E. J. Bowen

Edmund ("Ted") John Bowen FRS, born in Worcester, England, was a British physical chemist, photochemist, and geologist. He won the Brackenbury Scholarship in 1915 to the University of Oxford where he studied chemistry. In 1916, after less than a year of his undergraduate course, he volunteered for training as a gunner officer and served as Second Lieutenant in the Royal Garrison Artillery during World War I. After being demobilised in 1919, he returned to Balliol College.

In 1922, Bowen became a Fellow in Chemistry of University College, Oxford. Bowen also served as Domestic Bursar of University College and as Junior Proctor of Oxford University in 1936. Created a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1935 for his research into fluorescence, he was awarded the Davy Medal in 1963. He wrote a seminal book called The Chemical Aspects of Light. He was Vice-President of the Faraday Society and of the Chemical Society.

Bowen was an accomplished glass blower for his chemical apparatus and even produced artworks in glass. His 1966 Liversidge Lecture on Fluorescence was based on his life's research. After retirement in June 1965, he was elected as an Honorary Fellow of University College. He was one of the longest serving Fellows of that college, and there is a room in the college named after him.

As well as chemistry, Bowen also had an interest in geology. Perisphinctes boweni, an ammonite from the Jurassic period, is named after him. Bowen was involved with the Oxford University Museum of Natural History and produced a scale model of the sun, earth, and moon, for the upper galleries in the museum.

Source: Wikipedia