William Crookes was a scientific polymath. He discovered thallium. He was a master of spectroscopy. He talked to ghosts.

...okay, one of those things may not SEEM scientific, but trust us, it is. After a tragedy befell his family, William Crookes was sucked into the world of the paranormal. Eventually, this would culminate in him joining one of the most mysterious cults of England, but for now, he's just the son of a tailor with his own magazine. Join us in our first-ever two-part episode to learn a bit about the history of William Crookes!

Also, follow us on Twitter at @STEMSeedscast!

SOURCES:

https://nationalmaglab.org/education/magnet-academy/history-of-electricity-magnetism/pioneers/william-crookes https://www.bbvaopenmind.com/en/science/leading-figures/the-ghosts-of-william-crookes/d'Albe, E.dmund The Life of Sir William Crookes. Cambridge University Press, 2013.

CREDITS:

"Midnight in the Greenhouse" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) "Shadowlands 2 - Bridge" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Copernicus may have proven the Earth goes around the Sun and not vice versa, and Galileo may have been the first person to view the heavens with a telescope, but between those two lies a lesser-known hero of astronomy.  Tycho Brahe was the Danish nobleman who worked side by side with Johannes Kepler to build the Rudolphine Tables, one of the most comprehensive and precise star catalogues ever created. The thing is, for a noble Danish astronomer, his children were commoners, he was driven out of Denmark by an angry mob, and his dying wish to his best friend involved violating the laws of astrophysics. Listen to STEMs and Seeds to get the scoop on Tycho Brahe, Denmark's noseless hero!

SOURCES:

http://curioushistorian.com/bizarre-facts-about-tycho-brahe

CREDITS: 

"Giant Wyrm" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Hedy Lamarr is most well known as being a Golden Age starlet - well, honestly, she's probably most well known today as being a running joke in Blazing Saddles. But offscreen, she was more than that. She successfully fled the country not once but twice, She worked side-by-side by Howard Hughes. And most importantly, she helped create the most important invention of the 21st century all the way back in 1941.

Also, quick trigger warning: the start of this episode talks about how she was manipulated into performing nude at 18, and also mentions body image/eating disorder issues, and briefly mentions her drug problem at the end of the episode. Viewer discretion is advised.

SOURCES:

https://www.notablebiographies.com/supp/Supplement-Ka-M/Lamarr-Hedy.html

CREDITS:

"Five Armies" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

“Roar.wav” CGEffex (freesound.org/people/CGEffex/)

DNA - the building block of life itself. One of the greatest scientific discoveries of biology. And its iconic double helix structure was discovered by, of course, Watson and Crick... except for the fact that it absolutely wasn't. Rosalind Franklin was a Jewish woman who, in addition to being a child prodigy, saved lives during The Blitz, housed child refugees, and took one of science's most important photographs. Join us this week on STEMs and Seeds while we explore Rosalind Franklin's life!

SOURCES:

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(12)60452-8/fulltext

CREDITS:

"StompDance" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

When you hear the name "Samuel Morse", the first thing that comes to mind is a series of dots and dashes, communicating information through the telegraph wire. But there's more to the man than that. He had a knack for painting, a (thankfully) failed political career, a mess of legal trouble, and, to be honest? Kind of a raging ego. And also a lot of problematic beliefs. Join us this week on STEMs and Seeds while we explore Samuel Morse's life!

SOURCES:

https://www.famousscientists.org/samuel-morse/

CREDITS:

Plantation by Audionautix | http://audionautix.com

Heavy Impacts by RICHERlandTV | https://freesound.org/people/RICHERlandTV/

"Mourning Song" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

If you've taken a high school algebra class, then chances are, you're familiar with the name Pythagoras. But, Pythagoras was more than the guy with the theorem about right triangles. He was a natural born genius who ran off to Egypt, became a slave, and later became the head of a bizarre and secretive religious movement. Join us this week on STEMs and Seeds while we explore Pythagoras' life!

SOURCES:

https://classicalastrologer.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/iamblichus-the-pythagorean-life-1.pdf

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/favism-fava-beans

Kahn, Charles H. (2001), Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans: A Brief History, Indianapolis, Indiana and Cambridge, England: Hackett Publishing Company

CREDITS:

Sound effects and ambient noise taken from freesound.org

“Hidden Wonders" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)