Background
Leo Baekeland was born in Ghent, Belgium, on November 14, 1863, the son of a cobbler and a house maid. He spent much of his early life in Ghent, Belgium.
Leo Hendrik Baekeland, 1916
Ghent University
Leo Hendrik Baekeland, 1916
Portrait of young Leo Hendrik Baekeland.
Ghent University
The first semi-commercial Bakelizer, from Baekeland's laboratory
The gravesite of Leo Hendrik Baekeland
Baekeland's Yonkers Laboratory
Perkin Medal
Franklin Medal
Leo at the Berlin Zoo, circa 1932
Leo on the Ion
Leo with Charles Parsons at Columbia University
Leo and Céline with unknown girls at the Anchorage
Leo at the Anchorage
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Leo Baekeland was born in Ghent, Belgium, on November 14, 1863, the son of a cobbler and a house maid. He spent much of his early life in Ghent, Belgium.
Leo graduated from the Ghent Municipal Technical School with honours and was awarded a scholarship by the City of Ghent study chemistry at the University of Ghent, which he entered in 1880. He acquired a PhD maxima cum laude at the age of 21.
After a brief appointment as Professor of Physics and Chemistry at the Government Higher Normal School in Bruges (1887-1889) he was appointed associate professor of chemistry at Ghent in 1889.
In 1889 Leo went to the United States on a traveling scholarship, liked the country, received a job offer from a photographic firm, and decided to make America his home. These were the years when science was first coming to the attention of American industry. In some European countries, notably Germany, industrial research was already helping to improve old products and processes and to develop new ones. Baekeland began work to improve photographic film, and in 1893 he established the Nepera Chemical Company to manufacture Velox paper, a film of his invention which could be handled in the light. In 1899 he sold out to the leading firm in the field, Eastman Kodak.
Leo used his money to set up his own private industrial research laboratory in a converted barn behind his home in Yonkers, N. Y. At this laboratory Baekeland began a large number of experiments covering a range of subjects. One of these was an attempt to produce a synthetic shellac by mixing formaldehyde and phenolic bodies. Other experimenters had worked with these two substances, and it was known that the interaction was greatly influenced by the proportions used and the conditions under which they were brought together. Baekeland failed to synthesize shellac but instead discovered Bakelite, the first successful plastic. Baekeland's new material did not suffer from any previous defects. Using temperatures much higher than previously thought possible, he developed a process for placing the material in a hot mold and adding both pressure and more heat so that a chemical change would take place, transforming the material in composition as well as shape.
Leo patented the process in 1909 and formed the Bakelite Corporation the following year to market the material. Bakelite soon became very successful and was widely used in industry as a substitute for hard rubber and amber, particularly in electrical devices. In 1917 Baekeland became a professor by special appointment at Columbia University. He retired from the company in 1939. He died of a cerebral hemorrhage in a sanatorium in Beacon, New York in 1944.
Leo Baekeland was called "The Father of the Plastics Industry", best known for the inventions of Velox photographic paper and Bakelite. His Bakelite was the first plastic, that retained its shape after being heated. He also developed a stronger diaphragm cell for the chloralkali process, his improvements were important for the construction of one of the world's largest electrochemical plants, at Niagara Falls. He held more than 100 patents, including processes for the separation of copper and cadmium, and for the impregnation of wood.
As Baekeland grew older he became more eccentric.
Baekeland married Céline Swarts, the daughter of his professor Theodore Swarts and Celine (Platteau) Swarts, on August 8, 1889. They had three children, George, Nina, and Jenny.
