Oral history interview with Eugene Garfield
- 1987-Nov-16
Oral history interview with Eugene Garfield
- 1987-Nov-16
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.Eugene Garfield begins this interview by recalling his youth in New York, his family background and early education. He describes his interest in the West, his first jobs in Colorado and California, and his brief military career, injury and subsequent medical discharge. Garfield continues by discussing his undergraduate degree in chemistry, the influence of his first ACS meeting and the Division of Chemical Literature on his life's work. He also talks about his participation in the Welch Medical Library project. In the middle portion of the interview, Garfield focuses on the origin and development of the Institute for Scientific Information [ISI] and its products, including major publications. He also describes his doctoral studies at the University of Pennsylvania, and difficulties in having his thesis approved. The interview concludes with a discussion of his patents for a copying device, an analysis of the successes of ISI, and speculation on ISI's future activities.
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About the Interviewers
Jeffrey L. Sturchio is president and CEO of the Global Health Council. Previously he served as vice president of corporate responsibility at Merck & Co., president of the Merck Company Foundation, and chairman of the U.S. Corporate Council on Africa. Sturchio is currently a visiting scholar at the Institute for Applied Economics and the Study of Business Enterprise at Johns Hopkins University and a member of the Global Agenda Council on the Healthy Next Generation of the World Economic Forum. He received an AB in history from Princeton University and a PhD in the history and sociology of science from the University of Pennsylvania.
Arnold Thackray founded the Chemical Heritage Foundation and served the organization as president for 25 years. He is currently CHF’s chancellor. Thackray received MA and PhD degrees in history of science from Cambridge University. He has held appointments at Cambridge, Oxford University, and Harvard University, the Institute for Advanced Study, the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In 1983 Thackray received the Dexter Award from the American Chemical Society for outstanding contributions to the history of chemistry. He served for more than a quarter century on the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania, where he was the founding chairman of the Department of History and Sociology of Science and is currently the Joseph Priestley Professor Emeritus.
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| Oral history number | 0078 |
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Interviewee biographical information
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Education
| Year | Institution | Degree | Discipline |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1948 | Columbia University | BS | Chemistry |
| 1954 | Columbia University | MS | Library Science |
| 1961 | University of Pennsylvania | PhD | Structural Linguistics |
Professional Experience
Evans Research and Development Corporation
- 1949 to 1950 Laboratory Chemist
Columbia University
- 1950 to 1951 Research Chemist
Johns Hopkins University
- 1951 to 1953 Staff member, Welch Machine Indexing Project
Eugene Garfield Associates
- 1954 to 1960 President
Institute for Scientific Information
- 1960 to 1992 President and CEO
- 1992 Chairman
- 1993 Chairman Emeritus
The Scientist, LLC
- 1986 to 2000 Publisher and Editor-in-Chief
- 2001 President
American Society for Information Science and Technology
- 1998 to 2000 President
Honors
| Year(s) | Award |
|---|---|
| 1953 to 1954 | Grolier Society Fellow, Columbia University |
| 1966 | Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science |
| 1966 | Fellow, Institute of Information Scientists |
| 1975 | Award of Merit, American Society of Information Scientists |
| 1977 | Hall of Fame Award, Information Industry Association |
| 1977 | Herman Skolnik Award, Division of Chemical Information, American Chemical Society |
| 1978 | Book Award for Best Information Science Book of 1977 |
| 1980 | Award, Chemical Notation Society |
| 1983 | Patterson-Crane Award, American Chemical Society |
| 1983 | John Price Wetherill Medal, Franklin Institute |
| 1984 | Derek J. de Solla Price Memorial Medal, Scientometrics |
| 1986 | John Scott Award, City of Philadelphia |
| 1987 | Distinguished Alumni Award, Columbia University, School of Library Service |
| 1988 | Doctor (honoris causa), Vrije University, Brussels, Belgium |
| 1990 | Honorary PhD, State University of New York, Albany |
| 1991 | Honorary Fellow, Society for Technical Communication |
| 1991 | Honorary PhD , Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia |
| 1993 | Honorary Fellow, Medical Libraries Association |
| 1993 | Honorary Foreign Member, Institute of Marine Biology, Vladivostok, Russia |
| 1993 | MD (honoris causa), University of Rome, Tor Vergata, Italy |
| 1995 | MD (honoris causa), Charles University, Czech Republic |
| 1999 | Avenue of Technology Award, Philadephia, Pennsylvania |
| 2000 | Professor Kaula Award for Library and Information Science, India |
| 2007 | Richard J. Bolte, Sr., Award for Supporting Industries, Chemical Heritage Foundation |
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Complete transcript of interview
The published version of the transcript may diverge from the interview audio due to edits to the transcript made by staff of the Center for Oral History, often at the request of the interviewee, during the transcript review process.