|
|
|
Ernest Everett Just was born August 14, 1883 in Charleston, South Carolina. Just attended college at Dartmouth and graduated magna cum laude in 1907. He then went to the University of Chicago in 1916 where he earned his Ph. D in zoology.
In November 17, 1911 Mr. Just helped three Howard students with establishing Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc.
Upon graduation Ernest encountered his next task at hand. He wanted to work for a college or university, but knew that was going to be hard. The reason for it being hard for him to get hired was because the schools faculty was white and African Americans just were not hired on. He decided the best place for him to go work would be a historically-black Howard University in Washington D.C. Ernest took a teaching position and was put in charge of the new biology department at the university. From 1912-1941 he was head of the Department of Zoology.
Just was very interested in Marine Biology. Ernest became friends with Dr. Frank R. Lillie who was the chief of the Marine Biological Laboratory in Massachusetts. Frank invited Ernest to come spend the summers so he could study Marine Biology. Starting in 1909 for the next 19 years Ernest would be Franks assistant at the MBL.
Over the years Ernest wrote more than 50 scientific papers on his research at MBL and had them published. He also wrote a very important text book of the 20th century called Biology of the Cell Surface.
Ernest did some experiments in Italy then to his amazement in 1930 he was invited to Berlin, Germany. He was asked to come to Kaiser Wilhelm Institute where research was conducted by Nobel Prize winners.
In 1940 Mr. Just was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and died October 27, 1941. |
Dorothy McClendon was born in 1924 in Minden, Louisiana and has been a professional in the field of microbiology for 24 years. She received her Bachelor of Science degree in Biology in 1948 from Tennessee A&I State University. She currently studies tiny living things such as fungi and bacteria, otherwise known as microorganisms that are far too tiny to be seen with the naked eye alone. Some of these microorganisms cause materials, liquid or solid, to become contaminated and decay or to spoil. Some of these microorganisms are very harmful to our bodies and, if you are contaminated by them, they will destroy cells and cause disease.
In Warren, Michigan, at the U.S. Army Tank Automotive Command, Dorothy is a microbiologist who coordinates microbial research and is developing methods to protect the fuel from getting contaminated as well as to protect the deteriorating military storage materials. Currently she is working on developing a fungicide that will not be harmful to the humans that come into contact with it but that will still protect the storage material.
A native to the state of Louisiana (Minden) she moved to Detroit, Michigan where in her early teens she began attending classes at Cass Technical High School and became very interested in the study of science. She later majored in biology at Tennessee Agricultural and Industrial State University as well as attending Wayne State University and University of Detroit and Purdue University where she took advanced science courses.
Prior to taking on the Industrial Microbiologist research for the U.S. Army Tank Automotive Command, Dorothy was a teacher in the public schools of Eldorado, Arkansas and in Phoenix, Arizona.
Dorothy holds the following Memberships and Awards
* Michigan Society of Professional Engineers
* Detroit Central Business District Association
* Tennessee Agricultural and Industrial State University
|
George Washington Carver was known as a Chemurgist. His birthdate is not actually known, but some believe he was born in 1865. Carver grew up in the slavery days, but he never gave up on his goals in life. He received his bachelors from Iowa Agricultural College in 1894. He wanted to help the farmer by teaching them to turn their crops. He also wanted to educate them about three crops that could be used for a variety of things. The peanut, sweet potatoes and soybeans were the three crops George concentrated on.
He taught the cotton farmers how they could rotate their cotton crops with one of these other crops and it would help put the nutrients back in the soil that the cotton drained out. While he was teaching the farmers things he went on to make several different things out of peanuts, pecans, soybeans and sweet potatoes.
George was able to produce paints, stains and even cosmetics. George had there patents in place for the paints, stains and cosmetics. He made things that would help aid the farmers like axle grease, flour, linoleum and many more.
Over the years George was honored for his accomplishments. President Roosevelt gave $30,000 for a national monument to be dedicated to him. Diamond Grove, Missouri has preserved a park and George received the Spingarn Medal in 1923. Unfortunately when George passed in 1943 he had none of his formulas wrote down for others to use. George kept all his formulas in his head and never encountered a problem remembering them. The only thing that was written down was on the bulletins George made all the time. On these bulletins were recipes people would use for baking different things with the peanut, soybeans, sweet potatoes and the pecans that the farmers produced. |
| Ida Stephens Owens: Biochemist | | |
Ida Stephens Owens was born September 26, 1929 in Newark, New York. Ida received her PhD in Biology-Physiology from Duke University in 1967. Ida made the front page in the Carolina Times because she was the first black woman to not only earn her Ph.D, but to ever receive a degree in this field of study at Duke.
Ida is known for her research that is aimed at shedding light on how the human body defends itself against poison. She studies the biochemical and molecular genetics of human UDP-glucuronosyltransferase as it relates to both health and disease states. She is focused on understanding the genetic basis of the detoxifying system responsible for removing noxious chemicals from the body. Ida is helping to determine the genetic basis of hyperbilirubinemic disease. This is being done by cloning, describing, and characterizing the enzyme system.
They are hoping to provide an alternative to liver transplantation for children that are diagnosed with the lethal CN-I disease.
Dr. Owens is known all around the world for her work on drug detoxifying enzymes. She has done numerous written key publications in scientific journals on the genetics of this enzyme system. |
Katherine G. Johnson was born: August 26th, 1918 in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. Katherine is a Physicist, Space Scientist and Mathematician
Ms. Johnson has worked with the tracking teams of manned and unmanned orbital missions for NASA. At the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Langley Research Center, Hampton, Virginia she is an Aerospace Technologist. She trained in West Virginia as a mathematician and physicist and has worked on space navigation, the orbits of spacecraft, interplanetary trajectories and the challenging problems therein.
Spacecrafts Johnson has worked on include the Earth Resources Satellite, which has helped locate underground minerals and other earth resources. Johnson analyzed data on lunar orbital missions, the Apollo moon missions, gathered by tracking stations around the world. She has studied new navigation procedures in order to determine better ways to track the manned and unmanned space missions and her pioneering research in navigational problems has earned her the Group Achievement Award presented to NASA's Lunar Spacecraft and Operations team.
NASA Mission Control Specialists had to know exactly where the spacecraft was at all times during moon flights, relative to the gravitational tugs of Earth, the Sun and the Moon. They had to tell the crew when to fire rockets for altitude changes or for reentry and for many missions NASAs human computer, prior to mechanical devices performing the role, was Johnson, the West Virginia State mathematician who coauthored the early reports on plotting spacecraft trajectories and calculating orbital flights in relation to points on Earth, and locating the orbiting craft.
Ms. Johnson Awards are as follows:
* Recipient of the Group Achievement Award, NASA's Lunar Spacecraft and Operations.
* Honorary Doctor of Laws from the State University of New York in Farmingdale in 1998
* West Virginia State College -- Outstanding Alumnus of the Year (1999) |
|
|
|
|
