[CH] The quasi-compleat Wilbur L. Scoville biography (LONG!!)
Captain Apathy (captappy@yahoo.com)
Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:53:19 -0800 (PST)
Who was Wilbur Scoville? No clue.
So why, of all the thousands of hits you'll get from typing "Scoville" into
any common search engine, did I never find any of this? This took more digging
than I expected. Answer: Search engines are companies and companies need
money. Free education? Go buy some hot sauce from these sponsor links
instead!! Ok don't buy; just click-through. //rant off
Ah well, I feel better. Here's what I've tracked down so far. I'm running into
dead ends and need assistance. Share what you gots.
CA
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He was born in 1865. He died. Really. In 1942. Whoo. I don't know where he was
born, nor where/how he shuffled off.
Parke Davis was founded in a Detroit drugstore in 1866 and they built the
world's first pharmacological research labratory in 1902. And hired many an
obsessed scientist to help figure out fun things like narcotics development.
The Way-Back Machine: 1912 is still "wild, wild west", people gawk at dem rich
folk with automobiles, the NY Times just put up a huge electronic bulletin
board in Times Square, and Coca-Cola costs 5ยข but doesn't "relieve fatigue"
like it used to. The Roosevelt / Taft / Wilson presidential election, and of
course - the Titanic sinks.
(I don't know if/where he went to school or when he joined Parke Davis.)
Scoville worked at Parke Davis during an interesting time, like when they were
marketing many types of refined cocaine and cannabis extracts. Competitor
Bayer's big product at the time was heroin cough syrup. (and Merck is
producing cocaine by the ton.) Ah, medicine and science! This has nothing to
do with Scoville other than to say, this is probably the perfect time to
subject people to capsaicin-induced pain and then question them about it.
Scoville won two awards from the American Pharmaceutical Association (APhA) -
in 1922 he was awarded the Ebert Prize and in 1929 the Remington Honor Medal.
Coincidentally the Ebert Prize is given to "...recognize the author(s) of the
best report of original investigation of a medicinal substance..."
He won APhA's top award in 1929, he also received an honary Doctor of Science
from Columbia University that same year. I'm assuming it was for the Art of
Compounding and not the S.O.T. but Parke Davis Co was spitting out patents and
products even faster than the other 4 big drug companies.
"The Art of Compounding" was a hugely popular work, first published in 1895
and was a pharmacological reference until at least 1960 (8+ editions). He
completely re-wrote a Harry Beckwith book in it's 4th revision "How To Get
Registered: Home Study for Pharmaceutical Students" in 1909. And, he did
another book called "Extracts & Perfumes" containing hundreds of
formulations... after all, he understands the art of compounding. :-)
(Scholarly type rare book stores can still locate these originals.)
What makes this quasi-compleat is that I cannot find data to substantiate the
1912 date, the original research papers, what building he worked in, his
family life, etc... Then again with 1914 bringing large-scale death and
destruction worldwide... I'm sure with a bit more research we could track his
parents and immediate family, but I'm running out of resources. (Brittanica,
Groliers, World Book, etc have no mention of him.)
That's the point; he's unknown because it wasn't important to the whole
world... even for us he didn't exist but for this one act. People were more
interested in the new inventions of the times - and war. Categorizing the heat
levels of a plant no one eats? Nobody cared. And the Art of Compounding, well,
you'd have to be a geeky apothecary type to know or care - back then that
would probably be larger than chile geeks.
Photos? One. This is the only one I have found so far. It resides at the
National Library of Medicine's History of Medicine Division. Copyright
compliance is your deal. (Almost every medical and scientific book of that
time was printed by P. Blakiston's Son & Co. out of Philadelphia, PA - good
luck!)
http://wwwihm.nlm.nih.gov/ihm/images/B/22/911.jpg
If you have any additional data (or corrections) please email or post
publically.
Pods away,
CA
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REFERENCES
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Library of Congress
Historical Collections of the National Digital Library
National Archives and Records Administration
University of Michigan NOTIS database
The College of Pharmacy at Washington State University
National Library of Medicine
Columbia University Ceremonies Archive
Michigan State Historic Preservation Office
American Pharmaceutical Association
University of Massachusetts Medical School ENDEAVOR
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