The first leader of the 1900s, 'A New Century', heralds a new era in which electricity and the "space-annihilating power" of mechanics have made the Earth a "tiny satellite", whereby commodities and ideas are exchanged "as soon as they have emerged from the brain of the Thinker". And consider that powered flight and the basis for television would arrive during this decade. But there was little in the way of real celebration in the new century's editorials. Britain's global power and influence was in decline and her industrial power was waning by comparison with Germany and America. More resources for education, closer ties between science and industry, and the application of the scientific method to government were consistent themes of Nature's prescribed medicine for the ills of the British Empire: "...the attempts to put our house in order will be made in scientific lines." Image shows titles written by Norman Lockyer.
1903
Presidential address to the British Association
Lockyer resigned from the Royal Society in 1902, remarried in 1903, and was elected President of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (BAAS) the same year (see a congratulatory letter from Sir Archibald Geike — pictured). In his inaugural address to the BAAS, Lockyer pointed out that the Royal Navy had received £21.5 million for a five-year building programme in 1888, so Britain was spending £120 on its navy for every pound spent on its universities. Later figures indicated that in 1905 British universities received £155,000 between them — paltry amounts by comparison with, for example, the equivalent of £167,000 allocated to Berlin University alone by the German government a decade earlier. Lockyer's address, widely commented upon and quoted in speeches and in the press — even by the Prince of Wales — was published by Macmillan in 1903 as 'The Influence of Brain-Power on History' and reworked for Nature: "It may be long in this slow moving country before the influence of Brain-power on history is recognised as fully as the influence of Sea-power...it will be bad for our country if much more time is lost." Image courtesy of University of Exeter Academic Services, Special Collections
1903
Discovery of radioactive decay
The Scottish chemist William Ramsay (pictured) and Englishman Frederick Soddy reported in 13 August 1903 issue of Nature that helium gas is produced by the radioactive decay of radium. Working at University College London, they had unknowingly discovered the spontaneous transmutation of elements, but candidly offered no explanation for the effect: "The spectrum [of helium] was apparently a new one, probably that of the emanation, but this has not yet been completely examined, and we hope to publish further details shortly." The spectrum of helium obtained was an isotope of helium, but it would be another ten years before Soddy coined the term 'isotope' in the pages of Nature. Frederick Soddy would later win the 1921 Nobel prize for Chemistry for his work on radioactive elements and isotopes.
Peaceful industrial competition
Against the backdrop of a ship-building arms races between Britain and Germany, Nature commented on a new type of conflict: "Progress in science during the last century has brought about a perfectly new state of things, in which the "struggle for existence" which Darwin studied...is now seen...to apply to organised communities, not when at war with each other, but when engaged in peaceful commercial strife." Nature saw this "struggle for existence" as having as much to do with brain power as sea power. Britain had more ships than Germany, but Britain had only eleven universities to Germany's twenty-two. Nature repeatedly pushed the case that modern Germany was a direct outcome of "the policy of intellectual effort" and that the German state was "as busily employed in increasing the efficiency of their universities as they are in adding to their navy" (see picture). The next year an additional £75,000 was provided annually to British universities, with a promise that the sum would be doubled. Image courtesy of Photos of the Great War.
1904
A lady entomologist
Following the enthusiastic reviews of scientific lectures for women in the 1880s, Nature continued with its then forward-looking attitude towards the role of women in science in a book-review leader in 1904. Eleanor Anne Ormerod was an entomologist who applied her skills to agriculture and helped to found the field of economic entomology. The review throws much praise on her abilities, comparing her to astronomer Caroline Herschel and mathematician Mary Somerville, and hints that her work may have influenced the Linnean Society to open its doors to women — papers submitted by women were previously read to a male-only audience. Sadly, much as Mrs Ormerod's achievements are lauded, the same cannot be said of the book, which Nature summarizes as "one the most glaring instances we have ever seen of how not to edit a biography". Image courtesy of the Royal Meteorological Society.
