UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON ARCHIVES
ORAL HISTORY PROJECT

Interview #265
HAROLD A. CAMPBELL

CAMPBELL, Harold A.  (1909-1996)
Graduate Student, Biochemistry; Senior Scientist, McArdle Laboratory
At UW: 1935-39; 1969-95

Interviewed: 1983	
Length: 2½ hours
Series: Life Sciences
Interviewer: Laura Smail

Background; Graduate work under Karl Paul Link; Friday teas for laboratory group; Discoveries of niacin and dicumarol; Developments in Link's laboratory; Issues about attributing credit for research results; His work at McArdle Laboratory.

Tape 1/Side 1

00:00:00

00:00:19	HC discusses a method to help recognize pre-cancer cells, interpret data through a two-dimensional picture using a computer.  How he solved it.  
00:09:10	Value of his chemical engineering background.

00:30:27	End of tape 1 side one. 

00:30:34	HC was here as graduate student from 1935 to 1939.  His arrival and renaming by Link.  Likes to be associated with discovery of dicumarol, minute rice, instant coffee.  More on solving.  Chemical identification of vitamin niacin.

00:43:30	Choice to be an organic chemist.  Hooked on excitement of discovery.  Always enjoyed math.  Father was a contractor.  Worked with him.

00:49:16	Gets one quarter of 15% on dicumarol patent.  Largest check received was for $2017.  There was a much greater return on Warfarin patent.

00:54:19	Process of finding cumadin and trying it out.  Their motivation.

01:01:29	Karl Paul Link.

01:01:57	End of tape 1

Tape 2

00:00:00

00:02:35	Link was a tremendous teacher.  His handling of his graduate students.  Recognized talent.  Stanley Moore an example.  Was a Nobel Prize winner.  Link always accessible to students.  Gave encouragement and confidence.  Didn't suggest, let students find their way.

00:08:19	Afternoon teas of lab group.  Linus Pauling's visits.  Fridays, students took turns describing discoveries.  Mark Stahmann's work on cabbage root--plant pathology.

00:14:49	Link was a tremendous showman, teacher.  He made assignments.  HC recommends reading Link's Harvey Lecture, given at New York Hospital.  That's a clean story of discovery of dicumarol.  A serious account.  Link stuck to facts.

00:16:03	Later may have embellished story a bit.

00:25:27	Link trained HC as his microanalysist.  Link had first microanalytic lab in  U.S.

00:27:20	HC did microanalysis for lab on Saturdays and Sundays, worked on dicumarol rest of week.  Madden got crystals for niacin.  HC identified it.  Only three or four labs in country that could have analyzed it.

00:31:32	What to do with numbers once you get them is a problem.

00:34:22	Hart an excellent teacher.  Describes an experiment he did on self.  Steenbock's joke about vitamin D.  HC's decision to have his degree called agricultural chemistry rather than biochemistry.  Name was changed while there.

00:45:38	HC not invited to stay on.  

00:47:26	When Mark Stahmann came back, he and Link were still friends.   Stahmann had been with Rockefeller and then Linus Pauling.  Came back to help with lab while Link was in hospital.  Must have viewed self as heir-apparent.  Worked on animo acids which he began at Rockefeller Institute.  Van Potter had been writing on animo acids.  Then Link came back.  Awkward situation.  Link's lab.  UW provided Stahmann with fine new lab, but Stahmann might have preferred old lab.  
		
00:55:44	Stahmann thought he owned Warfarin patent too.  Misunderstandings and skuffles.  Karl is an outspoken person.  HC doesn’t think he would have gotten sucked into the same situation.

01:00:00	Elizabeth Link told HC that he was Karl's favorite student.

01:01:47	End of tape 2

Tape 3

00:00:00	Two stories that ought to be told.  One is story about cattle dying from eating sweet clover.  Involves Link, James King, and HC.  The other--identification of niacin, a story which hasn't been told.  Also--relationships among scientists.  Harry Waisman knew story.  HC not ready to tell these stories.  Discusses process of scientific research.  Work done in Link's office by Schoeffel, followed up by William Smith in agronomy, on subject of bitter taste in clover.  This was given to HC.

00:12:39	Shows clipping from Capital Times on accomplishments in life sciences.  HC points out that he was only person involved in two of these achievements.  More on these discoveries.  Stahmann and HC's role in dicumarol. 

00:18:53	End of interview.

END