1871 |
Born
at Spring Grove (now Brightwater), Nelson Province, New Zealand, 30th Aug 1871. |
1877 |
Family moves to
Foxhill, Nelson Province. |
1877-83 |
Attended Foxhill
School, Nelson Province. |
1883 |
Family
moves to Havelock, Marlborough Sounds. |
1883-6 |
Attended Havelock
School. |
1883 |
Baby brother Percy
died of whooping cough. |
1886 |
Brothers Herbert
and Charles drown in the Marlborough Sounds. |
1887 |
Won a Marlborough
Scholarship to Nelson College. |
1887-9 |
Attended Nelson
College. |
1889 |
Won a University
of New Zealand Junior Scholarship. |
1890-4 |
Attended
Canterbury College, University of New Zealand, in Christchurch |
1892 |
Joined the
Philosophical Institute of Canterbury, now the Canterbury Branch of the Royal Society of
New Zealand. |
1892 |
Completed BA. |
1893 |
First original
research on the high frequency magnetisation of iron. Developed a timing device which
could switch circuits in less than one hundred thousandth of a second. |
1893 |
Completed MA with
double First Class Honours; in Mathematics and Mathematical Physics, and in Physical
Science. |
1894 |
Completed BSc in
Chemistry and Geology. Extended his research to higher frequencies using discharging
Leyden jars and a Hertzian oscillator. Developed a magnetic detector of very short current
pulses. |
1894 |
His first research
paper published. |
1895 |
Awarded an
Exhibition of 1851 scholarship to go anywhere in the world to carry out research of
importance to New Zealand's industries. |
1895-8 |
Cavendish
Laboratory, Cambridge University. |
1895 |
Measured the high
frequency dielectric properties of materials. Used his magnetic detector as part of a
frequency meter. |
1896 |
Jan. Roentgen
publicly announces the discovery of X-rays. |
|
Feb. Ern sets the
world record for the distance over which `wireless' waves were detected. |
|
Mar. Becquerel
announces the discovery of radioactivity. |
|
Apr. Ern is
invited to work with JJ Thomson on electrical conduction in gases. |
1897 |
JJ Thomson
announces the discovery of the electron, the first object lighter than an atom. |
1898 |
Ern discovers rays
from radioactive materials are of two main types, which he names alpha and beta. |
1898-07 |
McGill University.
|
1899 |
Demonstrates the
principle which is the basis of the modern smoke detector. |
1899 |
Discovers a
radioactive gas, later to be named radon. |
1900 |
Marries Mary
Georgina Newton in Christchurch, New Zealand. |
1900 |
Elected Fellow of
the Royal Society of Canada. |
1901 |
DSc from the
University of New Zealand. Now Dr Rutherford. |
1901 |
Daughter Eileen
born. |
1902 |
Announces formally
that ``radioactivity is a manifestation of sub-atomic change.'' |
1903 |
Elected Fellow of
the Royal Society of London. |
1904 |
Awarded the
Rumford Medal, his first major science prize. |
1905 |
Reconciles
geologists and physicists determinations of the age of the Earth. |
1905 |
Family visit to
New Zealand. |
1907-19 |
Manchester
University. |
1908 |
Invents the
Rutherford-Geiger detector of single ionizing particles. |
1908 |
Nobel Prize in
Chemistry. |
1910 |
Purchases his
first car. |
1910 |
Sister Alice dies. |
1911 |
Ern announces the
nuclear model of the atom. |
1914 |
Knighted. Now Sir
Ernest Rutherford. |
1914 |
Visits New
Zealand. Canterbury College given approval to build a physics department. |
1914-18 |
First World War. |
1915-17 |
Pioneer work on
acoustic methods of detecting submarines. |
1916 |
Ern and W H Bragg
patent apparatus for determining the direction of submarine sound. |
1916 |
States publicly
that he hoped mankind should not discover how to extract the energy from the nucleus until
man was living at peace with his neighbour. |
1917 |
Leads the allied
delegation to America to transfer anti-submarine knowledge. |
1917 |
Becomes the
world's first successful alchemist, changing nitrogen into hydrogen ie he splits the atom. |
1919-37 |
Director of the
Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge University. |
1919 |
Elected an
inaugural Fellow of the New Zealand Institute, now the Royal Society of New Zealand. |
1920 |
Predicts the
existence of the neutron. |
1922 |
Elected Corresponding Member
of the Russian Academy of Science 2/12/22. |
1924 |
Edward Appleton
and Miles Barnett (of New Zealand) prove the existence of the ionosphere. Appleton
receives the 1947 Nobel Prize in Physics. |
1925 |
Elected Honorary Member
of the Russian Academy of Science 3/1/25. |
1925-30 |
President of the
Royal Society of London. |
1925 |
Order of Merit. |
1925 |
Visits Australia
and New Zealand. The New Zealand DSIR is formed in 1926. |
1928 |
Father dies. |
1929-37 |
Chairman of the
Advisory Council of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. |
1930 |
Daughter Eileen
dies two days before Christmas. |
1931 |
Raised to the
Peerage at New Year, now Ernest, Lord Rutherford of Nelson. |
1931-33 |
President of the
Institute of Physics. |
1932 |
Cockcroft and
Walton use an accelerator to split the atom. Chadwick discoveres the neutron. Each
received a Nobel Prize. |
1933-37 |
President of the
Academic Assistance Council. |
1934 |
Ern and Oliphant
discover H3 (tritium) and He3. |
1935 |
Mother dies. |
1935 |
Opens the LMS
Railway Research Labs at Derby, 10th Dec 1935. |
1937 |
Died 19th Oct
1937. Ashes interred in Westminister Abbey. |