January 1943 : that penicillin cured the incurable SBE is a military secret, but penicillin's chemical formula is not !

The American scientific journal "The Journal of Bacteriology" is a top journal in its field, read - at least in peacetime - by workers in that field the world over.

Yet in January 1943, it is revealing that one of the earliest and most persistent researchers as to the chemical structure of penicillin , Karl Meyer, is still free to publish his informed opinion on the formula for penicillin : C14H19NO6 or C14H17NO5 + H2O.

His co-author, clinician Henry Dawson, by way of contrast, is NOT free to reveal that he has achieved a truly spectacular medical event : curing the incurable, invariably fatal SBE with penicillin , still the acid test of all infectious diseases.

Howard Florey sole hero of 1944 American national radio play on Penicillin

Here, Howard Florey rules !

Du Pont's Cavalcade of America  on NBC was a very well financed American national radio and later tv show, popular before and after WWII (1935-1957), that as Marcel Lafollette points out , often featured heroes from medicine and science.

Not surprising then that the series featured an half hour show on "The Story of Penicillin" as soon as the censors would let it : which interestingly enough was April 24th 1944  --- starring Howard Florey as the one-and-only who brought us the miracle of penicillin !