ABSTRACT
This chapter begins with a description of the evolution of alchemy, which was mostly concerned with finding the philosopher's stone—an agent that could transform metals into gold, into a pursuit for the development of tools that might be useful in medicine, and ultimately, into the discipline which would become chemistry as we know it today. It then explores how we came to know about atoms and molecules through experiments with gases, and specifically, the discovery of oxygen and hydrogen from experiments on combustion. Next, the chapter explores the discovery of electrons from experiments with electricity, and in the process, the invention of the cathode-ray tube. The chapter ends with a discussion of the advent of chemical bond theory and the all-important hydrogen bond by Lewis and Pauling, respectively.
