After he lived in Kensington Park Gardens, London, where he built and equipped his own laboratory in order to devote his life to his research. With this, his reputation had been established and he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in After years of research, he determined the atomic weight of the new element in observations that serve as an exemplar of methodical accuracy. To ensure the greatest of precision he constructed a vacuum chamber to hold his balance and noticed the erratic behaviour of his balance when in this vacuum.
By examining the properties of the rays, Crookes could demonstrate that they travelled in straight lines, caused phosphorescence in objects upon which they entered and thus produced heat. His observations in the elements of the rare earths led to special methods having to be created in order to separate them as they were so similar to one another in their chemical properties. His investigations in radiant matter spectroscopy were at first connected with the visible spectrum.
His determination of the atomic weight of thallium, reported in , was a first-class piece of work and the figure he obtained, His flair for careful observation continued to serve him well.
He devised the radiometer — though his explanation of its action was soon discredited — he described the Crookes dark space in the cathode discharge tube — but was less than profound in his theoretical views on electrical discharges through gases — he separated Uranium X, he devised the spintharoscope, and he developed Crookes glass to protect the eye against the ultra-violet.
In his later years, like Sir Oliver Lodge, he explored the mysteries of spiritualism. All his work was done in his private laboratory in his house, first in Mornington Road and after at 7 Kensington Park Gardens which he claimed to be the first in England to be lighted by electricity and much of it was financed by grants from the Royal Society. In his later years he was involved in a variety of commercial enterprises.
He was prominent in every area of scientific activity in London for nearly sixty years and was widely honoured. He was awarded the Order of Merit in No scientific meeting of note failed to welcome him, and in scores of paintings and photographs of scientific gatherings of the period his distinguished bearded figure is prominent in the foregound. The early issues of The Chemical News devoted a remarkable amount of space to the platinum metals.
The base metals are slagged off, gold and palladium vaporised and collected in an earthenware tube, and osmic acid finally trapped in a vessel full of ammonia. Part of the osmium is deposited on the tube walls in the metallic state. These formed the subject of his first published papers in Leaving the Royal College, he became superintendent of the meteorological department at the Radcliffe Observatory in Oxford in , and in was appointed lecturer in chemistry at the Chester training college.
In he married Ellen, daughter of William Humphrey, of Darlington, by whom he fathered three sons and a daughter. From this time his life was passed in London, devoted mainly to independent work. After , he lived at 7 Kensington Park Gardens, where in his private laboratory all his later work was carried out.
Crookes's life was one of unbroken scientific activity. He was never one of those who gain influence by popular exposition. The breadth of his interests, ranging over pure and applied science, economic and practical problems, and psychical research, made him a well-known personality, and he received many public and academic honours.
In he founded the Chemical News a science magazine, which he edited for many years and conducted on much less formal lines than is usual with journals of scientific societies. Crookes was knighted in , and in received the order of merit. He died in London on 4 April , two years after his wife, to whom he had been much devoted. Crookes is buried in London's Brompton Cemetery. The work of Crookes extended over both chemistry and physics. Its salient characteristic was the originality of conception of his experiments, and the skill of their execution.
Crookes was always more effective in experiment than in interpretation. The method of spectral analysis, introduced by Bunsen and Kirchhoff , was received by Crookes with great enthusiasm and to great effect. His first important discovery was that of the element thallium , announced in , and made with the help of spectroscopy. By this work his reputation became firmly established, and he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in Crookes' attention had been attracted to the vacuum balance in the course of the thallium researches.
The son of a tailor, he was sent for a time to the Grammar School, Chippenham, but his scientific training began when at the age of sixteen he became a student under Prof.
Hofmann at the Royal College of Chemistry. For four years he was one of Hofmann's assistants. He then spent a year as meteorologist at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, and another as lecturer in chemistry at the Training College, Chester. At twenty-four years of age he married and returned to London, which henceforth became his home. Few men of science have had a more active or distinguished career than Crookes.
For sixty years he was recognised as a most skilful experimenter, and he was likewise known for his intellectual independence and his wide interests. He first became well known through his discovery in of the element thallium, a specimen of which was exhibited at the Hyde Park Exhibition of
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