Uncle Tungsten

Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood is a memoir by Oliver Sacks about his childhood published in 2001. The book is named for Sacks's Uncle Dave, owner of a business named Tungstalite, which made incandescent lightbulbs with a tungsten filament, whom Oliver nicknamed Uncle Tungsten. Uncle Tungsten was fascinated with tungsten and believed it was the metal of the future. The book also talks about many other things that happened to Sacks, such as the many whippings at Braefield school, the burning down of the Crystal Palace, his interest in amateur chemistry, and his short-lived obsession with coloring his own black-and-white photographs using chemicals in his home laboratory. It is also an extremely readable primer in the history and science of chemistry.