Sir John Pople KBE, FRS

John Pople

Burnham’s only Nobel Prize winner was born 1925 and died in 2004 in Chicago. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1998 for his work with Walter Kohn on theoretical chemistry, a field of chemistry devoted to the understanding of the electrical properties of materials.

His parents lived in The Grove and he went to Bristol Grammar School, where he won a scholarship to go to Trinity College, Cambridge in 1943, graduating in 1946. His father, Keith Pople, owned a men’s clothes shop In the High Street, on the corner with west Cross Street. A plaque on the wall in Cross Street commemorates John’s achievements.

He worked at British Aerospace until 1947 when he returned to Cambridge where he was awarded a PhD in mathematics in 1951

He emigrated to USA in 1964 where he lived for the remainder of his life.

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John Pople receiving his Nobel Prize from King Gustav of Sweden

Find out more about John and the Nobel Prize here.

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