Bonding Beyond Borders: The Nozoe Autograph Books and Other Collections

Abstract

This is a story of bonding, chemical and human. It is a story of connectivity among scientists through conversations, shared experiences and common interests. It is a story of a man who, for over 40 years, carried an autograph book with him and encouraged thousands of chemists around the world to record their presence and connection with him and with chemistry. This story goes beyond the publications, patents and books that record the progress and history of science. It is the story of people, of other autograph books and memorabilia of all sorts: notes retained, letters filed, photographs stored. It is more than a story about memories; it is a story about the context in which we interact: talk, work and play, and ultimately record our presence in this world. For 41 years, beginning on July 19, 1953 in West Germany and ending on October 16, 1994 in Japan, eminent chemist Tetsuo Nozoe (Figure 1; born May 16, 1902—died April 4, 1996) invited many thousands of people to sign his autograph books. Nozoe could not have imagined that an idea of a man in his fifties would continue and expand for four more decades, finally totalling nine volumes and 1179 pages in all. These represent a wonderful—even unique—collection, worthy of great honor. These autograph books chronicle not only the travels of Nozoe to places far from and near to Sendai, his home during his time at Tohoku University, and in Tokyo, after his official but not actual retirement. The books also record the travels of chemistry colleagues and friends to Japan as well as to sites of chemistry conferences, especially the ISNA meetings, where both Nozoe and others would congregate. In addition, these books illustrate, via chemical structures, the lives of the signatories and often, much about their personality as well. Tetsuo Nozoe, 1952. This essay (1) will introduce Tetsuo Nozoe and the Nozoe Autograph Books to the chemical and history of science communities; (2) will present Wiley-VCH and The Chemical Record's project, the publication of these books in both journal format and in an editable, searchable website http://www.tcr.wiley-vch.de/nozoe/ which will be open access for at least three yearsfrom its initial publication date; (3) will discuss what an autograph book is and can be, not just for the owners of the books but for the signees and those who subsequently read them; and (4) will briefly acknowledge other forms of memorabilia that are cousins to the Nozoe Autograph Books. In addition, the author, who is serving as Guest Editor of The Chemical Record for this project, will share his own personal and professional experiences with Nozoe, with Nozoe's autograph books, and with his own autograph books. The publishers of The Chemical Record and this author welcome you to the Nozoe Autograph Books and hope that you will have fun and even learn from the experience. In this and 14 subsequent issues of The Chemical Record, these autograph books will be presented to you in a unique fashion. The books will become part of the permanent chemical record, roughly 80 pages in each of 15 consecutive issues of The Chemical Record. In addition, Wiley-VCH, the publisher of The Chemical Record, has taken on the responsibility of producing a special, new section of the journal's website which will provide the pages from the autograph books—free of charge, open access, for at least three years from the start of publication. Furthermore, Wiley-VCH has funded a web design which will not just allow but will encourage users of the website to identify signatures and enter the names of the signees and other information into the website's database such that the identified signatories and their affiliations will be indexed and easily searchable. This project was the joint brainchild of Eva Wille, Vice President and Executive Director at Wiley-VCH, and this author. I remember, quite clearly, seeking out and finding Eva at the Wiley exhibitor's booth at the 2006 Fall National Meeting of the American Chemical Society in San Francisco. I showed her the combined Nozoe autograph books and her response was as I had anticipated: great excitement (Figure 2). She was immediately enthralled by the books. She sat there and went page by page, happily recalling many people and her interactions with them over the years. Eva Wille examining for the first time the combined and reproduced Nozoe Autograph Books, lent to the author by Koji Nakanishi, at the Wiley exhibition at the 232nd ACS National Meeting, San Francisco, CA, September 11, 2006. Photograph courtesy J. I. Seeman. I suggested publishing the autograph books, and that conversation ultimately led to this project. Clearly, Eva was committed to seeing the Nozoe books in print, archived and accessible to all. We also immediately recognized the necessity to develop a searchable index of the entries. It was my idea to convert this challenge—we weren't certain we could identify all or even most of the autographs—into