Pre-Barbier Period

13 The Early Histary of Organomagnesium Chemistry 13.1 Pre-Barbier period 

Hallwachs and Schafarik 1859, Cahours 1860. Ten years after Frankland s discovery of the organozinc compounds Hallwachs and Schafarik [23] and then Cahours [24], were able to prepare and identify dialkylmagnesium compounds. 

Lohr 1889. Fleck 1893. However it was a further thirty years before Lohr [25] and Fleck [26] started investigating the reactions of such compounds. 

Ironically, in an attempt to prepare phenylmagnesium bromide which was unknown at that time. Fleck added bromine to a suspension of diphenylmagne-sium in diethyl ether From the equations given in his publication it can be concluded that he should have foreseen the formation of bromobenzene and magnesium bromide on the addition of bromine  

Nevertheless Fleck added bromine until the reaction mixture had attained a yellowish color  

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