Maurice Wilkins by James Watson. During the second phase, 1951–52, Wilkins produced clear "B form" "X" shaped images from squid sperm, images he sent to James Watson and Francis Crick, causing Watson to write "Wilkins... has obtained extremely excellent X-ray diffraction photographs" [of DNA]. In 1953 Wilkins' colleague Rosalind Franklin instructed Raymond Gosling to hand over to Wilkins a high quality image of "B" form DNA ("Photo 51"), which she had made in 1952 but had “put it aside” as she was leaving King's College London. Wilkins showed it to Watson. This image, along with the knowledge that Linus Pauling had proposed
Francis Crick of the importance of her experimental results in Watson and Crick's model building and theoretical analysis, Franklin should have had her name on the original Watson and Crick paper in "Nature". Franklin and Gosling submitted their own joint 'second' paper to "Nature" at the same time as Wilkins, Stokes, and Wilson submitted theirs (i.e. the 'third' paper on DNA). Watson's portrayal of Franklin in "The Double Helix" (written after Franklin's death when libel laws did not apply anymore) was negative and gave the appearance that she was Wilkins' assistant and was unable to interpret her own DNA data. The X-ray