J Willard Hershey (6 February 1876,

Gettysburg, Pennsylvania Gettysburg (; non-locally ) is a borough and the county seat of Adams County in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. The Battle of Gettysburg (1863) and President Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address are named for this town. Gettysburg is home to th ...

– 27 September 1943) was an American chemist who was best known for his work on synthetic diamond production. There is, however, some doubt whether his success was real, or whether co-workers introduced the diamonds without his knowledge. He also studied the effects of rare gases such as helium on animal life. He was awarded a B.S. degree in 1907 and an M.S. degree in 1910 by Gettysburg College. He studied at

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

in 1907 and 1908 and at

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hem ...

in 1910 and 1911, and was awarded a Ph.D. by the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...

in 1924. He was head of

McPherson College McPherson College is a private college associated with the Church of the Brethren and located in McPherson, Kansas. It was chartered in 1887 and is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission. History During their 1887 Annual Meeting, the Ch ...

's chemistry department from 1918 to 1945, and became president of the Kansas Academy of Science in 1933.

References

1876 births 1943 deaths American chemists McPherson College faculty University of Chicago alumni Gettysburg College alumni People from Gettysburg, Pennsylvania Harvard University alumni Johns Hopkins University alumni {{US-chemist-stub