Arnold Beckman

Arnold Orville Beckman was an American chemist, inventor, investor, and philanthropist. While a professor at California Institute of Technology, he founded Beckman Instruments based on his 1934 invention of the pH meter, a device for measuring acidity, later considered to have "revolutionized the study of chemistry and biology". He also developed the DU spectrophotometer, "probably the most important instrument ever developed towards the advancement of bioscience". Beckman funded the Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory, the first silicon transistor company in California, thus giving rise to Silicon Valley. After retirement, he and his wife Mabel (1900–1989) were numbered among the top philanthropists in the United States.

10 April 1900

Born on the same birth day (10 April): Anna-Leena Härkönen • Anne Lamott • Barkhad Abdi • Clare Turlay Newberry • Dolores Huerta • Doris Leuthard • Eugen d'Albert • George William Russell • Jamie Chung • John Watkins (South African cricketer) • Johnny Hayes • Kenny Lattimore • Lew Wallace • Metin Göktepe • Narayan Rane • Paul Theroux • Peter MacNicol • Rachel Corrie • Sean Avery • Sofia Carson • Stefan Heym • Terry Teagle

Born in the same month (April 1900): Adolf Dymsza • Amelia Best • Elizabeth Goudge • Herbert Bayer • Pierre Molinier • Ramón Iribarren • Roberto Arlt • Roman Steinberg • Sándor Márai