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Ben Bennett Corson (August 12, 1896 – August 25, 1987) was an American chemist best known for his contribution to the development of CS Gas or "Corson-Stoughton Gas".

Early life and Education
Ben Bennett Corson was born to father, Walter Danville Corson, and mother, Louella Eva Bennett, on August 12th, 1898 in Bridgeton, Maine. Growing up with his brother Carl in small town Maine, poor, Ben learned from a young age to work for his success, graduating from Bridgeton High school at the top of his class. Ben Corson attended Harvard University under the Henry B. Humphrey Fellowship in the class of 1919. As a freshmen he joined the wrestling team and contributed to his team's winning title. However Ben did not graduate with his class of 1919, instead volunteering as an ambulance driver for the French army in 1917. Once in France, Ben was assigned to drive an ammunition truck instead. Within the year, Ben enlisted as a private in US Military and was involved in the ending of the first World War in 1918. In battle Ben's unit was gassed, however this did not slow him down but it did enable him to receive a government pension until his death. After the War, Ben stayed in France, to join the American Army wrestling team and study French. After returning to Harvard, Ben received his BA and MA in chemistry in 1922, then his PHD in organic chemistry in 1924.

Career
After graduating University, Ben moved to Vermont to become an assistant professor at Middlebury College, where he would make his mark on chemistry history, CS gas. CS gas is a common form of riot control that can cause irritation and weeping around the area of impact, developed by Ben Bennett Corson and his graduate student, Roger Wolcott Stoughton (1906-1957). The chemical, also known as Corson-Soughton Gas, to honor the two American chemists who developed it, is not actually a gas. When used in riot control the CS chemical or chlorobenzylidene malononitrile is dissolved in a solvent to expand the effected area. The two scientists in 1928 published a 13 page journal investigating the reactions between carbonyl compounds including CS. The solute was pioneered for use in the late 1950s by British Chemical Defense Unit, then approved by the US military in 1959 for standardized riot-control and soon became widely adopted by agencies in law-enforcement because of it's effective yet safer results than its rival CN gas, which is stronger and has caused casualties."

Later life and death
Ben met and married Nina Catherine Tugman (1893-1930), a graduate of Radcliffe College, in 1929 in Boston. However Nina passed away during childbirth while Ben was at Harvard earning his post doctorate. In 1932 Ben joined Universal Oil Products and began developing the process of the catalytic cracking of crude oil. At the time Ben was in his second marriage to Suzanne Rolland (1902-1978), a french Algerian. Ben later joined the Kopper Company at the Mellon Institute in Pittsburg as a senior fellow where he was able to further develop his research in catalysis. In retirement, Ben and his wife moved to San Juan, Costa Rica. There Ben spent his time teaching catalysis engineering as a professor of the National University and worked on his novel. His wife passed away in 1978 and he remarried Lucille Sladek (1907-2006). The couple moved to Ventura, California where Ben later died in 1987 at the age of 91.

Achievements
Ben worked on many books while under the Kopper Company but his notable is "Catalytic reactions at high pressures and temperatures": Vladimir Nikolaevich Ipatieff, Sophia Berkman, Ben Bennett Corson, Raymond Eugene Schaad. He also wrote and published over 100 peer-reviewed papers for the American Chemical Society. Ben also still holds nearly 50 patents on Catalysis developments, however his one discovery he never patented was CS gas.