From Wikipedia,
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John William Draper
(1811-1882) developed the
proposition in 1842 that only
light rays that are absorbed can
produce chemical change. It came
to be known as the Grotthuss-Draper
law when his name was teamed with
a prior but apparently unknown
promulgator
C.J.T. de Grotthuss of the
same idea in 1817. Draper's
scholarly curiosity was not
limited to the sciences, however.
In his later career he went on to
write a history of the U.S. Civil
War, a study of European
intellectual development, and a
work on the relationship between
science and religion.
