Royal Institution Christmas Lectures Royal Institution Christmas Lectures The Royal Institution Christmas Lectures are a series of lectures on a single topic each, which have been held at the Royal Institution in London each year since 1825, missing 1939–42 because of the Second World War. The lectures present scientific subjects to a general audience, including young people, in an informative and entertaining manner. Michael Faraday initiated the first Christmas Lecture series in 1825. This came at a time when organised education for young people was scarce. Faraday presented a total of nineteen series in all. The Royal Institution's Christmas Lectures were first held in
H. A. Humphrey Africa. He died there in 1951. He was married to Mary Elizabeth Horniblow. They had three sons and two daughters, the bacteriologist John H. Humphrey among the former. H. A. Humphrey Herbert Alfred Humphrey MInstCE MIMechE MIEE FCGI (2 December 1868 – 9 March 1951) was a British engineer, inventor of the Humphrey pump. Humphrey was born in Gospel Oak, London. He trained at the Finsbury Technical College and the Central Institution (which later became the City and Guilds College). He patented the Humphrey pump in 1906. During World War I he worked as a chemical engineer, working on improving