00:00:00 I'd like to say a bit about that, because I do regard it as terribly important.

00:00:05 And did you...

00:00:14 Nothing happened, except people just knew a bit more about everything.

00:00:19 But there were no revolutions.

00:00:21 And then suddenly, two or three revolutions,

00:00:25 One of the things I was going to ask you about when you were talking about it,

00:00:28 but then you moved on to another topic,

00:00:30 was did they know the function of these acetylenes in plants?

00:00:34 Are they a growth enhancer?

00:00:37 We know some of the things they do.

00:00:40 Undoubtedly, in fungi, they do help in a kind of defensive way.

00:00:47 That is, the fungi put out things that people don't like.

00:00:50 They help in a kind of defensive way.

00:00:53 That is, the fungi put out things that prevent other plants invading their territory.

00:00:59 This, undoubtedly, they do do.

00:01:03 But, by and large, no.

00:01:07 I think we just have to say we don't know what the function is.

00:01:11 And of course, this is one of the fascinations,

00:01:13 a thing that one would like to learn.

00:01:15 Do you want to have this in your hand too?

00:01:18 Yes.

00:01:19 Well, I have actually said a bit of that,

00:01:22 exploring the unknown, that I've dealt with.

00:01:28 Collaboration I haven't dealt with, that's right.

00:01:31 Shall we get some tea now?

00:01:34 Oh yes, shall we skip for tea then?

00:01:36 Is this the time that we said, what time did we say?

00:01:38 We did, in fact.

00:01:39 This next twenty minutes.

00:01:41 Want me to hold up a bit of paper?

00:01:44 Yes, well, you stop me if you think we're not doing enough.

00:01:50 There's another tape.

00:01:54 Yes, ma'am.

00:01:55 Good boy.

00:01:56 I tell you, who is this?

00:01:58 She's turning into a monster.

00:02:00 Before my very eyes.

00:02:05 Five, four, three.

00:02:09 You had some things to say about some of the people you've collaborated with.

00:02:15 Yes, one is very fortunate indeed in having the opportunities

00:02:21 of collaborating with so many people in our kind of activity.

00:02:25 But first of all, I should think of the people

00:02:28 that I worked with right at the beginning, my teachers.

00:02:32 Simonson, of course, was undoubtedly a chemist

00:02:36 of the greatest distinction, and he worked with Perkin

00:02:40 who worked with the great von Bayer,

00:02:42 and so I was getting instruction in experimental techniques

00:02:46 which came from Germany in the middle of the last century,

00:02:50 and there's no doubt the experimental technique

00:02:52 that Simonson and Perkin had was of the highest quality.

00:02:59 But then, when I went to Heilbronn, I acquired something quite different.

00:03:04 Heilbronn was, of course, very interested in chemistry,

00:03:08 but he was also interested in people,

00:03:11 and he regarded people as perhaps as important as chemistry,

00:03:15 and I think he was right.

00:03:17 I think you can't just progress by being a chemist.

00:03:22 You've got to be able to contribute in some way or other

00:03:26 to the world in which you're living,

00:03:30 and he put quite a bit of emphasis, I think,

00:03:34 on understanding people and learning to work with people,

00:03:38 being tolerant.

00:03:40 He could, of course, be fairly forthright at times.

00:03:45 If things weren't going the way he expected them to go,

00:03:48 it didn't do us any harm to get a kick in the pants now and again,

00:03:52 but most of the time it was encouragement that he used

00:03:57 and really did encourage those of us who worked with him,

00:04:01 and inevitably I have tended to adopt the same techniques myself

00:04:09 when I got into the position where I could exert any sort of influence.

00:04:15 The other great thing about Heilbronn, of course, was his loyalty.

00:04:19 He was a Jew.

00:04:21 He was in the army in the First World War.

00:04:25 He had a tremendous loyalty to the country, militarily and domestically,

00:04:31 and to those who worked for and with him.

00:04:38 If you did what he wanted,

00:04:42 he was not averse from any contribution from you

00:04:47 as to the direction, the way things were going,

00:04:50 but he was very keen to help people who helped him,

00:04:55 and at times even embarrassment.

