Page 20 - PERIODIC Magazine Issue 7

Al
Letters from umni

Last year, we looked at the history of the Alembic Club and asked alumni to
contribute their memories. We received more than we can publish here, and
intend to include more on the Chemistry website in the near future. There was
also much correspondence about a picture of the Alembic Club, which brought
to light some fascinating stories. We are very grateful to the many alumni who

were kind enough to share their memories and contribute to our knowledge
of the history of chemistry at Oxford. And we were amazed to find that some
members are still in possession of Alembic Club ties, some of which were worn
to the annual chemistry reception in January!

placed in a flask near the front of the theatre. The time
of the lecture came and went, and I was improvising
ever more far-fetched excuses on the hoof in front of
the restless crowd. Eventually the speaker arrived. The
reason for his delay turned out to be that his car tyre had
punctured on the M1. To access the jack to change the
wheel, he had to empty the boot onto the hard shoulder.
Imagine the surprise of the Police to find a heap of bomb-
making and related supplies when they stopped to see
what was going on! Eventually Colonel Shaw was able to
convince the officers of his bone fides, and he was able
to continue on to Oxford to give his most entertaining -
and explosive - talk.

Noel Jackson
(Lincoln, 1974)
I remember an excellent lecture on explosives by the late
Colonel Shaw in the Inorganic lecture theatre. He started
by moving a small sealed vial of water into a Bunsen
flame then moving across the bench to the other side
and doing the same. He was talking in a very relaxed
Tim Wright manner when the first vial exploded with the biggest
(Corpus Christi, 1971) bang any of us had ever heard. Colonel Shaw kept going
Each term we organized a couple of meetings to which as if nothing had happened whereas the entire audience
an external speaker would be invited and one of these was on edge waiting for the second vial to go off. Other
was addressed by the Rev. Ron Lancaster, then chemistry startling demonstrations included a mixture of white
teacher and chaplain at Kimbolton School, and then - phosphorus and a chlorate in a volatile solvent spread
as now - a world authority on pyrotechnics. Amongst over an aluminium plate which was placed on an old
other things, he was responsible for the fireworks at the fashioned threepenny bit. When the solvent evaporated,
beginning and end of the 2012 Olympic Games. His talk the phosphorus and chlorate reacted explosively and a
to us included a number of interesting demonstrations! neat dodecagonal hole was punched in the aluminium.
The second meeting forever etched in my memory was Colonel Shaw concluded the show by using black
when we invited the late Colonel Brian Shaw to give a powder to fire a candle from a musket through several
talk on explosives. We booked the Inorganic Chemistry thicknesses of plywood. It was certainly a lecture which
Lab lecture theatre, which quickly filled to capacity. went with a bang.
During the preceding day, a large amount of liquid
oxygen was prepared at his request, which was

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Periodic The Magazine of the Department of Chemistry