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Dromo's Den
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[Up] [Dromo's Den] Benjamin Silliman Biography SILLIMAN,
Benjamin (1779-1864). An American scientist, born Aug. 8, 1779, at North
Stratford (now Trumbull), Conn., the son of Gold Selleck Silliman, a general in
the army of the Revolution. After graduating at Yale in 1796, he studied law,
became a tutor in Yale, was soon chosen to be a professor of natural science,
and went abroad to fit himself for the chair in which he became a teacher of
chemistry, mineralogy, geology, and pharmacy. He held his professorship in Yale
from 1802 to 1864- from 1853 onward as professor emeritus. He was honored and
beloved as a teacher and acquired even greater distinction as a lecturer,
especially on geology. These courses began at New Haven in 1831 and were so much
appreciated that Silliman was selected to give 24 lectures before the Lowell
Institute of Boston in its first session (1839-40). In 1818 he established the American Journal of Science (often quoted as "Silliman's
Journal"), the editorship of which long remained in his family. With Dr.
Robert Hare he constructed the compound blowpipe. He published after his return
from England a narrative of his journey, and 50 years later, at the end of a
second journey, he published a similar memoir. His Tour to Quebec (1819) was likewise widely read. His contributions to
science were not numerous, one of those most famous at the time being an account
(with J. L. Kingsley) of a remarkable meteor which fell at Weston in 1807.
During his long career Silliman was an active participant in all the affairs of
Yale College- the organization of the Medical School, the formation of a cabinet
of minerals, the acquisition of Colonel Trumbull's paintings, and the purchase
of the Clark telescope. He died Nov. 24, 1864. Consult the Life
written by G. P. Fisher (2 vols., New York, 1866), largely from material left by
Silliman and containing many entertaining reminiscences, and D. C. Gilman, in Leading American Men of Science (ed. by D. S. Jordan, New York,
1910). |