The Dalton Celebrations at Manchester

Abstract

THE Manchester celebrations in connection with the centenary of Dalton's atomic theory began on Tuesday afternoon, May 19, when Prof. F. W. Clarke chairman of the International Commission on Atomic Weights, delivered the “Wilde” lecture on “The Atomic Theory” to the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society. Addresses were presented on behalf of the Royal Society and the Chemical Society, and a message was received from the Russian Physico-Chemical Society. In an admirable discourse Prof. Clarke sketched the history of the atomic theory from its first conception in the, minds of Greek philosophers-down to the present day. He pointed out the directions-in which the atomic theory would probably develop, but declared that the problem of matter would never be-solved until the atomic weights of the elements had been finally settled. “Who,” he asked, “wilt establish the Dalton Laboratory for pure research, and so give the work which he started a permanent home?”