JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu Vol. 75 No.

4 April 1998 Journal of Chemical Education 495

Chemistry Everyday for Everyone
Sir Humphry Davy and Frankenstein
Charles J . Thoman
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science,
600 S. 43rd Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104
We are all aware that relating classroom material to the
real world is a time-honored and successful teaching tech-
nique that brings to life otherwise dry (to the student) and
seemingly forbidding subject matter. Even older students still
enjoy understanding the why of things. Why was the fer-
tilizer ammonium nitrate chosen as the explosive material in
the Oklahoma City and Saudi Arabian bombings?Why do
snow and ice slowly disappear even when the temperature
never reaches their melting point?Why does paint dry?What
is the real function of the vitamins?Such explanations can
make the scientific principles that we teach both interesting
and meaningful.
Another strategy that elicits the same response is to
connect what we teach to literature or to the arts. What is
the background to some of the solutions of crimes that are
arrived at by Sherlock Holmes or Dr. Quincy?Are the gadgets
and phenomena depicted in Star Trek (whichever incarna-
tion) or Jurassic Park really possible?
One of the earliest examplesof scientific fiction in English
literature was the novel Frankenstein, published in 1818. How
did the author possibly develop the outlandish idea that a ca-
daver, or a composite of parts from different cadavers, could
be vivifiedbrought to lifeby the infusion of huge amounts
of electricity?We know now, and actually they knew then,
that large amounts of electricity destroy life rather than gen-
erating it. Why was such an obvious fact lost on the author?
We cant today imagine the effect that the discovery of
electricity had on the knowledgeable people of the late 18th
and early 19th centuries. This new force seemed like a
miracle. Nothing like it had existed before, outside of the
lightning that had earlier been attributed directly to the in-
tervention of the gods. And, indeed, it has revolutionized life
on our planet. The argument can easily be made that the
discovery of electricity was and remains the single scientific
discovery that most influences every aspect of our daily lives.
Static electricity had been known for some time. The
Greek word electron means amber; static electricity was gen-
erated by rubbing such materials as amber with a smooth
cloth. Studies of it by Charles Franois Du Fay (1) preceded
the invention in 1745 of the Leiden jar, which stores static
electricity; his assistant received the worlds first recorded
electric shock from it (2). This led to Benjamin Franklins
famous experiment with the kite, which proved that light-
ning was identical with electricity (3).
In Italy, Luigi Galvani (4) found that placing electrodeson
an excised frogsleg caused the musclesto contract. Later, he
discovered that the same effect could result from attaching the
frogsleg to two different metals, in hiscase iron and brass. This
led, in 1800, to Alessandro Voltas(5) development of the so-
called electric pile, what we know asa battery. It consisted of
alternating piecesof silver and zinc metal separated by felt satu-
rated with brine. Thiswasthe first source of an electric current.
Thisbreakthrough wasput to immediate practical uses
especially in England, by Sir Humphry Davy. He developed
and used the process of electrolysis to break melts of salts or
solutions of them into their constituent elements (6) and
thereby, in the first decade of the 19th century, he first isolated
the metals sodium, potassium, magnesium, calcium, barium,
and strontium. This afforded him international notoriety. His
fame in England had started to grow when he began a series
of public lectures/demonstrations at the Royal Institution on
scientific subjects. These became enormously popular, attract-
ing as many as one thousand spectators. One young man who
attended asked to become his assistant: Michael Faraday,
considered by many to be the foremost experimental scientist
of the 19th century.
Davy himself not only lectured, but often invited guest
lecturersto these presentations. Hisearly interest in electricity
impelled him to invite the nephew of Luigi Galvani (who
had died in 1798) to participate. Giovanni Aldini, of the
University of Bologna, had been an associate of his uncle
indeed, to a great extent, his mouthpiece. His demonstra-
tion for Davy occurred in 1803 (7). Using the cadaver of an
executed convict, Aldini placed the electrodes on the wrist,
whereupon the hand twitched and grasped as if alive! Placed
on the legs, the electrodes made them and the feet contort
wildly. Most amazing and frightening of all, when the elec-
trodes were touched to the face, the eyes opened, the mouth
twisted, and, depending on where the electrodes were placed,
the face actually assumed various expressions (8). Some of
the witnesses had to be helped from the auditorium.
It is almost certain that Percy Bysshe Shelley and his wife,
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, were not in the audience that
evening. He would have been eleven at the time, and she only
six. But, considering the sensation that it caused, they both
must have heard vivid descriptionsof it (9). Some twelve years
later, when they were newly married, Davy and his wife, Jane
Apreece, were members of their literary and social circle (10).
Davy was a close friend of Coleridge and Wordsworth, and
wrote poetry himself (11). Mrs. Shelley considered the facts
that were recounted to her concerning the demonstration and
theorized that if a small amount of electricity could seem to
restore life temporarily to a small part of a human body,
perhaps a large amount of it, derived from lightning, could
restore life to the whole. Perhaps electricity was the vital force
that separated living things from nonliving, the power that
gave them the ability to grow and move and generate (12).
Thus was born the supposition of Dr. Frankenstein that
led to his attempts to bring life to a constructed cadaver. The
idea may seem bizarre to us today, but Mrs. Shelley saw the
same kind of logic and possible scientific basis in it that we
now see in some of the assumptions of Star Trek. Is it really
any more incredible than that a colony of dinosaurs could
