Died April 29, Albert Hofmann, Swiss scientist, inventor of LSD, studier of plants and animals, particularly natural substances that could be used to benefit people. Of note is his research into chitin, a cellulose-ish, fibre-y substance found in the shells of bugs and such.
But we all remember him for coming across lysergic acid diethylamide in 1938. I know I do. Actually he shelved the research for 5 or so years and it wasn't until 1943 that he got serious with what this stuff was. Legend has it he absorbed some of it through his fingers while handling ingredients and had a short 2 hour "trip". Soon thereafter, he deliberately experimented with it over a period of a week or so with his research colleagues. (I would like to see their notes.) This leads to another legend, the "Bicycle day", where he took a good sized dose on purpose. Not surprisingly he got good and looped and had an assistant ride him home on his bike. It was quite fun apparently.
During this trip he summoned a doctor just in case. He reported that some aspects of the experience were scary: For example, he feared he was possessed by demons, his furniture was talking to him and his neighbor was a witch. The doctor could find nothing physically wrong and just sent him to bed. Here he calmed down and had pleasant dreams filled with rainbows and sounds transformed into colours.
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