ACS President: Edward W. Morley (1828-1923)

With Albert A. Michelson he performed the famous “ether drift” experiments which are the basis for the modern theory of relativity

Worked for the Sanitary Commission during the Civil War

• Graduated, Williams College, 1860, Chemistry
• License to preach, 1862, Andover Theological Seminary

• Professor, chemistry, Western Reserve College (now Case Western Reserve University), Cleveland, OH, 1868-1923

Determined the relative atomic weights of O and H to an accuracy of 0.0004, 1896

• Davy Medal, 1907
• Willard Gibbs Medal, 1899

. . . that he first prepared for a profession as a Congregational Church minister?

. . . that a grave in the basement of Noyes Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign was purported to belong to him? The grave has since been called a hoax but is regularly visited by students.