Way to kill the planet dude!

In the annals of history one man has to go down as the most unfortunate scientist of all time, and I’ll bet you’ve probably never heard of him.

Thomas Midgley Jr May 18 ^th 1889 – November 2 ^nd 1944

Thomas Midgley Jr was a gifted chemist and mechanical engineer working for a subsidiary of GM, when in 1921 he hit upon a way of stopping the “knocking” problem that was prevalent in internal combustion engines. He suggested adding tetraethyllead (TEL) to gasoline and hey presto it worked, no more knocking car engines. Dubbing the new petrol “ethyl” and avoiding any mention of lead in their advertising, motor manufacturers promoted their new fuel as an alternative to “ethanol” on which they made very little profit.

It was a great success and in 1922 Thomas was awarded the William H Nichols Medal by The American Chemical Society.

Unfortunately his idea led to vast amounts of toxic lead being released into the atmosphere causing serious health problems around the world for millions in the years to come.

You would think that the above would be damage enough for one man to inflict upon the world (all be it unwittingly) but no Thomas Midgley Jr wasn’t finished yet.

In 1930 while still working for GM he was tasked with finding a non-toxic and safe refrigerant for household appliances. Along with his colleague Charles Kettering he came up with dichlorodifluoromethane, a chlorinated fluorocarbon (CFC) which he called Freon. CFC’s again were a great success replacing various explosive and toxic liquids which has been used previously.

They awarded him a Perkin’s Medal in 1937 for this breakthrough.

Unfortunately we now know CFC’s destroy the planets ozone layer causing global warming.

He went on to gain more awards and was even made President of the American Chemical Society in 1944.

In death however karma appears to have hit back. Having become severely disabled after contracting polio at the age of 51, he devised a complicated pulley system to help others lift him out of his bed. This apparatus would be his ultimate undoing, when in 1944 he was bizarrely strangled to death by the ropes of his own device.

No other scientist comes close to the damage Midgley caused and he didn’t know a thing.