Sir Arthur William Rucker (or Rücker) (23 October 1848,

Clapham Park Clapham Park is an area in the Borough of Lambeth in London, to the south of central Clapham and west of Brixton. History The original Clapham Park Estate was a speculative development by Thomas Cubitt, who bought of Bleak Hall Farm in 1825 ...

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– 1 November 1915,

Yattendon Yattendon is a small village and civil parish northeast of Newbury in the county of Berkshire. The M4 motorway passes through the fields of the village which lie south and below the elevations of its cluster. The village is privately owned ...

Berkshire Berkshire ( ; in the 17th century sometimes spelt phonetically as Barkeshire; abbreviated Berks.) is a historic county in South East England. One of the home counties, Berkshire was recognised by Queen Elizabeth II as the Royal County of Berk ...

) was a British

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...

Education and career

Rucker gained his BA at

Brasenose College Brasenose College (BNC) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. It began as Brasenose Hall in the 13th century, before being founded as a college in 1509. The library and chapel were added in the m ...

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

, in 1871, and was a Fellow there from 1871 to 1876. He was Professor of Physics, and the first Cavendish Professor at

Yorkshire College , mottoeng = And knowledge will be increased , established = 1831 – Leeds School of Medicine1874 – Yorkshire College of Science1884 - Yorkshire College1887 – affiliated to the federal Victoria University1904 – University of Leeds , ...

Leeds Leeds () is a city and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds district in West Yorkshire, England. It is built around the River Aire and is in the eastern foothills of the Pennines. It is also the third-largest settlement (by populati ...

from 1874 to 1885. Rucker was then a Professor of Physics at the

Royal College of Science The Royal College of Science was a higher education institution located in South Kensington; it was a constituent college of Imperial College London from 1907 until it was wholly absorbed by Imperial in 2002. Still to this day, graduates from th ...

from 1886 to 1901, when he left to become Principal of the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...

. He received the honorary degree ''

Doctor of Science Doctor of Science ( la, links=no, Scientiae Doctor), usually abbreviated Sc.D., D.Sc., S.D., or D.S., is an academic research degree awarded in a number of countries throughout the world. In some countries, "Doctor of Science" is the degree used f ...

'' (D.Sc.) from the

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

in May 1902, and from the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

in June 1902.

Royal Society

He was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

in 1884. He jointly gave the Royal Society's

Bakerian Lecture The Bakerian Medal is one of the premier medals of the Royal Society that recognizes exceptional and outstanding science. It comes with a medal award and a prize lecture. The medalist is required to give a lecture on any topic related to physical ...

in 1889, and was awarded the Royal Society's

Royal Medal The Royal Medal, also known as The Queen's Medal and The King's Medal (depending on the gender of the monarch at the time of the award), is a silver-gilt medal, of which three are awarded each year by the Royal Society, two for "the most important ...

in 1891: "For his researches on liquid films, and his contributions to our knowledge of terrestrial magnetism". He served as Secretary of the Royal Society from 1896 to 1901. For his services, he was

knighted A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the Christian denomination, church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood ...

in the

1902 Coronation Honours The 1902 Coronation Honours were announced on 26 June 1902, the date originally set for the coronation of King Edward VII. The coronation was postponed because the King had been taken ill two days before, but he ordered that the honours list shou ...

, receiving the accolade from King

Edward VII Edward VII (Albert Edward; 9 November 1841 – 6 May 1910) was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and Emperor of India, from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910. The second child and eldest son of Queen Victoria an ...

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on 24 October that year.

Lectures

In 1889 Rucker was invited to deliver the Royal Institution Christmas Lecture on electricity.

Politics

In the general election of 1885, Rucker stood as the

Liberal Liberal or liberalism may refer to: Politics * a supporter of liberalism ** Liberalism by country * an adherent of a Liberal Party * Liberalism (international relations) * Sexually liberal feminism * Social liberalism Arts, entertainment and m ...

candidate for the newly created Leeds North constituency. He was narrowly defeated by the

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...

candidate William Jackson by 4,494 votes to 4,237. The following year, Rucker stood again in the general election of 1886 as a candidate for the

Liberal Unionist Party The Liberal Unionist Party was a British political party that was formed in 1886 by a faction that broke away from the Liberal Party. Led by Lord Hartington (later the Duke of Devonshire) and Joseph Chamberlain, the party established a political ...

(a breakaway wing of the Liberals that formed an electoral pact with the Conservatives). In that election, where Rucker stood in the Pudsey constituency in West Yorkshire, he lost to the Liberal candidate Briggs Priestley by 5,207 votes to 4,036.

Family life

His first wife died in 1878 and he married Thereza, a daughter of Nevil Story-Maskylene, in 1892.

Arms

References

Sources

Entry for Rucker
in the Royal Society's Library and Archive catalogue's details of Fellows (accessed 27 April 2008)

External links

Obituary: Sir Arthur Rucker

Geographical Review The ''Geographical Review'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal published by Routledge on behalf of the American Geographical Society. It covers all aspects of geography. The editor-in-chief is David H. Kaplan (Kent State University). ...

, Vol. 1, No. 4 (April 1916), pp. 309–309
Sir Arthur William Rucker
picture from

Science and Society Picture Library The Science Museum is a major museum on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, London. It was founded in 1857 and is one of the city's major tourist attractions, attracting 3.3 million visitors annually in 2019. Like other publicly funded ...

(Science Museum, London) {{DEFAULTSORT:Rucker, Arthur William 1848 births 1915 deaths British physicists Alumni of Brasenose College, Oxford Fellows of Brasenose College, Oxford Fellows of the Royal Society Knights Bachelor Royal Medal winners Presidents of the Physical Society People from Yattendon Liberal Unionist Party parliamentary candidates