Date: Sun, 4 Feb 1996 21:17:15 -0500
From: pore@mainelink.net
Subject: Scientific Pioneer Clair Patterson Dies (fwd)
To: orgonomy@jefferson.village.virginia.edu
Sender: owner-orgonomy@jefferson.village.virginia.edu



 
Date: Sun, 24 Dec 1995 22:55:35 -0600 (CST)
 
Subject: Scientific Pioneer Clair Patterson Dies (fwd)
 
Organization: NASA Spacelink Teacher Resource Center-a service to educators
 


 


For Immediate Release                                   December 6, 1995

Scientific Pioneer Clair C. Patterson Dies

PASADENA--Clair C. "Pat" Patterson, who won the prestigious Tyler Prize
for Environmental Achievement in 1995, died suddenly on Tuesday morning,
December 5, at his home in The Sea Ranch, California, northwest of Santa
Rosa.  He was 73.

Patterson, who had a remarkable talent for finding the most important
scientific problems and then solving them, is best known for his
determination of the age of the earth and the solar system, and for his
pioneering work on lead pollution in the modern world.

The passion that directed Patterson's research was his desire to better
understand the geochemistry of metals in terrestrial rocks, waters, and
atmospheres, in meteorites, and in the solar system.  Patterson was a
pioneer in the study of lead in the earth's crust.  He developed precise
analytical techniques that enabled him to establish the true levels of
pre-industrial lead in the environment.  His analysis of lead isotopes in
meteorites and oceanic minerals led him in the early 1950s to conclude
that the earth and solar system are 4.6 billion years old.

This result is one of the most important measurements of time ever made. 
Current theories of stellar birth and evolution, and our very
understanding of the history of the universe, are based in some measure on
this important measurement.

While studying lead isotopes, Patterson found that human civilization had
mined and dispersed an unprecedented amount of the metal around the
world.  Ice cores from the Greenland ice cap, dating back thousands of
years, showed that the amount of lead in modern snow is much higher than
in pre-industrial times.

This knowledge led Patterson to wonder whether this abundance of lead
might affect humans.  His studies of the bones and teeth of prehistoric
people confirmed that modern humans contain up to 1000 times more lead
than did their ancient ancestors.

His message, that people were being contaminated by lead from water pipes,
from leaded gasoline, and from the solder used to seal canned foods, was
not a popular idea.  But Patterson was a courageous and determined man,
and he knew that he was right.  He fought, against great odds and the
money of powerful corporations, to discontinue the use of lead in these
materials, and eventually, through his tenacity and his extremely thorough
methods, his results and recommendations were accepted.

Patterson was born in Des Moines, Iowa, and earned his bachelor's degree
in chemistry at Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa, in 1943.  He continued
to study chemistry at the University of Iowa, where he earned his master's
degree in 1944, and at the University of Chicago, where he completed his
doctorate in 1951 with Harrison Brown as his thesis advisor.

He stayed on at the University of Chicago as a postdoctoral fellow for one
year, and when Brown came to Caltech to establish the geochemistry program
in 1952, Patterson came with him as a research fellow.  At the time of his
death, Patterson was professor of geochemistry, emeritus.

Among his many honors, Patterson received the J. Lawrence Smith Medal from
the National Academy of Sciences in 1975 and the Professional Achievement
Award of the University of Chicago in 1981.  He was elected to the
National Academy of Sciences in 1987, and has also had a peak in
Antarctica and an asteroid named for him.  Most recently, he won the 1995
Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, the premier international
environmental honor in the world.

Patterson is survived by his wife, Lorna Patterson of The Sea Ranch,
California; his brother, Paul H. Patterson of Pasadena; his sister,
Patricia Stuart of Altoona, Iowa; and four children and three
grandchildren.  Lorna Patterson was also an analytical chemist, and taught
science for many years at La Canada High School in La Canada, California. 
The children are Susan McCleary of Crawfordsville, Iowa; Cameron Patterson
of San Diego; Charles Patterson of Powell, Ohio; and Claire May Keister of
Minneapolis, Minnesota.  His nephew, also named Paul H. Patterson, is a
professor of biology at Caltech.
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