00:04:57 Being pushed forward as a young man wasn't always what I wanted,

00:05:02 but I got a great deal of it in the days immediately after the war

00:05:07 when I had certainly been doing a lot for Heilbronn.

00:05:10 I'd kept Imperial College, or at least his part of it, going

00:05:13 fairly flourishingly during that period,

00:05:16 and he was very intent on seeing that I got my due deservance.

00:05:20 The other thing, of course, is then people who've worked with me,

00:05:23 and I've had very fruitful collaboration with,

00:05:26 particularly the people who've worked as my lieutenants,

00:05:29 Mark Whiting, Bernard Henvest, and Tom Halsall.

00:05:33 These have been the main collaborators whose work with me I have enjoyed,

00:05:38 but there are several others that I could mention

00:05:42 that it has been a great pleasure to work with.

00:05:46 Collaboration, of course, then goes beyond one's immediate circle,

00:05:50 and I was thinking the other day of the collaboration

00:05:54 that takes place in my subject all over the world.

00:05:58 I looked at one of our papers, a paper on hydroxyhopinone.

00:06:02 This was one that made a rather important contribution

00:06:06 in the structure of the triterpenes,

00:06:09 and in it we thanked E.J. Corey, who was then in Illinois.

00:06:14 We thanked Carl Geraci, who was then at Wayne University in Detroit.

00:06:19 Derek Barton, who was in Glasgow.

00:06:23 Oskar Jaeger, who was in Zurich.

00:06:27 And Mills, forget his first name now, who was in the National Gallery.

00:06:32 This was on Damar resin, and the National Gallery connection comes in

00:06:36 because Mills was a chemist concerned with restoration and that,

00:06:40 and he was interested in the composition of the varnishes

00:06:43 that were used in the paintings that he was having to work with.

00:06:47 Now all of these people were involved in collaboration of one kind or another.

00:06:51 It consisted of many things, providing specimens, providing information,

00:06:56 providing determinations.

00:06:59 For example, Corey did some labelling work for us.

00:07:03 We sent a sample to him and he labelled it the deuterium

00:07:06 and did a spectrum for us.

00:07:09 That sort of thing.

00:07:11 And over the years this has resulted in a tremendous amount of to-ing and fro-ing.

00:07:16 Correspondence, telephone visits and so on with people all over the world

00:07:21 and has combined to make the job as enjoyable and fruitful

00:07:26 as it's been over all these years.

00:07:29 As you look at natural product chemistry now,

00:07:32 how do you see the field developing further?

00:07:37 Developing as far as learning about natural products.

00:07:43 I don't think we're going to go an awful long way in isolating more natural products

00:07:49 because you get the law of diminishing returns.

00:07:53 If you work in the composity family, you look at a new species

00:07:57 and you find 99% of what you find is what you found before.

00:08:02 There's only 1% that's different.

00:08:05 But the advances are going to take place, undoubtedly,

00:08:08 and these are going to be very helpful,

00:08:10 in learning how nature manages to make its natural products.

00:08:14 I'm well satisfied to understand what goes on

00:08:19 in the millions of chemical reactions in our bodies

00:08:22 or in this plant or that microorganism.

00:08:26 There are millions of chemical reactions going on all the time

00:08:30 and it's going to take us a very long time to understand how these work

00:08:35 and to gain control, as I hope eventually man will,

00:08:40 over his environment, really understanding exactly what goes on.

00:08:45 This should help enormously.

00:08:47 I see a very big future on that side.

00:08:50 You asked specifically about natural products.

00:08:52 If I may widen it to say organic chemistry,

00:08:55 on organic chemistry, the sky's the limit

00:08:59 because carbon compounds combine,

00:09:03 carbon atoms combine with one another more or less indefinitely.

00:09:07 You can go on making bigger and bigger and different molecules.

00:09:10 See, even in our work on acetylenes, we were able to make, let's see,

00:09:15 we were able to make one molecule which has only 3 carbon atoms,

00:09:20 4 hydrogens and 1 oxygen for the first time.

