Rudolph John Anderson papers

Rudolph John Anderson was born in Haina, Sweden, on September 15, 1879. He was the son of Anders and Johanna Anderson, and came from a family of farmers. In 1893, at age fourteen, Anderson immigrated alone to the United States.

Anderson graduated from the Harvard Grammar School, Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1897. He soon found it financially impossible to continue his education. At this time his ambition in life was to be a locomotive engineer. Anderson secured a job in a chemistry lab in New Orleans and soon acquired what was to be a life-long interest in chemistry. Gradually, over a period of twenty-two years, he earned college degrees, culminating in a Ph.D. in Chemistry from Cornell University in 1919. His education proceeded as follows:

*Degree of Graduate in Pharmacy, New Orleans College of Pharmacy, 1902

*B.S. From Tulane University, 1906

*Graduate work at Tulane, 1906-1907

*Attended Upsala University, Sweden, 1909-1910

*Studied at the University of Berlin, 1910-1911, and again in 1917

*Worked at University College, London, 1914-1915

*Ph.D. from Cornell University, 1919

In 1947, Anderson received an honorary degree from the University of Lund, Sweden. The degree was an honorary Doctorate of Medicine, awarded to him as Professor Emeritus of Yale University for his chemical research.

After teaching chemistry at Cornell for a number of years, Anderson left to join the faculty of Yale University. From 1927 to 1948, he was a Professor of Chemistry at Yale. He held the title of Professor Emeritus from 1948 until his death in 1961.

Rudolph Ander devoted his life to the study of chemical substances in plants, such as the chemical called phytin, and to the study of bacteria. His discoveries in the field of lipoids of tubercle bacilli were outstanding.

As well as contributing articles to the Journal of Biological Chemistry and to the Journal of American Chemistry, Anderson became increasingly involved in editing scientific work. He was on the editorial board of the Journal of Biological Chemistry from 1931 until 1958, and was managing editor from 1937 until 1958. The December 1958 edition of Biological Chemistry was dedicated to Professor Anderson, and a handsomely bound copy is to be found in the collection. As well as his magazine connections, Anderson held memberships in several learned societies: the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Chemical Society, the American Society of Biologists, and the Society of Experimental Biology and Medicine. He was also Vice President of the American Society of Biological Chemists, 1939-1940, and later President, 1941-1943.

Anderson served as a Captain in the Sanitary Corps of the United States Army, 1917-1919, and was then promoted to Major in the Army Reserve, in which he continued to serve for many years.

Rudolph John Anderson married Clara Tillinghast on June 3, 1920. He died on April 16, 1961.

For biographical details of a more personal nature please see box 1, folder 2, of the collection which contains a typescript of an autobiographical sketch entitled, "Adventures in the Education of Rudolph Anderson."