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Wendell Mitchell Latimer was born in Garnett, Kansas, the only son of Walter and Emma Mitchell Latimer. His father was a manager of a bank. Latimer had a happy, affluent early childhood--he had a pony, and during the summer accompanied his parents on many trips--but when he was eight his father died of typhoid fever, leaving his mother with only meager funds. The boy and his mother then went to live with his grandfather on a farm near Greeley, Kansas.
The school in Greeley was inadequate, and Latimer's mother, who had herself been born in a log cabin, arranged to have him attend the high school in Garnett, ten miles distant, and come home weekends. In 1911 Latimer entered the University of Kansas and enrolled in a prelegal curriculum, partly as a result of skill in debating developed in high school; but he later wrote, "I became disgusted with the methods which one had to use to win debates . " and shifted to mathematics and chemistry. He received the Ph. D. in 1918. His thesis, under the direction of G. E. Gibson, and in association with G. S. Parkes, dealt with entropy at low temperatures and was entitled "A Test of the Third Law of Thermodynamics. "
In 1915 Latimer was appointed assistant to Professor H. P. Cady, one of the ablest chemists then in American universities. They determined the dielectric constant of liquid ammonia from-40°C to + 110°C. Latimer attended lectures by W. D. Harkins at the University of Chicago in the summer of 1916, and the following fall received a fellowship to work in the department of chemistry at the University of California in Berkeley.
In 1920, with W. H. Rodebusch, Latimer published a paper, entitled "Polarity and Ionization From the Standpoint of the Lewis Theory of Valence", that has become one of the classics of modern chemistry. It set forth clearly the characteristics of the hydrogen bond as distinguished from the interaction between ordinary dipoles, and eventually supplied the basis for understanding the genetic code. He also constructed a cycle for liquefying hydrogen and a cryostat for maintaining low temperatures. He and his students determined heat capacities and entropies of many substances.
A major result of all Latimer's work was his book The Oxidation States of the Elements and Their Potentials in Aqueous Solution (1938, 1952). The magnitude of this contribution to science was assessed many years later, in the Proceedings of the seventh meeting in Lindau, Austria, of the International Committee on Electrochemical Thermodynamics and Kinetics, published in 1957. It asserted that Latimer's "systematic work on oxidation states and potentials constitutes the very basis of the most important phase of C. I. T. C. E. activities. . "
Latimer's career refuted the fallacy that researchers make poor teachers; he conducted freshman quiz sections with no less attention than that which he applied to supervising graduate students and to his own work. He collaborated in frequent revision of the laboratory course. The Reference Book of Inorganic Chemistry, with J. H. Hildebrand (1929, 1940, and 1954), was largely his work. He was mainly responsible for initiating a seminar on nuclear chemistry that included G. T. Seaborg, W. F. Libby, and others who later played important roles in the development of atomic energy and the discovery of plutonium.
He was appointed a consultant to the Atomic Energy Commission in 1954. He was a director of the Manhattan Engineering District project on plutonium at the University of California from 1943 to 1947. In 1943 and 1944 he was a member of War Department missions to England, Panama, Australia, and New Guinea. He served the University of California on important academic committees. While dean of the college of chemistry, 1941-1949, he added to its faculty able young men who have maintained its distinguished position in both research and teaching.
Latimer's health during later years was poor and he underwent several operations. He took it all stoically, and with a never-failing sense of humor, and continued both teaching and research. He died in his sleep in the Kaiser Foundation Hospital in Oakland, California.
Latimer was notable for his description of oxidation states in his book "The Oxidation States of the Elements and Their Potentials in Aqueous Solution". He was the first scientist to grasp the importance of the knowledge of the entropies of ions in water solution, and to recognize that such entropies can be combined with thermal data to establish their free energies and predict the direction of chemical reactions. Latimer was the recipient of a number of other honors and awards. In 1948 he was awarded the Presidential Certificate of Merit for his work during World War II. A magnificent laboratory and office building bears the name Latimer Hall, and an excellent portrait by Peter Blos hangs in its faculty-student lounge.
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Quotes from others about the person
W. F. Giauque wrote in an obituary article, "During my own early research years, I worked in the laboratory beside Latimer, and for some years following 1922 I shared his office at his invitation. It was during this period that I learned many of the facts concerned in gas liquefaction by watching him build a successful hydrogen liquefier and extend research to these temperatures. This obviously had its effect on my later low-temperature work. . "
His first wife was Bertha Eichenauer. Latimer married his second wife, Glatha Hatfield, in 1926, following the death of both his first wife and their only son. He had two children in the second marriage.