00:09:24 Nobody had ever made this molecule containing only 8 atoms

00:09:29 and we made several others containing 10 or 11 atoms for the first time.

00:09:35 Well, that's a small number if you start working in the 10s and 20s.

00:09:40 The permutations and combinations are enormous

00:09:43 and all the time you're coming across new properties.

00:09:46 These polyacetylenes, nobody had any idea what their properties were like

00:09:50 in all sorts of ways, stability, light absorption, physiological properties.

00:09:56 These were all unknown when we began work in this field.

00:10:00 So I see tremendous possibilities there

00:10:04 and again on the theoretical side I think there's a lot of understanding

00:10:08 yet to be found about the way reactions go.

00:10:12 What sort of advice do you give to young scientists you come across now

00:10:16 who are starting out, say, in organic chemistry or any other field of chemistry?

00:10:21 Well, the advice I give, of course, is to look around

00:10:24 and find interesting fields in which to work

00:10:27 but don't look for these too early.

00:10:29 Make sure you've got command of the basic science.

00:10:33 It's very essential that you should have a good coverage

00:10:36 of basic chemistry and basic physics.

00:10:40 It's then you can build on these.

00:10:42 I'm sorry, I don't believe biochemistry is a science that stands on its own.

00:10:47 I think it's very much dependent upon chemistry and physics

00:10:51 and upon biology which, of course, is very much easier to understand

00:10:56 if you understand the chemistry and physics behind it.

00:10:59 So I believe there is a very great future in these subjects

00:11:04 but it's got to be based on a firm understanding

00:11:07 of the fundamental principles of chemistry and physics

00:11:10 so that I see them.

00:11:12 I know some people will say that chemistry as we've known it hasn't got a future.

00:11:17 Well, I don't think that is a proper assessment.

00:11:20 I think it's always got to have a future.

00:11:22 You've got to build on it in order to be able to advance.

00:11:26 Quite apart from your work, you've always had a very long association

00:11:31 with the Royal Society of Chemistry and with its predecessor bodies,

00:11:35 the Chemical Society and the Royal Institute of Chemistry.

00:11:38 You were president of the Chemical Society

00:11:41 and you were president of the Royal Institute of Chemistry

00:11:44 and then when they amalgamated, you were president of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

00:11:49 Has this also brought you a lot of pleasure?

00:11:52 Yes, I refer to collaboration.

00:11:55 Well, this is another sort of collaboration.

00:11:57 It's collaboration with colleagues and friends in the organisation of science,

00:12:01 organisation of chemistry in the first place,

00:12:03 but it goes beyond that, of course, into the research councils and things of that sort.

00:12:07 But chemistry indeed.

00:12:09 I joined the Chemical Society on the advice, perhaps,

00:12:14 or the instruction of the professor when I was in 1935

00:12:19 and I enjoyed having my own copies.

00:12:23 In those days you got the journal.

00:12:25 If you joined the society, you got a copy of the journal.

00:12:27 Not today.

00:12:29 And I also joined, out of my own volition,

00:12:32 in about 1937, the Helvetica, the Swiss Chemical Society

00:12:37 and I then had my own very treasured copy of the Helvetica,

00:12:41 eight times a year, a beautifully produced journal

00:12:45 and one which contained a lot of chemistry in which I was deeply interested.

00:12:50 It still is one of the finest journals in the world.

00:12:54 There was a lot of good stuff in it in those days.

00:12:58 So I enjoyed societies that produce media

00:13:03 that enable one to read about research and describe one's own research,

00:13:07 which, of course, is what I was able to do in the Journal of the Chemical Society.

00:13:11 I did a certain amount of work for the society in the 40s

00:13:14 in writing annual reports and things of that sort

00:13:17 and I suppose this, Anne Hardon, got me known

00:13:21 and after a while I was on the council

00:13:24 and from then on one thing followed another

00:13:28 and you referred to the amalgamation,

00:13:32 which was the original getting together and then unification.

