Professor John Campbell Earl (1890-1978)
Papers 1903-1978

MSS 0037

Contents Listing

1. Personal documents.  1903-1942.

• Certificate of passing Oxford Preliminary Local Examination, 1903
• Inorganic Chemistry examination paper, Board of Education South London, 1907
• Genealogy of Allen family (manuscript) undated
• Dinner menu, plan of cabin accommodation on S.S. Persic, 1913
• National Ration Book and ration cards/tickets, 1918
• Passenger ticket on Port Line from London to Sydney, September 1937
• Patent applications of Timbrol Ltd., 1941 and 1942 ("Improvements relating to the production of phenylalkylamines" and "Method for the purification of cyclic organic compounds")
• Circular statement by Timbrol Ltd. of Professor Earl's association with and contributions to the Company.  Undated.

2. Correspondence.  1909-1978.

2.1  Personal  1909-1927, 1946-1948, 1951-1953 (including correspondence relating to examinations, appointments and degrees)

2.2  Personal (financial)  1936-1951, 1962, 1966-1978.  [Principally with the Perpetual Trustee Company, Sydney]

2.3  Professional 1936-64, 1970-1972.
Principally with colleagues and with journal editors and reviewers re publication of Earl's scientific papers, and including some typescripts of the papers under discussion and reports on research on sydnones completed under Leverhulme Research Award, 1955. Includes typescripts of papers/reports on research on syndnones:

• Bond orders and lengths (1954)
• The reduction and polymerisation of 3-Phenylsydnone (1955)
• Chemistry of the sydnones I (1956)
• Intramolecular energy and heats of combustion (1970)
• Thermochemistry (1970)
• Chemical energy equations (1971)
• Essay on thermochemistry (1972)

Other scientific papers, published and manuscript, are to be found in Series 3 and 4.
A complete set of Earl's reprints has also ben catalogued seperately at University Collection 540.4 E12

Earl's personal correspondence, Series 2.1, also includes some letters from colleagues and former students and regarding his D.Sc. thesis (1948)

3. Reprints of scientific papers.  1914-1964.

1914    Fibrous materials for paper making.
1933    The nitrosation of methylaniline.
1935    The action of acetic anhydride on N-nitrosophenylglycine and some of its derivatives.
1937    The decomposition of aniline nitrite.
1946    The sydnones. A new class of compound containing two adjacent nitrogen atoms.
1946    Structure of the sydnones.
            Structure of the Sydnones  [Reply to communication of Prof. Wilson Baker].
1947    Sydnones.
1953    Molecular structure of the sydnones.
1955    The molecular structure of benzene.
            Bond orders.
1956    Chemistry of the sydnones I
            Chemistry of the sydnones II
1957    Chemistry of the sydnones III
            Relation between the "regular" and Kekulé structures for benzene.
1958    Bond character, bond order and the quadrivalency of carbon.
1959    Carbon-carbon bond energies.
1962    Three-linked carbon.
1964    Carbon-carbon bond energies [amplification].

See also the Professional correspondence in Series 2.3

4. Typescript and manuscript papers. c.1914- [1960s] (most undated)

• Note on the composition of the oil of Eucalyptus platypus
• The essential oil of Eucalyptus platypus
• Notes on cineole
• The interconnexion of economic botany and chemical industry c.1920  [Note Earl's curriculum vitae, c.1920, on verso of a loose summary of this paper]
• The variability of valency
• Sydnones and similar compounds [see also Series 2.3, 1954/1955]

Undated

• Chemistry of the sydnones II
• Further studies on the sydnones
• The reaction between nitrous acid and amines
• Bond character, bond order and the quadrivalency of carbon.
• Reaction heats and the structure of molecules
• Simple mechanics and the structure of molecules
• Molecular structure and classical mechanics

See also Series 2.3

5. Notes and notebooks on scientific matters.  1914- c.1960s

• (most undated)
  Practical botany, 1915?-1917
• Untitled [oil distillation research], 1914-1915
• Untitled, Feb.-March 1915
• Certain amino- and allied derivatives of anthraquinone, n.d.
• Notes on "S.S.", bye[sic]-product from wood distillation, n.d.
• Untitled [Sydnones, post-retirement research at Norwich], 1954 and undated.  8 v.
• Chemical bonds, n.d.
• Untitled [include bonding, heat of combustion, etc.], n.d.  4 v.
• Miscellaneous undated and untitled loose notes

6. Monthly reports

Relating to research work done at St. Andrews, plus separate file of notes of anthraquinone research

7. Reports and papers by others

Includes monthly reports on research by Elgar D. Treharne, Feb.-Oct. 1935; report of B.V. Chandler, May-June [no year]; report of S. Kruger, Feb.-Oct. 1947; Case, War Gas, Testing Mark II Instructions [official report], n.d.; and a few scientific reprints 1923-1955

8. Miscellaneous cuttings, notes, circulars etc.

Relating to institutions and individuals, principally scientific or relating to war events and University and local affairs.  1900-1953. Including:

• Notes on the history, scientific work and organisational structure of the Imperial Institute (manuscript) undated
• Circular report on meeting of professional Chemical Institutes in the British Empire, 1946
• Circular memorandum of the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Adelaide re the public lectures of the Tutorial Class Organisation.  24 May 1935
• Articles on Dr Francis Lions, Professor A.S. Hook
• Issues of the Finsbury Technical College Old Students' Association Magazine 1912-1913, 1920

9. Photographs and postcards.
"Continent and overseas [including Australia]".  Most unidentified and undated.  Postcards are occasionally written on but appear to have been kept for their pictorial interest