Britain and by the Soviet government. Her experiments were mainly life sciences, since she had a PhD in chemistry. After about 7 days, she returned to Earth May 26 aboard Soyuz TM-11.
Lloyd Noel Ferguson, born February 9, 1918, is the first African-American to receive a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley in 1943. He took a faculty position at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College and then moved to Howard University about two years later. There he founded the doctoral program, the first at any black college.
In the 1960s, he became an advisory to the Food and Drug Administration. In 1972, he became one of the founders of the National Organization for the Professional Advancement of Black Chemists and Chemical Engineers (NOBCChE).
Marie Maynard Daly, born April 16, 1921 in Queens, New York, was the first African-American woman to earn a PhD in Chemistry awarded by Columbia University in 1947. Her father, an immigrant from the British West Indies, attended Cornell University, planning to major in chemistry but was unable due to lack of funds.
Marie majored in chemistry receiving her degree from Queens College in 1942. She received her Master's degree from New York University and her PhD from Columbia University in 1947. Her thesis was entitled "A Study of the Products Formed by the Action of Pancreatic Amylase on Corn Starch".
While teaching at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, she investigated the effects of cigarette smoke on lungs. She passed away October 28, 2003 in New York City.