be regenerated from fossilized genetic material as suggested
Interdisciplinary Connections
edited by
Mark Alber
Darlington School
Rome, GA 30161
496 Journal of Chemical Education Vol. 75 No. 4 April 1998 JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu
Chemistry Everyday for Everyone
in Jurassic Park?She took the same type of literary license
that many outstanding writers of science fiction take today.
With this idea in mind and in preparation for her writ-
ing, Mary Shelley did research on the science that would be
necessary to make it realistic. She did this by studying Davys
A Discourse: Introductoryto a Courseof Lectureson Chemistry,
dating from 1802, and especially his Elementsof Chemical
Philosophy, I, of 1812. In fact, some statements of Professor
Waldman, Victor Frankensteins professor of chemistry at the
University of Ingolstadt, are almost direct quotes from Davys
works (13).
Dr. Frankenstein, or A Modern Prometheuswas published
when Mary Shelley was only 21 years of age. The result was
a classic that has survived the decades and that has been con-
verted into film a multitude of times in different countries
and languages, a story that still fascinates us all. It should
have carried an acknowledgment to Sir Humphry Davy.
Litera ture Cited
1. Dictionary of Scientific Discovery; Gillespie, C. C., Ed.; Charles
Scribners Sons: New York, 1980; I, pp 107108; III, pp 598
604; IV, pp 215216.
2. Asimov, I. Chronologyof Scienceand Discovery; Harper & Row:
New York, 1989; p 197. Dictionaryof ScientificDiscovery; Gillespie,
C. C., Ed.; IX, p 596.
3. Asimov, I. Op. cit.; pp 202203. Dictionaryof ScientificDiscovery;
Gillespie, C. C., Ed.; V, pp 134135.
4. Asimov, I. Op. cit.; p 225. Dictionaryof ScientificDiscovery; Gillespie,
C. C., Ed.; V, pp 267268.
5. Asimov, I. Op. cit.; pp 249250; Dictionaryof ScientificDiscovery;
Gillespie, C. C., Ed.; XIV, pp 7680.
6. Asimov, I. Op. cit.; p 260. Dictionaryof ScientificDiscovery; Gillespie,
C. C., Ed.; III, pp 601602.
7. Dictionaryof ScientificDiscovery; Gillespie, C. C., Ed.; I, p 108.
8. Mellor, A. K. MaryShelley: Her Life, Her Fiction, Her Monsters;
Methuen: New York, 1988; pp 105106.
9. Mellor, A. K. Op. cit.; p 106.
10. Sunstein, E. W. MaryShelley: Romanceand Reality; Little Brown:
Boston, 1989. Knight, D. HumphreyDavy: Scienceand Power;
Blackwell Science: Cambridge, MA, 1992; 24, 121122.
11. Rooney, Robert P. J. Chem. Educ. 1986, 63, 739740. Kumar, V.;
Milewski, L. J. Chem. Educ. 1985, 62, 397398.
12. Cf. Lorenz, O. Lehrbuch der Naturphilosophie; Leipzig, 1809; cited
in Mellor, A. K. Op. cit.; p 106.
13. Mellor, A. K. Op. cit.; pp 9194; Shelley, M. W. Frankenstein;
Modern Library: New York, 1984; pp 4045.
A N ote from M a rk Alber, Editor of Interdisciplina r y Connections
This marks the beginning of a new Journal column, which will provide examples of how chemistry instruction can be
improved by drawing connections to other academic disciplines. The rationale for such a column comes from two observa-
tions. Far too many students perceive chemistry as lifeless and esoteric with little relevance to their lives. At the same time,
many of those who become adept in the field seem to have little interest or ability in explaining what makes chemistry inter-
esting and worthwhile.
My own interest in this area dates back to my time as an undergraduate when I found myself equally drawn to chemistry
and English literature. As I went back and forth between the classes I couldnt help but compare the two fields and look for
connections between them. Since the school I attended did not allow a double major, I ultimately chose a degree in chemis-
try. After working in the chemical industry for several years and moving from industry to teaching, I went back to school and
got a graduate degree in English. For the past twenty years I have taught science in both public and private schools, affluent
and inner city, in this country and abroad. Through it all I have continued to look for connections between chemistry and the
rest of the world.
Four years ago, with the help of a Sci-Mat grant, I began a collaboration with an English teacher to try and put some of
these ideas into practice. The broad goal of the grant was to improve science instruction by incorporating ideas and tech-
niques from the humanities into science. Our specific proposal was to use primary science materials, historical documents,
and laboratory experiences as the basis for creative writing assignments. In the process of researching our project we spoke
with scientists such as Roald Hoffmann at Cornell University and Ted Benfy and Arnold Thachery of the Chemical Heritage
Foundation, who are interested in the relationship between science and the humanities. These conversations plus the over-
whelmingly favorable response to our project from students convinced us that we were dealing with something both impor-
tant and timely.
If you have come up with innovative ways to use literature, art, history, or related disciplines in your course at either the
secondary or college level, please share your ideas with readers of the Journal. An interdisciplinary approach will not take the
place of traditional study, but it can make chemistry more interesting to both scientists and nonscientists and even improve
the relationship between the two.
Mark Alber Darlington School 1014 Cave Spring Road Rome, GA 30161
phone: 706/236-0442 fax: 706/236-0443 email: malber@darlington.rome.ga.us
Mark Alber earned his Bachelors degree in Chemistry from Hendrix College in 1976. He worked
in the chemical industry as both a chemist and process engineer before entering teaching in 1978.
While teaching at Bellaire High School in Houston, Texas he completed his Masters degree in En-
glish literature at the University of Houston. In 1985 he joined the faculty at the Georgetown Prepa-
ratory School in Bethesda, Maryland. In 1991 he was selected to participate in the Fulbright exchange
program and taught a variety of science courses, including A level Chemistry at the Yately Compre-
hensive school in England. Currently Mark teaches Advanced Placement Chemistry and video pro-
duction at Darlington School in Rome, Georgia, where he is head of the science department. He has
received numerous grants, which have enabled him to pursue his interest in interdisciplinary studies.

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