a wiki-like experience, “wiki” meaning a “server software that allows users to freely create and edit Web page content using any browser.” Eventually, this project was given to Brian Johnson, Managing Editor of The Chemical Record, who undertook the project with great enthusiasm and vigor. The rest is history. Or rather, the rest in now. The website, and I repeat its web address http://www.tcr.wiley-vch.de/nozoe/, is user-friendly. The website was designed to allow easy and instantaneous usage. Nonetheless, detailed instructions as to how to use the site and add information to the site's database are provided therein. The editors, publisher, and I hope and anticipate that the Nozoe Autograph Book Project will bring fun, enlightenment, perhaps a special “reunion” with old friends and current heroes, as well as a sense of context and history to our community. Please contact us with your comments, suggestions and experiences. In the late 1940s and 1950s, the world of aromaticity was being turned upside down. Novel compounds, structures, theories, concepts and terminology were appearing regularly in the chemical literature. Particularly striking was the recognition of a large number of structurally diverse compounds that were accurately described at the time as “non-benzenoid aromatic compounds.”[1] As an example of the concept of multiple simultaneous discoveries,[2] a number of scientists in locations around the world had, nearly simultaneously, discovered that tropolone (1) had aromatic character.[3-6] One of these scientists, Tetsuo Nozoe, would become one of the chemistry community's most well-known, admired, and well-liked practitioners. See Figure 3. Three happy friends sharing a warm moment. Tetsuo Nozoe with Koji Nakanishi (left) and Ron Breslow (right), Sendai, 1970. Breslow started the ISNA series of symposia as a tribute to Nozoe, and he participated in many of the early ISNA meetings. Breslow is well known for his pioneering work in novel aromatic compounds and, in 1965, coined the term “antiaromatic” [55,56] for molecules such as cyclobutadiene, to distinguish them from aromatic compounds. Nakanishi was a close friend and colleague of Nozoe's, having spent a number of years on the faculty of Tohoku University in Sendai in the 1960s prior to joining the faculty at Columbia University. Nakanishi has written an essay about Professor Nozoe and the autograph books that will appear shortly in this journal.[57] Nozoe was to devote his professional life—70 years of research[5]—to the study of tropolone and its derivatives and other novel aromatic compounds. He spent most of his early professional career—from 1928 to 1948—on a then rather undeveloped island, isolated from mainstream science. Indeed, shortly after his arrival on the island, the 1930 Musha Incident witnessed headhunting and other atrocities, one consequence was to limit Nozoe's ability and comfort in going into the forests to collect specimens.[5] That island was then called Formosa and is now known as Taiwan. Formosa was under Japanese control from the mid-1890s until war's end in 1945. For 20 years, Nozoe had been a professor of chemistry at Taihoku Imperial University in Taipei.≠ It was during those early years in Formosa that the foundation of Nozoe's work on novel aromatic compounds was laid down. Nozoe's birthright notwithstanding, after the war, he was asked—commanded, actually[7]—to remain for several years at the newly established National Taiwan University by his now Chinese hosts in their newly established country. The laboratories in Taiwan had not survived the bombings, and Nozoe was charged with rejuvenating the department in the early post-war environment. In 1948, Nozoe was permitted by the Taiwanese authorities to return to Japan where a position was waiting for him at Tohoku University in Sendai. Upon his return to Tohoku in 1948, Nozoe found that “the situation in Sendai seemed to be worse than that in Taiwan.”[5] He had been allowed to bring quantities of his research samples to Japan,&256C; and from those samples combined with hard work and productive colleagues and students, Nozoe's research in troponoid chemistry blossomed. In this essay, I shall neither review nor laud Nozoe's research. For those who wish to learn more about his science, there is his own autobiography published just a few years before his passing.[5] There are also a number of authoritative reviews of his chemistry that were published, many by Nozoe himself, and by others to commemorate his chemical achievements.[7-17] Several factors led to the recognition of Nozoe's contribution to novel aromatic compounds by the early 1950s: his publications and reviews, especially when they became available in English; his correspondence with European and American chemists; and the visits of American scientists to Japan in the late 1940s and early 1950s, following the war, who were assessing Japanese science.