00:13:36 Well, of course, what happened was I was chairman of the unification committee

00:13:40 and we sat for five years and eventually produced

00:13:44 a charter for the Royal Society of Chemistry,

00:13:47 which the membership happily voted in favour of

00:13:51 and the people who think about these things said,

00:13:56 well, you organise it, you better run it for the first couple of years.

00:14:01 So I had the job of being,

00:14:04 and when I say had the job, had the honour of being

00:14:07 the first president of the Royal Society of Chemistry

00:14:11 and, of course, I have the unique position

00:14:14 of having been president of all three bodies.

00:14:17 I think that's now impossible for anyone else to do

00:14:21 or extremely unlikely.

00:14:24 But this has always been a source of great satisfaction to me

00:14:28 and, of course, linking up with other societies,

00:14:31 the American Chemical Society and others

00:14:33 in the Federation of European Chemical Societies,

00:14:36 this has been a very well worthwhile activity.

00:14:40 And the same way I would broaden your question to include science

00:14:45 because after a while I got involved in the old DSIR,

00:14:49 Department of Scientific and Industrial Research.

00:14:52 I was on its council and then that, after the trend commission,

00:14:56 that became the Science Research Council.

00:14:58 It's now the Science and Engineering Research Council

00:15:01 and for some years I had quite a lot to do with its organisation,

00:15:06 with its distribution of funds, its support of research,

00:15:10 its support of students and fellows and so on.

00:15:13 That was a very...

00:15:15 I like organisations which are giving money away.

00:15:17 It's always pleasant to be at the giving end.

00:15:20 It's not so nice to be at the asking end

00:15:22 but asking was easier in those days.

00:15:24 We were looked upon more favourably.

00:15:26 We weren't told to run away

00:15:28 but nowadays I think the scientists get a harder deal

00:15:32 when they go to the Treasury asking for money.

00:15:36 We had the great advantage in the old DSIR

00:15:39 that the chairman of DSIR went straight to the Lord Privy Seal

00:15:48 who was Quentin Hogg, Lord Hailsham,

00:15:51 and he knew a great deal about what we were doing

00:15:54 and used to come every year to a dinner and talk to us about our activities.

00:15:58 We felt much closer to government

00:16:01 than I think any of the organisations can do today.

00:16:04 Science has got so big, it's become so costly

00:16:07 that it really is difficult to be in an intimate position,

00:16:10 connection with government.

00:16:12 But that kind of collaboration certainly has been a very important factor in my life

00:16:18 and happily I'm still enjoying that to some extent.

00:16:22 The Society has been kind enough to keep me on its council

00:16:25 and also has asked me to at least have a look at the possibilities for 1991

00:16:34 which is the celebration of the Cespri centenary

00:16:37 which I'm certainly looking forward to.

00:16:40 But you also spent a lot of time, didn't you, with the Anchor Housing Trust?

00:16:46 You devoted a lot of time to that.

00:16:49 This was essentially a retirement activity.

00:16:53 I knew quite a bit about it before I retired

00:16:56 but one of the things that we have to reckon, understand,

00:17:03 if you're a practical scientist as I was,

00:17:07 although I didn't do much at the bench myself,

00:17:10 my activity was essentially bench-oriented.

00:17:13 The people who worked with me worked at the bench.

00:17:16 When you retire and you give up the possibility of this kind of thing,

00:17:20 and that's inevitable today because the facilities required are so great

00:17:25 and the amount of money you require is very considerable

00:17:28 that one has to contemplate stopping that kind of activity.

00:17:32 What am I going to do? What sort of things?

00:17:34 I could, of course, dig my garden all the time

00:17:37 but there are other things in life besides that.

00:17:40 I've always been interested in buildings.

00:17:43 I was chairman of the buildings committee here for a number of years.

00:17:46 My friend, the University surveyor, was involved with Anchor Housing

00:17:51 and he had his eye on me that I was going to retire.

00:17:54 He knew I'd had experience with elder people.

