Society of Chemical Industry (American Section)

History

The creation of the Society of Chemical Industry (SCI) in London in 1881 led to the eventual formation of a number of satellite groups. A number of informal meetings were held in 1894, with the goal of organizing a New York section of the Society of Chemical Industry. On May 2, 1894, analytical chemist Arthur McGeorge met with seven other members of London's Society of Chemical Industry who were active in New York. At a second meeting, with Alfred H. Mason as chairman and McGeorge as secretary, it was decided to invite all New York-based members of the London society to an organizational meeting. At this third meeting, at the College of Pharmacy, 36 members of the Society of Chemical Industry signed a petition requesting the London organization to form a New York section, the first section to be created overseas. Their proposal was enthusiastically received by London president E. C. C. Stanford, who wrote "We are pleased to add the stars and stripes to our highly respectable old colours."

The first official meeting of the new New York Section was held in November 1894. The new section had a membership of 350 members, about 1/10th of the entire organization. The London group's president Thomas Tyrer and foreign secretary Ludwig Mond attended the October 1895 fall meeting in New York, which was rescheduled so that they could participate.

In contrast to the American Chemical Society, which required its members to hold university degrees, the Society of Chemical Industry was open to a broad range of working chemists in industry, manufacturing and pharmaceuticals. Mason emphasized that the new organization did not intend to compete with the ACS, but rather to bring together academic and manufacturing chemists:

We believe there is room for our Society in America... the industrial applications of chemistry have become so numerous that the existence of a separate body to especially consider this branch is desirable." – Arthur Mason

Members of the American section benefited from the activities of the parent society, which held scientific conferences and published The Journal of the Society of Chemical Industry to inform chemists throughout the world about development in the field. From the beginning, the American Section's focus was networking, engaging its members in collegial activities. The second chairman, Charles F. Chandler, said "It serves to bring us together, to make us acquainted, and it enables us to help each other." Members of the New York section helped to establish The Chemists' Club in New York City in 1898, using it for lectures and meetings, and establishing a members' library. In the beginning, talks were presented at the monthly meetings and published in the parent journal. Guest speakers included important international figures like Leo Baekeland, Carl Duisberg, and Jokichi Takamine. In 1904, the New York Section hosted the first annual meeting of its parent organization to be held in the United States.

The New York section was briefly involved in practical work on standardization in 1902-3, when they established a Subcommittee on Uniformity of Analysis of Materials. Two samples of Portland cement were analyzed by 14 chemists, and 3 samples of zinc ore were analyzed by 42 chemists. The results were critiqued by William Francis Hillebrand, who became chief chemist at the National Bureau of Standards. The committee dissolved and was replaced in 1904 by a new committee formed by the ACS. The American section also engaged in early lobbying efforts, as in 1907, when they passed a resolution protesting that Rules and Regulations published by the Department of Agriculture displayed a "lack of expert knowledge." However, such activities never became a major focus of the organization.

In 1919, the New York group was renamed the American Section.

Governance

The Society of Chemical Industry (American Section) is a registered nonprofit organization, with administrative offices in Philadelphia, PA. The American Section is directed by a set of officers including a chair and vice-chair, and an executive committee. As of 2016 the chair was Fred Festa, of W. R. Grace and Company. Previous chairpersons include Max Tishler, Ralph Landau, Harold Sorgenti, and Charles O. Holliday.

Awards

The major activities of the American Section are two yearly events for the presentation of awards. SCI America presents the Perkin Medal (established 1906), the Chemical Industry Medal, first awarded 1933), and the SCI's Gordon E. Moore Medal (first awarded 2004).

The first Perkin Medal was awarded to chemist William Henry Perkin to mark the 50th anniversary of his discovery of the aniline dye mauveine. This anniversary was celebrated internationally as the Perkin Jubilee. The American Section commemorated a visit by Perkin and his family to the United States in the fall of 1906 by inviting 400 guests to a dinner in his honor at Delmonico's and presenting him with the first Perkin Medal. The Perkin Medal is considered the highest honor in applied chemistry to be given to a chemist residing in the United States. It is administered jointly by a committee whose representatives include members of the American Section and several other societies.

From 1920 to 1932, the Society awarded the Grasselli Medal, on behalf of the Grasselli Chemical Company, for a paper presenting the most useful suggestions in applied chemistry before the Society. This award was replaced in 1933 by the Chemical Industry Medal, which was given to a person who had made a valuable contribution by applying chemical research in industry.

Starting in 2004, the Society has given a medal in honor of Gordon E. Moore, for early-career innovation involving the application of chemistry.

Scholars

The American Section also works with the ACS and others to support scholars in chemistry and chemical engineering.