A BRILLIANT SCIENTIST.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume L, Issue 59, 2 April 1907, Page 4

A BRILLIANT SCIENTIST.

CAXADfAX API'RF.CIATIOX. DR. ERXEST RUTHERFORD. The Montreal "Gazette." of January sth, lias the following about the retirement of Professor ' Ernest Rutherford from the McGiil I'nivevsity. Professor Rutherford, as everyone knows, is a New Zealand boy. who has won worldwide fame as a scientist, ami is known particularly well in Taranaki, where his father and mother reside, namely, at Pungarehu. The following will therefore be read with interest :•■ -

At a meetim; of the Board of Governors of Meliili I'niversit.y, held yesterday afternoon, the resignation of Dr. Ernest. Rutherford, as Macdonald professor of physics at Meliili I'niversity. was formally accepted with msiiiv expressions of regret on all sides'. Dr. Rutherford resigns to accept the po-.l of professor of physics and director of the physical laboratory at Victoria I'niversity, Manchester, the most progressive and perhaps already the foremost of the ISritish schools of science. 'The resignation is to take ell Vet at the close of the present session, and ne\t October Dr Rutherford will take tip his now dulies at. Main-hosier.

With the departure of Dr. Kullierford Meliili will lose the man who, more than any other of a seientilie stall' always of a high order, has won fame and [honor for the university throughout the world, Indeed Dr. Rutherford is today ranked among half a dozen modem masters of physics, lie was already well known when in ](Mfc> he advanced in the Philosophical Magazine the new theory of radio activity, based upon his research work into the properties of thorium. Two years later his complete development of the theory was published in the Dakerian lecture delivered before the Royal Society, and Dr. Rutherford's brilliant work was rewarded by the award of the Rumford medal, the'blbue ribbon of the Bri'ish scientific woikl. In the past five years he has had many offers of chairs in universities both on this, continent and in Great Britain, anu while there is now general rrprei at nis approaching departure, there is also a feeding of thankfulness that McGill has been able to keep him so long. Dr. Rutherford's resignation was laid before the board of governors yesterday, in the form of a letter to the principal, Dr. Peterson, [n part Dr. Rutherford said: "It is with a feeling of the deepest regret that I find ii necessary to sever my connection with Metiill. During the eight years in which I have been professor of physics I have been granted exceptional opportunities to carry nut my research work. ... In arriving at a decision as to the course I was to take I may say that the determining factor was that it was necessary for me in be in closer contact with European science than is possible on this side of the Atlantic." Continuing. Dr. Rutherford expressed his appreciation of and gratitude for the unfailing consideration and support he had received rom Professor Cox and his thanks to Sir William Macdonald, whose kindness and generosity "have al one rendered possible nines of the research work in the laboratories... Dr. Peterson was asked to convey to Dr. Rutherford the governors' appreciation of his work as professor at McGill, of the fame he had won for the university by his research work, and of their regret at his coming de]wrture. STILL A VOU..G MAX. Dr. Rutherford is still a. very young | man—he is only in his thirty-sixth I year—and while not a Canadian, he is by birth a citizen of the Greater Britain over the seas. He was born in Xew | Zealand, of Scottish ancestry, in 1871. He was educated at Nelson College and there won the Xew Zealand I'lii'vorsit/ scholarship, proceeding to Canterbury College. He distinguished himself there as the best all round student, his grealest success being in the natural sciences. In 18112 he graduated with the bachelor of arts degree and the senior scholarship. The following year he obtained his master's degree with first rank honors in mathematics and physics. Proceeding to the U.S. degree, he won a coveted 1851 exhibition in ISD-I. This led him farther afield. His research work was continued in the Cavendish laboratory at Cambridge, where he took up residence in 18!)5 as a student of Trinity College. His fame soon spread among the younger men of the big English I'niversity. and Dr Andrew Balfour, now of the Egyptian Govenuent medical stall', writing of him at the time, said: "We've got a rabbit here from the .Antipodes, and he's burrowing mighty deep." .Marked out by the authorities as a man of the future, lie was granted in 1807 the II.A. research degree and the Coutts-Trotter studentship. His standing was now established and a few years later his alma mater, X'ew Zealand I'niversity, conferred upon him the degree of doctor of science.

On Uii' appointment of Professor Cutlendar (Dr. Rutherford's predecessor) to the chair of physics at University Collegq, London, Prof. Cox visited the Cavendish laboratory, and on thet advice of Prof. J. J. Thomson, he selected Dr. Rutherford to fill the vacancy at McGill. The main features of his work at McGill have already been alluded to above. In his researches, he was assisted by a band of co-workers, to whom hu imparted his own enthusiasm, -with results which combined to add a new page, and an important one. to scientific history. Among -these coworkers were Prof. Owens, 31 r Soddy, Miss Brooks and Mr Cooke. PROVED J/TItST THEORY.

When the first announcement of his important discoveries in radio-activity was published in 1!)02 'there were many sceptics in two continents; in the face of doubt the- new theory was stoutly championed by Dr. Rutherford, and th» succeeding (wo years were devoted to establishing, with many important additions, the facts which he declared in 1002. It was tlm result, of Hhese, two years' work that won him the recognition of the Royal Society in the award of the Rumford medal. In December of 10W he was tendered a banquet in the Windsor Hotel to celebrate the honor that had been done both him ami Mcfiill Universitv. In V.m Dr. Rutherford lectured at Yale under the Sillinian foundation. Last August, at the annual meeting of Hie HritUh Association, at York, Kngltind, l)r Lankasler. in his prefiidential address, referred to Dr Rutherford's work a- one of the brilliant achievements of recent years.