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Imagine it’s (Th)ORsday (1)… You are a Swedish chemist in the early 1800s credited with the discovery of the periodic table elements cerium and selenium, are the first to isolate silicon and zirconium, and students from your laboratory are the first to isolate lithium, lanthanum, and vanadium. You are also the originator of the scientific terms catalyst, polymer, protein, and isomer. You are a (Th)ORoughly bad-a** scientist, a true (Th)ORnament in the scientific heavens. Your name is Jöns Jacob Berzelius (1779-1848), you have been proclaimed the “Father of Swedish Chemistry,” and Sweden even celebrates you with a holiday (2). But …

Pockets. Not only was there this ridiculous fashion era where women had to wear pantyhose (I have that lived experience and will never go back), but we women didn’t get pockets in our clothing until the 17th century. And they weren’t even pockets the way we think of them today (1). Men have had real pockets since the Renaissance. Let’s just call this what it is. Systematic fashion sexism (2) By “pockets,” I’m using the modern definition—a pouch or envelope sewn directly into clothing. Women’s fashion finally developed true pockets when they began to work outside the home in the mid 19th century AND with the push for equality …

Platinum and the Periodic Table of Death and Mystery over a steel bank vault door

Mad Hatter – “Why is a RAVEN like a writing desk? Have you guessed the riddle yet?” Alice – “No, I give it up. What’s the answer?” Mad Hatter – “I haven’t the slightest idea.” We might NEVAR know. (1) Let’s get the dry details out of the way so we can get to the good stuff. Mercury (Hg for the Greek hydrargyrumwhich means liquid silver) is a slippery silvery substance with an atomic number of 80. It’s also liquid at room temperature (quicksilver), and I remember a kid in grade school bringing some Hg in a glass vial and pouring …

Gallium (Ga) was discovered by the French scientist Paul-Émile Lecoq de Boisbaudran in 1875, who also discovered two other elements, samarium (Sa), and dysprosium (Dy)—which means difficult to obtain in Greek. All you Francophiles might have noticed that Lecoq (French) and Gallus (Latin) sort-of-kind-of mean the same thing. But in an 1877 article Lecoq de Boisbaudran protested he named the element after Gaul, from Gallia (Latin for France) (2). It was a nice coincidence, though. Right, Paul-Émile? Ga has an atomic weight of 31 and sits just to the right of zinc and right below aluminum on the Periodic Table. It’s a silvery white metallic element which can be …