Talk:John Wilson (industrial chemist)

Hold on
I'm adding info from Times obits — Preceding unsigned comment added by JimKillock (talk • contribs) 19:42, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

Some recollections
Hope this is not COI or improper. Amongst other encounters with "Johnny" Wilson, I was with him once when, to attract the attention of an employee who was staying away from work, Wilson drove me to the employee's residence and, to get his attention, stood with his back to the door and kicked backwards for several minutes. He then drove back to the lab, ignoring the steam from the radiator until the car broke down, then called a taxi ... (just realized rest of story cannot be sent in clear). I was told, and believe, that later he kept geese on the grounds outside the lab, for human consumption, that pecked the spokes of the wheels of employee's bicycles destructively.

I am grateful to him for the support of my activities by British Rayon Research Association (BRRA) (verifiable) that he authorized (not verifiable) so will mention this on the BRRA page. Michael P. Barnett (talk) 16:01, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Also, as Director of British Rubber Producers Research Association, he authorized support for William Moffitt, theoretical chemist who was appointed to a professorship at Harvard but died soon after from a heart attack while playing tennis, but had done enough work by then to qualify for notability. Michael P. Barnett (talk) 19:53, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks
Thank you, that's very interesting :)

JimKillock (talk)

Personal recollections and wartime odds and ends
John Wilson was my maternal grandfather. He was already an old man when I was a child, and died when I was in my teens. Despite his frailness, all his grandchildren were in awe of him, partly I think due to his sheer force of personality, even in old age, and partly because of the indelible impression that his autocratic parenting style had left on his own children. My mother's stories painted a picture of a man who was often loving, indulgent, playful, entertaining and inspiring, yet equally capable of being insensitive, domineering, unfaithful, cruel and even occasionally violent. I remember him as brusque and dynamic, but also absent-minded and strangely removed everyday life ... almost a living caricature of the eccentric scientist. When he died, he left various documents behind, which passed into the keeping of another branch of the family. I did, however, have the opportunity to copy some of the papers he saved from his time in the trenches of Flanders. Inspired by Jim Killock's efforts here, I have finally taken the time to make them available to a (slightly) wider audience. They can be viewed at http://www.haywoodhouse.net/Visitor/Lt_JWilson.htm.

George Barker GFBarker (talk) 22:12, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

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