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Clifford Hach (born October 20, 1922) co-founded the Hach Chemical Company in 1947 with his wife Kathryn Hach-Darrow (pronounced hɑ:k). He was devoted chemist with 36 patents and pioneer in the simplification of water treatment and analysis.

Early life and education
Clifford was a depression-era Iowa farm boy. When Clifford was a child, his father owned and operated a hardware store that provided ample opportunity for tinker, explore and nurture his curious mind. When the Great Depression hit during the 1930’s, Clifford’s family struggled through several economic hardships and made significant sacrifices to allow him to attend Iowa State University in 1938, where he majored in chemistry. Clifford did not graduate until 1947 due to World War II various wartime projects taken on by the university, including the Manhattan Project. It was at Iowa State University, where Clifford also met his wife, Kathryn “Kitty” Hach.

Professional Career
Hach Company was founded in 1947 in Ames, Iowa with his wife, Kathryn and support from several members associated with Iowa State University. Hach Company’s original building was a hand-laid cinder block plant. Clifford, Kathryn and their children lived in a small apartment within the facility so that work was uninterrupted.

The company’s initial successes were in developing simplified titration methods for measuring hardness in drinking water. The first product breakthrough arrived in 1950 with the small portable 5-B test kit that measured calcium and magnesium in water.

From reagent colorimetry to turbidity to photometry to electrochemistry to spectrophotometry to digital titration, the product line expanded from the 1950’s through the 1980’s as Clifford and his team innovated the boundaries of the field with a guiding philosophy of taking analytical chemistry from a purely laboratory endeavor into one that could be readily practiced by the general public in any setting. Clifford was known to say “Thank God it’s Monday” as a personal affirmation of his dedication to the science. Clifford had 27 patents in chemistry.

Product line highlights for the Hach Company during Clifford tenure include: •	1955 DC-DR for pre-calibrated photometry for direct readout units •	1957 CR Turbidimeter provided a non-candle continuous reading (CR) featuring sample illumination without the use of a sample cell. •	1960 DREL Portable Laboratory with a battery pack and packaged reagents with filter photometer for analysis. The DR line was continuously enhanced throughout the 1960’s, 1970s’, 1980’s and the 1990’s. •	1968 2100 Laboratory Turbidimeter offered fiver precalibrated ranges selected for using a dial turret and interchangeable analog meter scales. •	1976 Digital Titrator was constructed of plastic and provided precise dispensation of prepared titrant, packaged in disposable cartridges •	1976 Pump Colorimeter Analyzer simplified chlorine, fluoride and hardness monitoring •	1979 Ratio Laboratory Turbidimeter offered accurate accurate turbidity measurement in colored samples •	1980 Chemical Oxygen Demand or COD simplified traditional wastewater organic material testing. •	1983 Hach One pH Electrode provided a single click replaceable cartridge electrolyte test. •	1984 DR/3000 was an easy to operate microprocessor-based instrument with 60 calibrations and a digital readout.

In 1978, Hach moved its instrument division and corporate headquarters to Loveland, Colorado. Hach Chemical Company became simply Hach Company in 1980. By 1985, Hach Company had grown to 580 employees. The research, development, engineering operations and Technical Training Center were centered at its Loveland, Colorado headquarters. However, the chemical manufacturing operations, a chemical research laboratory, the company warehouse and shipping operations remained in Ames, Iowa. The company also had 20 sales offices around the country, including one in Belgium and another in Canada.

When Clifford passed away abruptly due to a heart attack in 1990 while at work, he was the company chairman and still spearheading the chemistry innovation at the company with Kathryn as the chief executive officer and his son Bruce as the president.

In 1999, Hach Company was purchased and wholly owned as a subsidiary of the Danaher Corporation, which includes over 30 companies working in the process/environmental controls industries. Due to the respected brand name Hach Company had acquired during its 52 year lifespan, Danaher chose to keep the Hach name after the purchase.

Philanthropy
Due to Clifford’s deep love of chemistry and wanting to ensure ways of fueling future generations of chemists, Clifford started the Hach Scientific Foundation within Hach Company in 1982 as a way to provide scholarships to undergraduate chemistry majors at a number of local universities and other schools tied to history of the company. Clifford had 50% of his estate designated to fund the endowment of the foundation that continued after the company changed ownership in 1999.

Recognizing the frequency of high school chemistry teachers as initial critical catalysts for future chemists, Clifford’s grandson Bryce refined the mission of the Foundation’s charter into a national model that provided scholarships and outreach grants to future and existing high school chemistry teachers in 2007. In 2009, the Foundation’s endowment and national programs were transitioned to the American Chemical Society where the organization’s building bears the name of Clifford and Kathryn Hach.

Hach Chemical Company
Hach Chemical was instrumental in standardizing water-purification tests and pioneered many world-standard analytical instruments. Their tests were designed to be simple and effective, with nontechnical directions that made their products easy for both chemists and non-chemists to use. As of 2012, about 70 percent of municipalities in the United States used Hach Company instrumentation, allowing them to detect impurities in water at the parts-per-billion level.

Hach Chemical Company was incorporated in 1951, went public in 1968,. The company moved its headquarters to Loveland, Colorado, in 1978,  and was renamed Hach Company in 1980.

Personal Life
Clifford and Kathryn Carter were married in 1943. They have three children, Mary, Bruce and Paul.