Dr. John D. Ferry was born in the Yukon Territory of Canada and moved around a lot as a child with his family. As a young boy, he taught himself to read and write, and this
interest in reading and self-learning persisted into his high school years, where he read about chemistry and started doing his own small experiments at home. Ferry never
actually took high school chemistry – he took the final exam and one laboratory and was able to get credit for the class. Ferry was able to graduate high school by the age
of fifteen, but he did not start college right away.
Starting college at Stanford, Ferry took courses in both chemistry and engineering because he was unsure as to what he wanted to study. He ended up choosing chemistry
because of the students – he liked them better. Ferry was one of the earliest, if not the first, student to graduate from Stanford with a straight A–average (as recalled
in his Oral History) where he graduated with a BA in 1932. After spending a year in London at the National Institute for Medical Research, he returned to Stanford and
received his PhD in 1935. After receiving his PhD, Ferry worked part-time at Harvard from 1936-1941 as an instructor and tutor of biochemical science, after which he
was appointed as a junior fellow to Harvard’s Society of Fellows. He then took a position at the University of Wisconsin in 1946, where he stayed until he retired in 1982.
Dr. Ferry’s research focused primarily on the rheology of polymers and how the modes of molecular motion related to the mechanical and physical properties of the polymers.
The understanding of these mechanisms led to the understanding of the clotting of blood and the gelation of gelatin, as well as the production of fibrinogen plastic and
fibrin products which are important to surgery. Ferry wrote what is arguably the definitive book on the subject of viscoelasticity called Viscoelastic Properties of Polymers,
clearly the viscous and elastic responses of polymeric materials under mechanical stress. It has been translated into at least three other languages, illustrating the importance
of the book to researchers in the field of polymer science. Dr. Ferry was awarded the Bingham Medal in 1953 for his contributions to the knowledge of the rheology of polymeric systems.
Sources
Interview of John D. Ferry by Laura Smail in 1985. UW–Madison Oral History Program, University of Wisconsin.
Go to link.
Tschoegl, N. W. John D. Ferry. Macromolecules 1987, 20(5), 909-910.
Go to link.
John D. Ferry. Chem. Eng. News 1946, 24(20), 2775.
Go to link.
Landel, Robert F.; Mosesson, Michael W.; Schrag, John L. John Douglas Ferry: 1912-2002. Biographical Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences; National Academy of Sciences: Washington D.C., 2007; pp 3-27.
Go to link.
Rheology Bulletin Fall 1953, 22(3).
Also Box 5, Folder 16. Niels Bohr Library & Archives, American Institute of Physics. One Physics Ellipse, College Park, MD 20740.
Photo Credit
Ferry John A1, Emilio Segrè Visual Archives.