Birthday profile

Vincent Schaefer

Vincent Schaefer, American chemist and meteorologist (died 1993)

Born
July 4, 1906
Died
July 25, 1993
Zodiac sign
Cancer
Birth year
1906

About Vincent Schaefer

Vincent Joseph Schaefer (July 4, 1906 – July 25, 1993) was an American chemist and meteorologist who developed cloud seeding. On November 13, 1946, while a researcher at the General Electric Research Laboratory, Schaefer modified clouds in the Berkshire Mountains by seeding them with dry ice. While he was self-taught and never completed high school, he was issued 14 patents. == Personal life == Vincent J. Schaefer was the oldest son of Peter Aloysius Schaefer and Rose Agnes (Holtslag) Schaefer. He had two younger brothers, Paul and Carl, and two younger sisters, Gertrude and Margaret. The Schaefer family lived in Schenectady, New York, and due to his mother's health, starting in 1921 the family made summer trips to the Adirondack Mountains. Vincent Schaefer had a lifelong association with the Adirondacks, as well as interests in hiking, natural history, and archeology. In his youth he was the founder of a local tribe of the Lone Scouts and with some of his tribe mates wrote and printed a tribe paper called "Archaeological Research." Schaefer credited this publication with his introduction to many prominent individuals in the Schenectady area, including Dr. Willis Rodney Whitney of the General Electric Research Laboratory. During the late 1920s and early 1930s, Schaefer built up his personal library on natural history, science, and his other areas of interest and read a great deal.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

Career and life highlights

Vincent Schaefer timeline

  1. Apperson introduced Schaefer to Irving Langmuir, a scientist at the GE Research Laboratory who was awarded a Nobel Prize in 1932 for his work in surface chemistry.
  2. As an example of this, in 1940, Schaefer became known in his own right for the development of a method to make replicas of individual snowflakes using a thin plastic coating.
  3. On November 13, 1946, while a researcher at the General Electric Research Laboratory, Schaefer modified clouds in the Berkshire Mountains by seeding them with dry ice.

The world when Vincent Schaefer was born

Vincent Schaefer was born in 1906. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1906

  • Best-selling bookThe Jungle by Upton Sinclair

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports moment"Hitless Wonders" Chicago White Sox upset Cubs in World Series
  • Top headlineSan Francisco earthquake and fire — 3,000+ killed
  • Technology milestoneFirst radio broadcast of voice and music
  • World population~1.66B

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderTheodore Roosevelt
  • U.S. population84.6M

1906 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Vincent Schaefer's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure19062026
Population84.6M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Library of Congress, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.