Background
Robert Hare was born on January 17, 1781 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States.
Robert Hare was born on January 17, 1781 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States.
Hare had few opportunities for a formal education.
He developed and experimented with the oxy-hydrogen blowpipe, with Edward Daniel Clarke of Oxford, shortly after 1800. Robert Hare was a professor at the University of Pennsylvania between 1810 and 1812 and between 1818 and 1847. By the 1820s, Hare had developed the "galvanic deflagrator", a type of voltaic battery having large plates used for producing rapid and powerful combustion.
In 1853, Hare conducted experiments with mediums. A year later Hare had converted to Spiritualism and wrote several books that made him very famous in the United States as a Spiritualist. He published a book entitled Experimental Investigation of the Spirit Manifestations (1855). His work was criticized by scientists but was welcomed with enthusiasm by Spiritualists.
Hare died in Philadelphia on May 15, 1858.
Hare extracted sugar from the sweet potato, improved the manufacture of potassium, was the first to use a mercury cathode in industry and in analysis, showed that platinum could be melted and easily worked, and denarcotized laudanum. He invented the valve-cock and the calorimeter, and constructed the first electric furnace.
He was elected an Associate Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1824.
Robert HareRobert Hare married Harriett Clark and had six children.
