'The Common Purposes of Life' by Frank A.J.L. James

Author:Frank A.J.L. James [James, Frank A.J.L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781351963169
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Published: 2017-07-05T00:00:00+00:00

Conclusion

Having surveyed the early history of the Davy-Faraday Research Laboratory, and looked at the scientists who worked within it, what can we conclude about its supposed status as ‘temporary hotel accommodation’? It is true that none of the workers reached quite the height of scientific attainment that William Bragg and his son and successor Lawrence did; clearly, much of Gwendolen Caroe’s opinion was bound up with her own prestigious family connections. The workers that I have described were not Nobel Prize winners, and most never became Fellows of the Royal Society. Nevertheless, they did go on to occupy responsible – and sometimes influential – positions within academia, government and industry in Britain and abroad. Certainly the research that they carried out was in its time of high quality and importance, and formed a foundation on which subsequent scientific work could be laid.

The DFRL offered a home to retired scientists who still had contributions to make, to young scientists who were just beginning their careers, and to experienced scientists who had decided to make changes in their career paths. Some spent only a few months in the laboratory, and for them it was only a temporary arrangement, an opportunity to do research before moving on to a permanent position. For those who already held permanent posts it offered facilities that might otherwise have been unavailable. For some it provided what amounted to a postdoctoral fellowship, while for others it was much more; those who remained for many years did indeed carry out sustained lines of research. During its first quarter century the DFRL was not the home of a research school, but of a group of disparate researchers. While this situation may have prevented the revolutionary advances that can emanate from research schools, it did address the need that Ludwig Mond had identified (facilities for the pursuit of ‘independent and systematic researches’), and it did produce contributions to chemical and physical knowledge.

In many respects, the notion of ‘temporary hotel accommodation’ for scientists was present in the founding principles laid out by Mond in 1894. This is nowhere more evident than in the requirement that workers apply for readmission each term. We cannot therefore be surprised that the DFRL did indeed play a temporary role in the careers of many of its early occupants. However, where Mond had hoped that the Royal Institution’s professors ‘could work out their problems by the aid of many qualified hands’,115 and thus perhaps to act as the leaders of a cohesive research group, this did not occur before the advent of William Bragg. We can only speculate on what the DFRL might have become had its first directors, Dewar and Rayleigh, and its superintendent, Scott, been scientists of less independent temperament.

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