8.2 Scheele’s First Discoveries
According to Retzius, Scheele worked without a plan with whatever he found
interesting. Retzius believed that this gave Scheele an advantage over more traditional chemists, as he lacked preconceived opinions and undertook investigations
that educated chemists would find pointless [6]. Retzius persuaded Scheele to write
down the results of his experiments. As we will see later, some of these notes still
exist today and contain a blend of laboratory notes, excerpts from books and other
notes. Scheele never dated any of his notes, the only dated documents are the
persevered letters written by Scheele to his friends. “A few times a year”, Retzius
wrote to Wilcke, “he visited me in Lund for a day, and then we rarely had time to
eat dinner, since he had performed a long row of experiments that we had to
discuss” [6]. Retzius also recalled that Scheele used most of his income to buy
chemistry books:
Fig. 8.2 Anders Jahan Retzius on a commemorative coin issued by the Royal Swedish Academy
of Sciences. Photo Linköpings mynt och antikhandel
8.2 Scheele’s First Discoveries
101
According to Retzius, Scheele worked without a plan with whatever he found
interesting. Retzius believed that this gave Scheele an advantage over more traditional chemists, as he lacked preconceived opinions and undertook investigations
that educated chemists would find pointless [6]. Retzius persuaded Scheele to write
down the results of his experiments. As we will see later, some of these notes still
exist today and contain a blend of laboratory notes, excerpts from books and other
notes. Scheele never dated any of his notes, the only dated documents are the
persevered letters written by Scheele to his friends. “A few times a year”, Retzius
wrote to Wilcke, “he visited me in Lund for a day, and then we rarely had time to
eat dinner, since he had performed a long row of experiments that we had to
discuss” [6]. Retzius also recalled that Scheele used most of his income to buy
chemistry books:
Fig. 8.2 Anders Jahan Retzius on a commemorative coin issued by the Royal Swedish Academy
of Sciences. Photo Linköpings mynt och antikhandel
8.2 Scheele’s First Discoveries
101