About 200 friends, family and colleagues gathered at the First United Methodist Church in Evanston on Monday to commemorate the life of Nobel Laureate and Northwestern Board of Trustees Professor of Chemistry Sir John A. Pople.
Pople died from liver cancer on March 15 at the Chicago home he shared with his daughter, Hilary. He was 78.
Pople’s brother, Don, flew from England to deliver the eulogy, which Michael Wasielewski, NU’s chemistry department chair, said was the most touching part of the memorial service.
Don Pople reminisced about his brother’s childhood and said the service was a celebration of Pople’s life and accomplishments.
His friends and family remembered Pople, above all, as a gentleman.
“His gentility largely impacted people’s lives,” Wasielewski said. “He was just a wonderful person to have around.”
Throughout his career as a chemist, Pople developed mathematical methods used to calculate molecular properties. His work has allowed scientists to make predictions about the structure of molecules and to examine molecular systems, Wasielewski said.
Pople was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1998 and was knighted by the Queen Elizabeth II of England in 2003 for his contributions to the field of chemistry.
He was decorated with many other distinctions, including induction into Britain’s Royal Society in 1961, the prestigious Wolf Prize in 1992, the American Chemical Society’s Award for Theoretical Chemistry in 1998 and a 2001 honorary doctorate from Cambridge University.
Pople grew up in England and studied at Trinity College in Cambridge as both an undergraduate and graduate student.
He taught at Trinity College before moving to the United States in 1964, when he began teaching at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. Pople then moved to Chicago in 1982 and continued to commute to Pittsburgh. He became an adjunct professor at NU in 1986 and joined the faculty full-time in 1993.
Pople often brought his work home, his daughter Hilary Pople said. He was constantly writing formulas on pads of paper and, in later years, spent countless hours at his computer.
“He was very devoted to his work and obviously was very good at it, but he was very humble,” Hilary Pople said. “I’ve heard his students say he was very accommodating to them and a very warm and generous teacher.”
Colleagues described John Pople as quiet, subdued and down-to-earth.
“You could tell he was always thinking,” said Vivian Alberici, Pople’s secretary for 10 years.
Pople’s wife, Joy, died two years ago. Survivors include his daughter; three sons, Adrian, Mark and Andrew; and 11 grandchildren.
“Other than his contributions to science, I think we’ll just remember him as a really loving father who was very devoted to his family and gave us a very good life,” his daughter said.
Wasielewski said the chemistry department will not be looking for a professor to fill Pople’s position. Board of trustees professors are not replaced, he said.
“Obviously, we’d love to have another John Pople,” he said. “But that is a matter of good fortune.”
