I was saddened to hear of the death of Bill Astbury, whose ceaseless support & enthusiasm for my research into his grandfather, the textile physicist and pioneer of molecular biology William T Astbury was always such an inspiration. Our paths first crossed when Bill was working as a children’s storyteller at Headingley Library in Leeds, displaying a talent and passion which was apparent in the memories of his grandfather that he kindly shared with me over the years when I was writing my book ‘The Man in the Monkeynut Coat.’ Thanks so much for all you did, Bill – I couldn’t have written it without you. You’ll be missed.
It may just look like a lead box with a few sides missing, but don’t be fooled – this is a piece of science history. It’s actually a camera – but one that uses X-rays instead of visible light, and on Sat 13th July I explained to visitors from the Clothworkers Company how, using this equipment, physicist William Astbury made X-ray studies of the molecular structure of wool fibres that led him and his colleage Florence Bell to take the first X-ray images of DNA fibres.
X-ray camera used by William Astbury and Florence Bell. With kind thanks to Dr. Mike Finn of the Museum for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine,University of Leeds
The visit celebrated the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Yorkshire College of Science in 1874, which eventually became the University of Leeds. First founded nearly 500 years ago, the Clothworkers Company provided invaluable financial support for both the establishment of the Yorkshire College of Science, and later for Astbury’s post as Lecturer in Textile Physics. I’d like to thank them for their enthusiasm & interest in learning how, with their funding and support, wool helped weave a path to double helix and resulted in today’s Astbury Centre for Structural Molecular Biology! (Accompanied by visual aids of bead necklace from Headingley charity shop to illustrate molecular structure of proteins!)
Plaque on the Textiles Department at the University of Leeds commemorating the support of the Clothworkers Company in the founding of the Yorkshire College of Science in 1874.
Delighted to see that, as a result of her appearance on the BBC World Service programme ‘Unstoppable’ last week, physicist Florence Bell who pioneered X-ray studies of DNA in 1938 is now catching up with more famous DNA scientist, Rosalind Franklin, thanks to a mention in the latest edition of UK TV and radio listings magazine ‘Radio Times’! Only a Royal Mint commemorative coin, a Mars Rover and a hit West End play to go now…
BBC World Service programme ‘Unstoppable’ mentions pioneering physicist Florence Bell who took first X-ray photos of DNA in 1938
In the course of researching my book ‘The Man in the Monkeynut Coat’, I’d been interested to discover that physicist Florence Bell who, despite having shown for the first time in 1938 that X-rays could be used to reveal the structure of DNA, was described under the heading ‘Occupation’ on her death certificate as ‘housewife.’ But I’ve just found that when Bell emigrated to the USA in 1943, she was also described not as a scientist, but as a ‘housewife’ on her US Naturalisation records. Talk about hiding your light under a bushel (not that I’m trying for one minute to say that housework doesn’t qualify as hard and worthy graft – it does!)
