John Stewart MacArthur facts for kids
John Stewart MacArthur was a smart scientist, a chemist, from Glasgow, Scotland. He was born on December 9, 1856. He is famous for inventing a special way to get gold out of rocks, called the MacArthur-Forrest cyanidation process, in 1887. This method was very important for extracting gold in places like South Africa.
Even though he invented this process, there were some legal problems with his invention, and his patent (a special right to his invention) was cancelled. Because of these long-lasting legal issues, MacArthur started looking into other businesses.
MacArthur's Later Work
Extracting Vanadium and Radium
After his gold extraction patent issues, John Stewart MacArthur began to explore new scientific challenges. He first looked into how to get a material called vanadium out of certain rocks. These rocks also contained a small amount of radium.
Later, he became very interested in radium itself. Radium is a special element that glows in the dark and was used for many things at the time, like in medicines and glowing paints.
Founding the Radium Works
MacArthur decided to focus on producing radium. In 1911, he started his own company called the Radium Works in a place called Halton. This was a big step for him, moving from inventing processes to running a business that made a valuable new material.
A few years later, in 1915, he moved his company to Balloch, West Dunbartonshire. He then renamed it the Loch Lomond Radium Works. This company continued his work with radium.
John Stewart MacArthur passed away on March 16, 1920, when he was 63 years old. His work in chemistry, especially with gold and radium, left an important mark on science and industry.
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