N-rays: debunking junk science
Nature originally carried notice of the new rays in a reprint of a paper read to the French Academy of Sciences in Paris by French physicist René-Prosper Blondlot of the University of Nancy (from where the 'N' of N-rays originates). But other researchers, including Lord Kelvin and William Crookes, had difficulty replicating the results. Blondlot then invited American physicist Robert Wood to his laboratory, but the suspicious Wood, who admitted to a 'doubting state of mind', removed a crucial prism from one experiment and supplanted a steel file for an inert piece of wood in another. Blondlot's team insisted that the n-rays were still being produced and Wood's account in Nature (pictured) settled the issue: N-rays were an illusion. But Wood did not revel in the report of his subterfuge: "I am obliged to confess that I left the laboratory with a distinct feeling of depression...having failed to see a single experiment of a convincing Nature."
1905
The British Science Guild
By now, Nature had espoused the importance of science education and lobbied for the appliance of the scientific method to government for decades. The British Science Guild (journal masthead is pictured) was instigated to formalize such activities, and Lockyer was a principal instigator of the movement. The 12 October issue of Nature carried news of the first meeting of the guild, which would push for "making the scientific spirit a national characteristic which shall inspire progress and determine the policy in affairs of all kinds." The organization was associated with no political party and its membership was open to men and women. Lockyer took the position of chairman of the committees, as nearly all the scientists were Nature contributors and many others were close friends like Hooker, Geikie, Tennyson and Lankester. Lockyer's new wife, Mary, whom he married in 1903, even became honorary assistant treasurer. Image courtesy archives of the British Association.
1906
A close friend in H. G. Wells
Richard Gregory, Nature's future editor, had now been working at Nature for more than ten years. In the early 1890s he had forged a close relationship with the science-fiction writer H. G. Wells (pictured) — a man with whom he shared ideas on science, mankind and the future. Together they founded the Normal School of Science's (later to become the Royal College of Science) Science Schools Journal (later to become The School World), a mixture of art, literature and science, in which a short story called The Chronic Argonauts, an early forerunner to Well's classic The Time Machine (1895), was published. Gregory's and Wells' correspondence, some of which can be seen at the University of Sussex Special Collections indicate much about the way Gregory viewed the world — an ideology that would later take Nature in new directions. In 1906, Gregory admitted to Wells that he was "completely dissatisfied with the habits and institutions established around me, I find pleasure in looking forward to the world of the future". Wells' story Love and Mr Lewisham (available in full, online) featured a character based on many of Gregory's real-life experiences. See page 14 of Macmillan News for more on H. G. Wells and Macmillan.
1908
The theory of TV
The development of the telegraph in the previous century was a revelation. Now the race was on to transmit images. Alexander Graham Bell's photophone and Shelford Bidwell's 'Tele-photography' (see 1881) demonstrated that the transmission of live images was possible, but an article by Bidwell published on 4 June emphasized the "wildly impracticable" problems of synchronizing 160,000 mechanical operations per second to transmit an image just two inches square. Within two weeks, a reply from Scottish electrical engineer Alan Archibald Campbell Swinton sketched out the solution with unnerving accuracy: "Obtaining distant electrical vision can probably be solved by employment of two beams of cathode rays (one at the transmitting and one at the receiving station, as pictured in Nature)" (see image). The Letter goes on to detail how electromagnets would direct the beam over a wide surface, and even that "a sufficiently sensitive fluorescent screen" would be needed to "obtain the desired result".
1909
Content and structure
By the end of the 1900s, the structure of the magazine still had not significantly changed since the first issue in 1869. The tendency in the 1880s for leading articles to consist of a book reviews, and non- or semi-scientific ones at that, continued into the new century, and the Our Book Shelf section seemed to grow, often at the expense of the scientific correspondence of the Letters section. The end of the journal is little changed — Articles, Notes, Our Astronomical Column, Societies and Academies are all still present — save for a column 'University and Educational Intelligence' that details appointments at learned institutions. The Diary section common in the 1870s makes a comeback as 'Diary of Societies' and, as before, details lectures and talks worthy of attendance.
