Percy Julian in his laboratory as a young man ... He formed the Julian Research Institute.

Ross Sheil, Staff Reporter

Percy L. Julian was one of the greatest scientists that America ever produced, yet battled racism to achieve recognition.

Coinciding with black history month, 'Forgotten Genius', a documentary broadcast last week on United States' Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), hailing his life and achievements.

"We didn't know you were a Negro," an interviewer at the Dupont chemical company told Dr. Julian before turning him down for a job - one of many snubs from employers and universities in a career devoted to the chemistry of plants and the development of cheaper drugs.

Top of his class

Born in 1899 in Montgomery, Alabama, such treatment might not have surprised him having grown up in a city that did not educate black people beyond the fifth grade. But despite this, he gained entrance to DePauw University in Indiana, took extra classes and graduated at the top of his class.

Upon graduation, his grandmother bared her shoulders to reveal scars from a beating she suffered as a slave during the Civil War. "This is worth all the scars," she told him, as she grasped his Phi Beta Kappa key, representing his induction into America's prestigious academic society.

Achieving his masters from Harvard and a PhD. from Vienna University in Austria, he returned to DePauw where he continued his research. In an event that the documentary compares to Jackie Robinson becoming the first black player in the Major League Baseball ten years later, he was appointed the laboratory director at the Glidden Company in 1936.

At Glidden he became the first to isolate the soy bean protein on an industrial basis, which made possible the commercial production of sex hormones as well as being used in other products from foodstuffs to paints and plastics. This came at a time when the chemical industry and its developments were at the forefront of technology.

But the commercial thrust of his work began to bore him with the ultimate frustration being the company's decision to cease steroid research. At Glidden alone he received 109 patents and from his success branched out and founded Julian Laboratories in 1953 which became well-known for employing young black scientists.

Rich legacy

He later formed nonprofit Julian Research Institute to train future generations of researchers. Nobel Prize-nominated Jamaican chemist Dr. Bert Fraser-Reid is one scientist who has benefited from his legacy by scooping the Percy L. Julian Award in 1991, awarded annually by the National Organisation for the Professional Advancement of Black Chemists and Chemical Engineers.

Dr. Fraser-Reid said that he was barely aware of the man under whose name he was being honoured. "He was not given his dues," Dr. Fraser-Reid told The Gleaner. "The thing that amazes me about Julian is that he was doing all this work under such deprived conditions."

Feedback: Science Matters is a bi-weekly feature dedicated to the field of science, technology and innovation. Please contact: ross.sheil@gleanerjm.com The 108-minute documentary can be watched free online at: www.pbs.org/wgbh /nova/julian/

Scientific Facts

Dr. Julian synthesised cortisone, an anti-inflammatory used in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis and other conditions including sporting injuries.

His synthesis of glaucoma drug physostigmine (also known as eserine) from the African Calabar bean was recognised as one of the top 25 achievements in the history of U.S. chemistry by the American Chemical Society in 1999.

Both these syntheses are credited with making the treatments cheaper and more accessible to patents.

His discovery that soy protein foam could be used as a fire-extinguisher, known as 'bean soup' , was credited with saving the lives of thousands of U.S. sailors in World War Two.

In 1993 Dr. Julian died aged 76.

From the collection of the Historical Society of Oak Park and River Forest