ABOVE: © LINDA WANG/C&EN
Helen Murray Free, the former president of the American Chemical Society who pioneered dip-and-read tests for diabetes and other diseases, died on Saturday (May 1) in hospice care following complications of a stroke. She was 98 years old.
Born in Philadelphia on February 20, 1923, Free (then Helen Murray) was predominantly raised in Ohio by her father, James, as her mother, Daisy, died of the flu when Free was only six. Although she originally wanted to pursue an English degree, The New York Times reports, there was a push for women to go into STEM fields while their male peers left school for military service following the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941. She ended up changing her major to chemistry and earned her degree from the College of Wooster in 1945.
Her first job after school was with Miles Laboratories, which has since been acquired ...
