Signature Mugs

Signature Mug Series: No. 1 Morgan

Signature: The original signature of L.O. Morgan was obtained by Professor Lagowski, ACT₂ Regional Director (mug #24).

Profile: Leon O. (Tom) Morgan (October 25, 1919 – July 29, 2002), Professor Emeritus, The University of Texas at Austin, Department of Chemistry was a doctoral graduate student under Glenn T. Seaborg (mug #2) at the University of California, Berkeley in 1944. (He had already received his master's degree in chemistry in 1942 at UT Austin.) Morgan helped synthesize americium and was given the privilege of naming it by Seaborg. His first two name selections submitted to IUPAC were rejected. He had suggested "delirium" (from Latin for madness) and "pandemonium" (from Greek for all demons or hell) because of the difficulties encountered when attempting to separate of curium and americium. Seaborg told his graduate student Tom, if you want to name this element then come up with a better name. He did, and americium was born and approved by IUPAC in 1945.

Element(s): Americium (Am) was first made late in 1944 at the University of Chicago by a team which included Glenn Seaborg (mug #2), Ralph James, Tom Morgan (mug #1), and Albert Ghiorso (mug #9). Americium was the fourth transuranic chemical element discovered. It is highly radioactive, has a silvery-white metallic luster and slowly tarnishes in air. It is soluble in acid with a density of 12 g cm^-3. Its most stable isotope, Am-243, has a half-life of over 7,500 years. Household smoke detectors possess a very small quantity of Am-241 as americium dioxide, AmO₂.

Distribution: 1997 ACT₂-Welch Biennial Conference at Our Lady of the Lake University, San Antonio, Texas

Design: Diana Mason designed the mug. The orange ink color was chosen to honor of Tom Morgan who was a member of the Department of Chemistry at The University of Texas at Austin faculty for 46 years (1947-1993).

Dr. Glenn Seaborg. The Seaborg mug was distributed at the 1997 ACT₂ luncheon at CAST in Ft. Worth. To learn more about Dr. Seaborg and his accomplishments, check out these links:

The Nobel Prize Internet Archive

Dr. Richard Smalley: 1996 Nobel laureate for the discovery of buckminster fullerenes (bucky balls). The Smalley mug was distributed on High School Day at the 1998 ACS National Convention in Dallas. To learn more about Dr. Smalley and his work, check out this link (other links are available on this particular page):

The Nobel Prize Internet Archive

Dr. Robert Curl: 1996 Nobel laureate for the discovery of buckminster fullerenes (bucky balls). The Curl mug was distributed at the Division of Chemical Education dinner at the 1998 ACS National Convention in Dallas and at the ACT₂ luncheon at CAST in Corpus Christi . To learn more about Dr. Curl and his work, check out this link (other links are available on this particular page):

The Nobel Prize Internet Archive

Antoine Lavoisier: aka the "Father of Chemistry" who was beheaded in 1794. The Discovery Channel recently had a program featuring the guillotine. As his last experiment, Lavoisier had a friend count the number of times he blinked after his head was separated from his body. Lavoisier blinked 13 to 14 times. Kathleen Holley checked with Lavoisier's Friends site in France for ACT₂. Jean-Pierre Poirier told Kathleen that: none of the witnesses ever said such a stupid story; Lavoisier had never been interested in muscle physiology and that he did not see what could be the meaning of such an experiment and that Lavoisier had more sophisticated goals; and that 28 farmers general were executed in 30 minutes and none of them had an opportunity for such a scientific contribution!

The Lavoisier mug was distributed at 1999 ACT₂ -Welch Biennial Conference at West Texas A & M University in Canyon. Additional information about Lavoisier can be found at The Catholic Encyclopedia. Check out Kathleen's biography of Lavoisier in Volume 3, pp. 842-843, of the MacMillan Encyclopedia of Chemistry

The Davy mug was distributed at the 2000 CAST conference at Texas A & M University.

Dimitri Mendeleev: creator of the original periodic table. Russian chemist born at Tobolsk, Siberia. He studied science at St. Petersburg and graduated in 1856. Mendeleev is best known for his work on the periodic table; arranging the 63 known elements into a Periodic Table based on Atomic Mass, which he published in Principles of Chemistry in 1869. He predicted the existence and properties of new elements and pointed out accepted atomic weights that were in error. [Excerpt from Who was Dmitri Mendeleev?]

The Mendeleev mug was distributed at the 2001 ACT₂-Welch Biennial Conference at Mary Hardin-Baylor in Belton, Texas. The mug was also distributed at the 2003 CAST conference.