Carl L. Alsberg, M.D.
12/16/1912 - 7/15/1921
Carl L. Alsberg was born in New York in 1877. After receiving
his M. D. from Columbia in 1900, he developed an expertise in
biochemistry over the next eight years during extensive research
training in Germany and as a junior faculty member at Harvard
Medical School. His early research interests were eclectic, and
included the chemistry and metabolism of proteins.
From 1908 to 1912 he was a chemical biologist with the Bureau
of Plant Industry in the U. S. Department of Agriculture, and
in 1912 he succeeded Harvey Wiley as chief of the Bureau of Chemistry,
a position he remained in until 1921. Alsberg's tenure at the
Bureau of Chemistry was characterized by increasing the attention
given to drug regulation, to research, and to an enforcement philosophy
that relied more on education and persuasion than prosecution.
After leaving the Bureau of Chemistry, Alsberg joined the faculty
of Stanford, where he was Director of the Food Research Institute
from 1921 until his retirement, and Dean of Graduate Study from
1927 to 1933. His scientific and professional standing was recognized
in part by his presidency of the Society of Biological Chemistry,
his membership on the editorial board of the Annual Review
of Biochemistry, and his position as the first editor of the
Journal of the Association of Official Agricultural Chemists.
Alsberg, the youngest of the sixteen men to lead the Bureau of
Chemistry and the FDA, died in 1940.
