Mr. J. H. Coste

Abstract

JOHN HENRY COSTE died on January 3 at his home at Smallfield near Horley, Surrey, in his seventy-eighth year. His death further reduces the dwindling number of old Finsbury Technical College students, for it was at this College during 1888-91 that he received, under Meldola, scientific training which served him in such good stead for a long and most useful life. He obtained his first appointment under John Augustus Voelcker, and three years later joined the staff of the Chemical and Gas Testing Department of the London County Council ; he remained in this service until his retirement in 1936. His ability was soon recognized, and in 1908 he was appointed chief assistant and in 1912 promoted to the position which is now designated Chemist-in-Chief, Public Health Department. He was always a keen experimenter, and scientific literature, mainly The Analyst and the Journal of the Society of Chemical Industry, contains no less than fifty papers of which he was either the author or part author. A perusal of these contributions shows him to have been a very versatile worker, for the subjects include petroleum, paint, water, air, milk, coal, sewage, etc., and in addition he was the author of one and part author of two books, on the calorific power of gas, the chemistry of paint pigments and on fuel.