The first leader of the 1900s, 'A New Century', heralds a new era in which electricity and the "space-annihilating power" of mechanics have made the Earth a "tiny satellite", whereby commodities and ideas are exchanged "as soon as they have emerged from the brain of the Thinker". And consider that powered flight and the basis for television would arrive during this decade. But there was little in the way of real celebration in the new century's editorials. Britain's global power and influence was in decline and her industrial power was waning by comparison with Germany and America. More resources for education, closer ties between science and industry, and the application of the scientific method to government were consistent themes of Nature's prescribed medicine for the ills of the British Empire: "...the attempts to put our house in order will be made in scientific lines." Image shows titles written by Norman Lockyer. 
Lockyer resigned from the Royal Society in 1902, remarried in 1903, and was elected President of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (BAAS) the same year (see a congratulatory letter from Sir Archibald Geike — pictured). In his inaugural address to the BAAS, Lockyer pointed out that the Royal Navy had received £21.5 million for a five-year building programme in 1888, so Britain was spending £120 on its navy for every pound spent on its universities. Later figures indicated that in 1905 British universities received £155,000 between them — paltry amounts by comparison with, for example, the equivalent of £167,000 allocated to Berlin University alone by the German government a decade earlier. Lockyer's address, widely commented upon and quoted in speeches and in the press — even by the Prince of Wales — was published by Macmillan in 1903 as 'The Influence of Brain-Power on History' and reworked for Nature: "It may be long in this slow moving country before the influence of Brain-power on history is recognised as fully as the influence of Sea-power...it will be bad for our country if much more time is lost." Image courtesy of University of Exeter Academic Services, Special Collections
The Scottish chemist William Ramsay (pictured) and Englishman Frederick Soddy reported in 13 August 1903 issue of Nature that helium gas is produced by the radioactive decay of radium. Working at University College London, they had unknowingly discovered the spontaneous transmutation of elements, but candidly offered no explanation for the effect: "The spectrum [of helium] was apparently a new one, probably that of the emanation, but this has not yet been completely examined, and we hope to publish further details shortly." The spectrum of helium obtained was an isotope of helium, but it would be another ten years before Soddy coined the term 'isotope' in the pages of Nature. Frederick Soddy would later win the 1921 Nobel prize for Chemistry for his work on radioactive elements and isotopes.
Against the backdrop of a ship-building arms races between Britain and Germany, Nature commented on a new type of conflict: "Progress in science during the last century has brought about a perfectly new state of things, in which the "struggle for existence" which Darwin studied...is now seen...to apply to organised communities, not when at war with each other, but when engaged in peaceful commercial strife." Nature saw this "struggle for existence" as having as much to do with brain power as sea power. Britain had more ships than Germany, but Britain had only eleven universities to Germany's twenty-two. Nature repeatedly pushed the case that modern Germany was a direct outcome of "the policy of intellectual effort" and that the German state was "as busily employed in increasing the efficiency of their universities as they are in adding to their navy" (see picture). The next year an additional £75,000 was provided annually to British universities, with a promise that the sum would be doubled. Image courtesy of Photos of the Great War. 
Following the enthusiastic reviews of scientific lectures for women in the 1880s, Nature continued with its then forward-looking attitude towards the role of women in science in a book-review leader in 1904. Eleanor Anne Ormerod was an entomologist who applied her skills to agriculture and helped to found the field of economic entomology. The review throws much praise on her abilities, comparing her to astronomer Caroline Herschel and mathematician Mary Somerville, and hints that her work may have influenced the Linnean Society to open its doors to women — papers submitted by women were previously read to a male-only audience. Sadly, much as Mrs Ormerod's achievements are lauded, the same cannot be said of the book, which Nature summarizes as "one the most glaring instances we have ever seen of how not to edit a biography". Image courtesy of the Royal Meteorological Society.
