Biography

George Downing Liveing (1827-1924), chemist and university administrator, was born on 21 December 1827 at Nayland, Suffolk. He entered St John's College, Cambridge, in 1847, and graduated as eleventh wrangler in the 1850 mathematical tripos. The following year he read for the natural sciences tripos, the first year of its establishment, during which he studied line spectra under J. J. Griffin. Next he studied with A. W. Hofmann at the Royal College of Chemistry before working with Karl Rammelsberg at Berlin. In 1852 he returned to Cambridge where he started the first course of practical chemistry for medical students in a primitive laboratory fitted up, at his own expense, in a cottage in Corn Exchange Street. Liveing was elected a fellow of St John's in 1853, and the college founded a lectureship in chemistry and built a laboratory for him. In 1860 he also became professor of chemistry at the Staff College, Camberley, and at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. In 1889 he returned to St John's as a professorial fellow; he was re-elected a fellow in 1908 and in 1911 became president, an office corresponding to that of vice-master. He became chair of chemistry at Cambridge in 1861. On 11 October 1924, while walking to the laboratory, he was knocked down by a bicyclist and on 26 December he died at home of his injuries.

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