Press Release - The Huntington Purchases Rare Pasteur, Austen Family, and “Wicked Ned” Collections

Library Collectors’ Council acquires renowned scientist’s lab notes, as well as rare material by 19th-century sailor and autodidact “Wicked Ned,” and letters, poems, and other material by members of Jane Austen’s family

SAN MARINO, Calif.— The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens added important rare material to its history of science collection recently:  handwritten research notes by Louis Pasteur (1822-1895) on the brewing of beer, furthering the scientist’s understanding of the fermentation process; and, for the manuscripts collection more generally—1,000 pages by a sailor and largely self-taught writer and artist who called himself “Wicked Ned,” and a collection of unpublished letters, poems, and other material from the family of Jane Austen.

The Huntington’s Library Collectors’ Council purchased the collections at its annual meeting earlier this  month. “These are each spectacular additions to the library,” said David Zeidberg, Avery Director of the Library at The Huntington. “And while Pasteur and Austen may be household names and those materials are compelling in their own right, I have to say, the Wicked Ned material is absolutely stunning.”

The Library Collectors’ Council is a group of 37 families who help support acquisitions. It was formed to augment the collections by helping to purchase materials that the institution otherwise could not afford.

Highlights of the newly purchased materials:

Louis Pasteur’s notes on brewing beer
Pasteur, the French chemist known for his important discoveries that led to vaccines and other major milestones in disease prevention, was a pioneer in the study of fermentation. It was studying fermentation, in fact, that led him to focus on and promote the process that ultimately became known as pasteurization—initially developed to keep wine and beer from souring, and then later used to preserve milk. The eight leaves of Pasteur’s lab notes on beer brewing from the 1870s “demonstrate how he knew that what he was doing with beer would provide conceptual tools for developing vaccines against anthrax and would lead eventually to rabies inoculations,” said Melissa Lo, Huntington curator in the history of science.  

The notes—scribbled on various sizes of paper, in black ink and blue and black pencil— also reveal a politically motivated scientist trying to help his country, which recently had been defeated in the Franco-Prussian War. If he could help his countrymen figure out how to brew a better beer, said Lo, he could thus help the French continue to rally against the Prussians. Ultimately, his work in fermentation helped transform the beer industry throughout the rest of the century. Based on his work, his fellow Frenchmen began to heat their concoctions to at least 50 degrees C (122 degrees F) to kill off putrid microbes. By the early decades of the 1880s, German and American brewers followed suit, and “pasteurization’”—this was when the term was coined—started being practiced worldwide. “It just goes to show,” quipped Lo, “that a little bit of beer goes a long way.”