In 1962, Maurice Wilkins, Francis Crick, and James Watson received the Nobel Prize, but it was Rosalind Franklin's data and photographs of DNA that led to their discovery. Brenda Maddox tells a powerful story of a remarkably single-minded, forthright, and tempestuous young woman who, at the age of fifteen, decided she was going to be a scientist, but who was airbrushed out of the greatest scientific discovery of the twentieth century. “A gripping yet nuanced account … a magnificent biography.” - The Independent “A meticulous biography…[Rosalind Franklin] was the unacknowledged heroine of DNA, the Sylvia Plath of molecular biology.” - The Economist “A vivid three-dimensional portrait of a sciencetist and human being … a moving biography.” - Daily Telegraph (London) “A joy to read.” - Sunday Telegraph “Lively, absorbing … What emerges is the complex portrait of a passionate, flawed, courageous women.” - Washington Post Book World “A story told with energy and eloquence. An engrossing read.” - American Scientist “Thoughtful and engaging.” - Chicago Tribune “Brenda Maddox has done a great service to science and history.” - San Francisco Chronicle Book Review “A finely crafted biography.” - Booklist “Maddox does justice to her subject as only the best biographers can.” - Los Angeles Times Book Review “An excellent biography … Maddox’s account of Franklin’s last years and premature death is moving and poignant.” - Women's Review of Books “Able, balanced and well researched.” - Science “In this sympathetic biography, Maddox …illuminates her subject as a gifted scientist and a complex woman.” - Publishers Weekly “A sensitive, sympathetic look at a women whose life was greater than the sum if its parts.” - New York Times Book Review “Maddox does an excellent job of revisiting Franklin’s scientific contributions while revealing her complicated personality.” - Library Journal “Lively, absorbing and even handed … What emerges is the complex portrait of a passionate, flawed, courageous women.” - Washington Post Book World In 1962, Maurice Wilkins, Francis Crick, and James Watson received the Nobel Prize, but it was Rosalind Franklin's data and photographs of DNA that led to their discovery. Brenda Maddox tells a powerful story of a remarkably single-minded, forthright, and tempestuous young woman who, at the age of fifteen, decided she was going to be a scientist, but who was airbrushed out of the greatest scientific discovery of the twentieth century. Brenda Maddox is an award-winning biographer whose work has been translated into ten languages. Nora: A Biography of Nora Joyce, won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Biography, the Silver PEN Award, and the French Prix du Mailleur Livre Etranger. Her life of D. H. Lawrence won the Whitbread Biography Award in 1974, and Yeats's Ghosts, on the married life of W. B. Yeats, was shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize in 1998. She has been Home Affairs Editor for the Economist, has served as chairman of the Association of British Science Writers and is a member of the Royal Society's Science and Society Committee. She lives in London and Mid-Wales. Rosalind Franklin The Dark Lady of DNA By Maddox, Brenda Perennial Copyright © 2004 Brenda Maddox All right reserved. ISBN: 0060985089 Chapter One Once in Royal David's City The Family into which Rosalind Elsie Franklin was born on 25 July 1920, stood high in Anglo-Jewry. Not at the very top: the highest rank was occupied by the oldest Jewish families in England, the Sephardi Jews of Spanish and Portuguese descent who arrived at the time of Cromwell. Nor were the Franklins among the wealthiest of the Ashkenazis from northern Europe, such as the Rothschilds and Goldsmids, who came to England in the eighteenth century seeking opportunity for trade. Yet they were well within the elite network known as 'The Cousinhood', so common was intermarriage. The first of their English line arrived as Fraenkel from Breslau in Silesia in 1763 and anglicised the name to Franklin, as was sensible. The English were uncomfortable with foreign names, and Jewishness was no advantage at a time there were only 8,000 Jews in England. Benjamin Wolf Franklin lived in the City of London, on Cock Court, Jewry Street. A rabbi and teacher, he married Sarah, the daughter of Lazarus Joseph, originally Lazarus Israel, who emigrated to England from Hamburg around 1760. Benjamin and Sarah had six children before dying in an epidemic in 1785. Their gravestones still stand in the burial ground in Globe Road Cemetery, Mile End, East London. The two surviving Franklin sons, Abraham and Lewis, went to Portsmouth for apprenticeships in watchmaking and shopkeeping and became successful businessmen. In 1815 or 1816 the brothers shifted to Liverpool and Manchester where they entered firms engaged in money-changing, banking and trade with the West Indies. In time, the Samuels of Liverpool (another line of Sil