[5] “Unexpectedly, in the summer of 1952, I received an invitation from Professor Erdtman of Sweden to give a lecture on hinokitiol [2, a tropolone] at the Symposium of Natural Products Chemistry. This symposium was to be a part of the IUPAC Congress that was being held in Stockholm in the summer of the following year . . . Because this overseas trip was to be a new experience for me, I decided to contact those professors whom I knew through the exchange of publications and ask them to assist me in setting up an itinerary. “I wrote to Professor Clemens Schöpf[18] (Darmstadt) regarding a trip to Germany, Professor Alexander Todd (Cambridge) for the United Kingdom, Professor Dupont (École Normale Supérieur) for France, and Professor Louis Fieser (Harvard) for the United States. In each letter, I indicated the flight number, the airport at which I would arrive, the number of days I was planning to spend, and the names of the persons with whom I wished to meet. Within approximately two weeks, every one of my letters had been kindly answered. Each person indicated that because it would take some time for a detailed schedule to be drawn up, they would contact me at the respective airports or through the IUPAC Congress Office in Stockholm. I was also asked to prepare a one-hour lecture based on our research in tropolone chemistry . . . “Dorothy Mizoguchi translated the manuscript [that I had written for my talk] and Dr. Koji Nakanishi [who had studied at Harvard with Fieser] recorded it on tape. I spent the remainder of my time before the trip practicing my English pronunciation and intonation via the tape and Linguaphone record . . .”[5] Imagine what this experience must have meant for Tetsuo Nozoe. In mid-July 1953, he arrived in Darmstadt, West Germany from Sendai in northern Japan, 5700 miles distant. The taste of World War II was still fresh in the minds of many. International travel was rare in those days. Even international telephone calls were highly exceptional. It was Nozoe's first trip abroad (of course, he had spent 20 years in Formosa and then Taiwan), a four-month adventure that would take him to many cities in Europe and the United States, including to the then Territory of Hawaii. Nozoe was going on a feast of international chemistry! In 1953, Nozoe was no youngster. He was a 51-year old chemist, much closer to retirement age than to the receipt of his Ph.D. He surely had poor if any facility in the various languages in which he found himself surrounded. He must also have had little knowledge of Western culture or ways. But he was rich in manner and optimism, energy and enthusiasm, appreciation and generosity, and love of people and chemistry.[5,7,8,12,19] The following decades witnessed the worldwide recognition that this fine gentleman and scholar received for his research and for his personal and professional qualities. “My happiest memory of Tetsuo Nozoe was when he arrived at Birkbeck College [London] in the early fifties on his first visit outside Japan. He gave us an interesting Lecture. He spoke in Japanese English that he had learned during his trip . . . I admired his courage very much! He succeeded admirably in his mission. Everyone appreciated him with affection.”[20] Tetsuo Nozoe with his friend, Derek Barton, sharing a happy moment, 1985. Barton, who signed Nozoe's autograph books at least ten times, received the Nobel Prize in 1969 for his “contributions to the development of the concept of conformation and its application in chemistry.” “He was making his first tour to strengthen the relationship between chemists in Japan and the United States. This was early in the 1950s. I remember his lecture well because he had brought with him vials containing multi-gram samples of each of the new compounds discussed in his lecture. He was very enthusiastic and was anxious to learn about new, unpublished results at each of the institutes he visited.”[21] “Before I left [my first stop, in Darmstadt, West Germany], I handed a notebook to Professor Schöpf and asked him to scribble something in it in memory of our meeting. [See page 1 for Professor Schöpf's autograph, his being the first in the autograph books.] Those words were the beginning of a souvenir that would become an important memoir of my travels . . . “When I began my collection with my first trip abroad, thinking these signatures would be a special memento of my travels. When I saw the enthusiastic response of those I asked, and realized how much I enjoyed rereading their comments, I decided to pursue my hobby more vigorously. I then began requesting autographs from friends and colleagues wherever and whenever we gathered—both at home and abroad—at meetings, lectures, labs, and social gatherings.”[5] “interesting comments, kind wishes, and fond memories of many exceptionally talented people”[5] as well as chemical structures, other drawings and cartoons, even poems and haikus. “Nozoe's charm was irresistible to all he decided visiting. By his very nature, he imposed gentleness even on chemists who were not necessarily gentle by nature.”