Henry Aaron Hill

May 30, 1915 – March 17, 1979

Henry Aaron Hill became the American Chemical Society’s first African American president in 1977. He is highly regarded for establishing standards for employer-employee relationships in the chemical profession. Early in his career, racial prejudices made it difficult for Hill to land a job. Eventually he would rise to vice president of the North Atlantic Research Corporation in Newtonville, Massachusetts, where he performed research on water-based paints, firefighting foam, and synthetic rubber. In 1962, Hill founded the National Polychemicals, Inc, to supply chemical intermediates for the polymer industry. Ten years later he founded the Riverside Research Laboratories, which offered research, development, and consulting services in polymer production. Hill received his Bachelor of Science degree from Johnson C. Smith University in 1936 and a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1942.

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