00:17:57 My father-in-law lived to be 95 and my mother, 87,

00:18:01 so we knew something about the problems of the elderly

00:18:04 and I was really quite prepared to take on the task

00:18:08 of being chairman of the Anchor Housing,

00:18:11 we call it the Anchor Group now,

00:18:14 which is primarily concerned with housing the elderly,

00:18:18 either in rented accommodation, in accommodation they can buy,

00:18:23 or in helping them in their own homes,

00:18:26 an exercise we originated called Staying Put,

00:18:29 in which we try to help people to stay in their own homes

00:18:33 and continue to live a useful life

00:18:36 even though the physical circumstances might be unfavourable.

00:18:41 In sheltered housing, of course,

00:18:43 we try and provide everything that elderly people need

00:18:46 and none of the things they don't need,

00:18:49 whereas, of course, in the domestic house,

00:18:51 it's usually designed for a family

00:18:53 and there are lots of things people don't need

00:18:55 and sometimes not the things, like a downstairs toilet,

00:18:58 which they do need.

00:19:00 So Staying Put partly was doing this kind of thing.

00:19:03 I found this very well worthwhile

00:19:05 because the people that work for this kind of organisation

00:19:09 are almost by definition caring, caring people

00:19:13 and they're nice people to work with

00:19:17 and it's been a great pleasure to know a lot of the several hundred people

00:19:21 we now employ.

00:19:23 I'm still involved.

00:19:24 In fact, tomorrow morning I have a meeting

00:19:27 of one part of our association, which is somewhat critical,

00:19:31 which I'll have to do some work on tonight.

00:19:34 Looking back over your life,

00:19:36 you have some reflections about the sort of whole course your life has taken.

00:19:41 You've said people have always been very important to you.

00:19:45 Is there anything you want to say about that?

00:19:47 Yes, although to prescribe to anyone else

00:19:50 the good fortune that I've enjoyed,

00:19:53 I haven't said anything about my wife and family up to this point,

00:19:57 but, of course, we have referred to my meeting my wife

00:20:00 when I was an undergraduate, when we were both undergraduates,

00:20:03 and we celebrated our 50th anniversary last December.

00:20:07 With a surprise party.

00:20:09 A complete surprise party, that's right.

00:20:13 50 years of, I think, my point of view, happy marriage.

00:20:18 I can't be contradicting at the moment.

00:20:20 And, of course, we've had a family who are scattered around the world,

00:20:24 which brings us a great deal of pleasure.

00:20:27 So this is one of the things that I can't prescribe for other people.

00:20:31 Find a good woman, marry her, and enjoy your family.

00:20:35 This is certainly what I have done.

00:20:38 But equally, of course, I can't prescribe to anybody

00:20:42 the things that have happened to me

00:20:44 that have made my 40 years of actual employment

00:20:48 a marvel in that I was paid for 40 years

00:20:51 for doing what I like to do,

00:20:53 which not many people can say at the end of that time.

00:20:57 There's nothing I would have done

00:20:59 at any stage where there were alternatives.

00:21:03 At no stage did I feel I made the wrong decision.

00:21:07 Always things have worked out well for me,

00:21:10 which is extraordinarily, extraordinarily good fortune.

00:21:13 And one of the very amusing things is that I can honestly say

00:21:17 that I never got a job that I applied for.

00:21:20 I was never successful, thank goodness.

00:21:23 I only applied for three, and I didn't get any of them,

00:21:28 and I'm jolly glad I didn't.

00:21:31 Oh, thank you.

00:21:38 Are we finished? Any more?

00:21:41 I just say 1, 2, 3, or 5, 4.

00:21:45 5, 4, 3.

00:21:48 Well, Professor York-Jones,

00:21:50 I'd like to thank you very much for talking to us today.

00:21:53 And I'd like to thank you for your patience and tolerance.

00:21:56 I feel I've exceeded almost the right of someone

00:22:02 to dominate the scene in this way for an hour or two.

00:22:06 I've certainly enjoyed it.

00:22:15 Given you something to go on?

00:22:18 No.