Gilman Hall is a building on the campus of the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

. Room 307 was where

Glenn T. Seaborg Glenn Theodore Seaborg (; April 19, 1912February 25, 1999) was an American chemist whose involvement in the synthesis, discovery and investigation of ten transuranium elements earned him a share of the 1951 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. His work in ...

and his coworkers identified

plutonium Plutonium is a radioactive chemical element with the symbol Pu and atomic number 94. It is an actinide metal of silvery-gray appearance that tarnishes when exposed to air, and forms a dull coating when oxidized. The element normally exhibi ...

as a new element on February 23, 1941 and as such, is designated a

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...

. The building itself is designated a

National Historic Chemical Landmark The National Historic Chemical Landmarks program was launched by the American Chemical Society in 1992 to recognize significant achievements in the history of chemistry and related professions. The program celebrates the The central science, cent ...

, recognizing the two Nobel Prizes in Chemistry that have resulted from research done in the building.

History

Gilman Hall was built from 1916 to 1917 to accommodate an expanded College of Chemistry under the leadership of

Gilbert N. Lewis Gilbert Newton Lewis (October 23 or October 25, 1875 – March 23, 1946) was an American physical chemist and a Dean of the College of Chemistry at University of California, Berkeley. Lewis was best known for his discovery of the covalent bond a ...

. Designed by

John Galen Howard John Galen Howard (May 8, 1864 in Chelmsford, Massachusetts – July 18, 1931 in San Francisco, California) was an American architect and educator who began his career in New York before moving to California. He was the principal architect at in ...

, the building provided research and teaching facilities for faculty and students specializing in

physical Physical may refer to: *Physical examination In a physical examination, medical examination, or clinical examination, a medical practitioner examines a patient for any possible medical signs or symptoms of a medical condition. It generally co ...

inorganic In chemistry, an inorganic compound is typically a chemical compound that lacks carbon–hydrogen bonds, that is, a compound that is not an organic compound. The study of inorganic compounds is a subfield of chemistry known as '' inorganic chemist ...

and

nuclear chemistry Nuclear chemistry is the sub-field of chemistry dealing with radioactivity, nuclear processes, and transformations in the nuclei of atoms, such as nuclear transmutation and nuclear properties. It is the chemistry of radioactive elements such as t ...

. It was named for

Daniel Coit Gilman Daniel Coit Gilman (; July 6, 1831 – October 13, 1908) was an American educator and academic. Gilman was instrumental in founding the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale College, and subsequently served as the second president of the University ...

, president of the University of California from 1872 to 1875.

Room 307

In 1942, the Berkeley campus became quite involved in the war effort of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. The top floor, or "attic," of Gilman Hall was fenced off for classified work in nuclear chemistry. Half of the rooms in the attic had small balconies that could be used as outdoor

fume hood A fume hood (sometimes called a fume cupboard or fume closet) is a type of local ventilation device that is designed to limit exposure to hazardous or toxic fumes, vapors or dusts. Description A fume hood is typically a large piece of equipmen ...

s, but the actual hoods in Gilman Hall were not equipped with fans. They operated only as chimneys, with a burner flame that produced a draft. For the war work, electrically powered fans were finally installed to vent the hoods. Plutonium research in Gilman Hall was part of the

Manhattan Project The Manhattan Project was a research and development undertaking during World War II that produced the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States with the support of the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the project w ...

to develop the atomic bomb. In 1942, Seaborg left Berkeley to join the Manhattan Project in Chicago. He returned to Berkeley after the war and directed the university's nuclear chemistry research. Between 1976 and 1983, as part of the

Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program The Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP) is a United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) project to manage and cleanup environmental contamination that resulted from early United States Atomic Energy Commission activities. Cl ...

, the

Department of Energy A Ministry of Energy or Department of Energy is a government department in some countries that typically oversees the production of fuel and electricity; in the United States, however, it manages nuclear weapons development and conducts energy-rel ...

conducted remedial action to remove or shield floor and walls contaminated with uranium from the nuclear research done in the Hall.

Nobel Prizes

Two Nobel Prizes in Chemistry have been awarded for research done in the building. The first was to

William Giauque William Francis Giauque (;''The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia'', 2004. May 12, 1895 – March 28, 1982) was a Canadian-born American chemist and Nobel laureate recognized in 1949 for his studies in the properties of matter at temperatures clo ...

in 1949 for his studies in the properties of matter at temperatures close to

absolute zero Absolute zero is the lowest limit of the thermodynamic temperature scale, a state at which the enthalpy and entropy of a cooled ideal gas reach their minimum value, taken as zero kelvin. The fundamental particles of nature have minimum vibration ...

. Seaborg received the second one in 1951 for discoveries in the

transuranium element The transuranium elements (also known as transuranic elements) are the chemical elements with atomic numbers greater than 92, which is the atomic number of uranium. All of these elements are unstable and decay radioactively into other elements. ...

s. Four other individuals who did research here received Nobel Prizes for later work as well.

Gilman Hall today

Gilman Hall has been used continuously by the College of Chemistry for 80 years; today it is occupied by the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. However, its laboratory equipment is no longer suitable for modern chemical research and as such, the University has renovated and converted some of the rooms into offices, classrooms, and small research laboratories. Following the FUSRAP remediation work, Gillman Hall has been certified as safe to current radiologic standards. The University of California is responsible for maintenance and monitoring of the shielded contamination.

References

* * * * {{National Register of Historic Places in California School buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in California University of California, Berkeley buildings National Historic Landmarks in the San Francisco Bay Area Beaux-Arts architecture in California Neoclassical architecture in California John Galen Howard buildings Science and technology in the San Francisco Bay Area National Register of Historic Places in Berkeley, California World War II on the National Register of Historic Places in California