[22] “I remember Tetsuo Nozoe, the lifelong friend of chemists worldwide. He would pass the book he carried everywhere and ask that I pick a page, draw him some pictures of ‘my molecules’ and sign the page to commemorate our reunion. What a book! I could scarcely contain my wonderment as I turned the pages, seeing the entire world of modern organic chemistry encapsulated so beautifully and so personally, all in one place. This man knew everyone.”[23] Figure 5 illustrates one eminent chemist, Professor Adolph Butenandt (Kaiser Wilhelm Institute, Tubingen and Munich, Nobel Prize in 1939) signing the Nozoe autograph book in 1955. I wish there were more photographs of the signees holding the most current autograph book! (Should you have one or know of one, please contact me.) The reader will have many opportunities to survey the Nozoe autograph books within this issue of The Chemical Record and on the web. Thus, I shall not duplicate many of these pages herein. But I shall include some of my favorites, including a wonderful graphic by Sir Robert Robinson detailing his chemical and personal pathways and his vibrant personality (Figure 6). Professor Adolf Butenandt (Nobel prize in 1939 “for his work on sex hormones”) signing Nozoe's autograph book (page 65), Tohoku University, Sendai, April 1955. In the background, barely visible are two figures watching Butenandt sign the book. Presumably, one of them is Nozoe. Graphical entry and message from Sir Robert Robinson and Lady Robinson, September 1964 (page 161), likely during a visit of the Robinsons to Japan. Underneath the heading, “An old English proverb says: ‘Rolling stones gather no moss’ ”, Sir Robert summarizes his chemical and personal pathways, from Manchester (1906) to Shell (1964). He also includes the names of several Japanese co-workers. These books are far more than a chemist's fancy, more than a sentimental man's hobby. are a that a travels and personal professional and are a of the connectivity within the a of shared and are a collection of chemical structures, and represent a and a of within the chemistry community. I have a very personal and of Tetsuo Nozoe's experiences with his autograph books. In the early I became very with and Eva was a at the National of in where I was a for two years, In I had of who would become quite for his research in the of Eva was the of of Nobel Prize in the who established in that the is a chemical rather than a a visit at the I learned of and autograph books that he had in his home in When I to in the of to take my first permanent professional position and my first I decided that I would an autograph book for That book is now the first in a series of autograph books in my own personal One is for to my of my books. is for to my or Figure entry in my home autograph book on the of his the of July This entry me of what we that years love of led us to a with of of and on an some miles outside of This is entry to the home autograph book. to the and, some a most I and was a chemist also known for his work on the of and the of compounds with to compounds including entry in Nozoe's autograph page on September to the of the It was only after I learned of Tetsuo Nozoe's autograph books I the to expand my home autograph collection to a What great friends and colleagues much in seeing their autographs or those of their from decades I much more than just the of to my friends and For the I two from my autograph books. The in Figure is a by a friend and the time of his entry on was a to the at which I was I was a in my professional a in my in Figure illustrates the continue my current chemical in a perhaps even a or a of great and That me and The entry in the autograph book by his friend and was the author to his a or one which would and would also in being I May when I showed a of this manuscript to he or its me a of (Figure are by Koji Nakanishi and both from Columbia University, after we and other friends had enjoyed a fine in on July 16, As they were about to sign the I that I was shortly going to visit friends at the in it was the of the that them both to to Nobel Prize in Koji was as he is when at that But asked a very a meaning and I would only nearly ten years when I was the of that the of was a received the Nobel Prize in In my autograph asked you know or to repeat the of to See Figure and from Koji Nakanishi, Koji Nakanishi, and in the autograph July 16, The author was shortly to visit and others in These were for their friend in you know or to repeat the of to he know and you are the only one who . . . It is worthy of that the his in as if there are many other chemists who be a scholar and a friend of See 1 and the for The to that is in In and the of and the of use of is retained, in with the context of the and had into and his had the of to But and had not provided the of their work which and of a of was In this message to in my autograph book in was if or known to had to repeat the and work a

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 23 citations exist upstream.

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.