Loci and Employment

Leading institutions with which ACS presidents were affiliated, 1876-1981 

Note An institution is included in this list if, at any time in his post-baccalaureate career, an ACS president was a student, faculty member, postdoctoral fellow, or research worker at that institution. 

This point is highlighted when one recalls that, at least since the late 1920s, 70% of American chemists have been employed in private industry (see Section 5.1). Strauss and Rainwater note that 70.4% of ACS members in 1960 were either self-employed or in private industry (III, Strauss and Rainwater, 1962, 37). The same survey indicated that academic chemists (and research administrators) are at least twice as active as other groups within the chemical community in local section governance (ibid, 176,187). 

The resurgence of industrial chemists in the ACS presidency since World War II is connected to at least two developments in ACS policies and politics. First, in 1943 the ACS instituted a policy of alternating academics and industrialists in the presidency. Second, since the mid-1960s increasing concern among rank-and-file ACS members over such issues as unemployment and member assistance has led to a number of petition candidacies from the industrial chemical community (see IB, Skolnik and Reese, 1976, 14,183-185). 

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