On This Day - Francis Crick

Francis Crick. How many people have heard of him? Yet he, and co-founder James Watson, made an amazing discovery in 1953 - DNA.

You may wonder why I am including him in my entry today? I like to occasionally look at the 'on this day' website which highlights significant anniversaries and key dates. It helps sometimes when I have a mental writing block the blog. So Monday morning, I decided to take a look and up popped the name of Francis Crick. Why did I choose to focus on him today? His connection to Northampton, where I used to live, is the real reason. And one many of my Northamptonian friends perhaps are not aware of...except for the ' Discovery' statue in the main shopping street. One which many of them would have walked past in pre-COVID days but not realised its significance. Discovery sculpture


The Nobel Prize-winning scientist was born in Holmfield Way, Northampton on 8 June, 1916. 

Holmfield Way
Birth place: Holmfield Way, Northampton as it is today
His grandfather, Walter Drawbridge Crick, had started a boot and shoe factory on St Giles' Street. Francis later recalled: "He was a successful businessman, as well as an amateur geologist and biologist. He published several scientific papers on geology. Two new forms of gastropods are named after him."



Francis's Uncle Walter lived on Abington Avenue. "He had a shed at the bottom of his little garden where he taught me to blow glass, do chemical experiments and to make photographic prints."

Northampton School for Boys
Old school: Northampton School for Boys

Francis attended Northampton Grammar School (now Northampton School for Boys) but in 1931, his family moved to London and Francis got a place at Mill Hill School, North London. He later studied physics at University College, London.

During the Second World War he worked for the Admiralty but in 1947 returned to his studies, this time biology, which was a subject he knew little about. He went to Cambridge and joined the Medical Research Council Unit. In 1950, he became a research student for the second time when he was accepted by Caius College, Cambridge.

It was this year that Francis first got to know a 23-year-old from the United States, James Watson. Together, Crick and Watson tried to work out the structure of DNA. In 1953, they jointly proposed a double-helix structure. This was a breakthrough science had been hoping for. Professor Crick died in Los Angeles in 2004 aged 88.

With thanks to BBC Northampton for the information in today's blog

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