Hillebrand, William

William Francis Hillebrand, 1853-1925. Chemist with the U. S. Geological Survey, later Chief Chemist at the Bureau of Standards. President of the American Chemical Society in 1906. Author of The Analysis of Silicate and Carbonate Rocks." He was the first to suggest the possibility of recovering potash from the fumes from cement kilns. 

In 1888-90 the great American mineralogical chemist William F. Hillebrand (46) noticed that, when the mineral uraninite is treated with a mineral acid, an inert gas is evolved, which he believed to be nitrogen. 

When W. F. Hillebrand discovered the presence of nitrogen in uraninite he considered it well worthy of further study but because of urgent official duties was unable to investigate it thoroughly. In one of his letters to Sir William Ramsay he wrote It doubtless has appeared incomprehensible to you in view of the bright argon and other lines noticed by you in the gas from cleveite that they should have escaped my observation. They did not. As Edgar Fahs Smith once stated, The modesty and nobility of Hillebrand shine forth in his beautiful letters to Ramsay (64). 

William Hillebrand discovers that an inert gas is produced when a uranium mineral is dissolved in sulfuric acid. /... 

William Francis Hillebrand was born in Honolulu in 1853. He studied in Heidelberg. Between 1880 and 1908 he worked as a chemist at the US Geological Survey, between 1908 and 1925 he was chief chemist of the US Bureau of Standards. He died in Washington in 1925. 

Ann. Phys.y 1876, clviii, 71 William Francis Hillebrand (Honolulu, 12 December 1853-Washington, 7 February 1925) studied with Bunsen (Ph.D. Heidelberg 1876), was chemist for the U.S. Geological Survey (1880-1908) and chief chemist for the U.S. Bureau of Standards (1908-25). He and T. H. Norton in Bunsen s laboratory prepared cerium, lanthanum, and didymium by electrolysis Ann. Phys.y 1875, civ, 683 1875, clvi, 466. 

Ira Rem sen John H. Long Arthur A. Noyes Francis Preston Venable William F. Hillebrand... 

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