Nature originally carried notice of the new rays in a reprint of a paper read to the French Academy of Sciences in Paris by French physicist René-Prosper Blondlot of the University of Nancy (from where the 'N' of N-rays originates). But other researchers, including Lord Kelvin and William Crookes, had difficulty replicating the results. Blondlot then invited American physicist Robert Wood to his laboratory, but the suspicious Wood, who admitted to a 'doubting state of mind', removed a crucial prism from one experiment and supplanted a steel file for an inert piece of wood in another. Blondlot's team insisted that the n-rays were still being produced and Wood's account in Nature (pictured) settled the issue: N-rays were an illusion. But Wood did not revel in the report of his subterfuge: "I am obliged to confess that I left the laboratory with a distinct feeling of depression...having failed to see a single experiment of a convincing Nature."
By now, Nature had espoused the importance of science education and lobbied for the appliance of the scientific method to government for decades. The British Science Guild (journal masthead is pictured) was instigated to formalize such activities, and Lockyer was a principal instigator of the movement. The 12 October issue of Nature carried news of the first meeting of the guild, which would push for "making the scientific spirit a national characteristic which shall inspire progress and determine the policy in affairs of all kinds." The organization was associated with no political party and its membership was open to men and women. Lockyer took the position of chairman of the committees, as nearly all the scientists were Nature contributors and many others were close friends like Hooker, Geikie, Tennyson and Lankester. Lockyer's new wife, Mary, whom he married in 1903, even became honorary assistant treasurer. Image courtesy archives of the British Association. 
Richard Gregory, Nature's future editor, had now been working at Nature for more than ten years. In the early 1890s he had forged a close relationship with the science-fiction writer H. G. Wells (pictured) — a man with whom he shared ideas on science, mankind and the future. Together they founded the Normal School of Science's (later to become the Royal College of Science) Science Schools Journal (later to become The School World), a mixture of art, literature and science, in which a short story called The Chronic Argonauts, an early forerunner to Well's classic The Time Machine (1895), was published. Gregory's and Wells' correspondence, some of which can be seen at the University of Sussex Special Collections indicate much about the way Gregory viewed the world — an ideology that would later take Nature in new directions. In 1906, Gregory admitted to Wells that he was "completely dissatisfied with the habits and institutions established around me, I find pleasure in looking forward to the world of the future". Wells' story Love and Mr Lewisham (available in full, online) featured a character based on many of Gregory's real-life experiences. See page 14 of Macmillan News for more on H. G. Wells and Macmillan. 
The development of the telegraph in the previous century was a revelation. Now the race was on to transmit images. Alexander Graham Bell's photophone and Shelford Bidwell's 'Tele-photography' (see 1881) demonstrated that the transmission of live images was possible, but an article by Bidwell published on 4 June emphasized the "wildly impracticable" problems of synchronizing 160,000 mechanical operations per second to transmit an image just two inches square. Within two weeks, a reply from Scottish electrical engineer Alan Archibald Campbell Swinton sketched out the solution with unnerving accuracy: "Obtaining distant electrical vision can probably be solved by employment of two beams of cathode rays (one at the transmitting and one at the receiving station, as pictured in Nature)" (see image). The Letter goes on to detail how electromagnets would direct the beam over a wide surface, and even that "a sufficiently sensitive fluorescent screen" would be needed to "obtain the desired result". 
By the end of the 1900s, the structure of the magazine still had not significantly changed since the first issue in 1869. The tendency in the 1880s for leading articles to consist of a book reviews, and non- or semi-scientific ones at that, continued into the new century, and the Our Book Shelf section seemed to grow, often at the expense of the scientific correspondence of the Letters section. The end of the journal is little changed — Articles, Notes, Our Astronomical Column, Societies and Academies are all still present — save for a column 'University and Educational Intelligence' that details appointments at learned institutions. The Diary section common in the 1870s makes a comeback as 'Diary of Societies' and, as before, details lectures and talks worthy of attendance. 
