Almroth Edward Wright made several significant contributions to science and is perhaps best known for introducing a vaccination against typhoid fever. Developed near the turn of the twentieth century, the vaccine was used on British soldiers during World War I and was responsible for saving many lives. The disease only claimed the lives of 1,191 British soldiers, instead of a projected 125,000 without the vaccination, according to estimates outlined in Leonard Colebrook's biography, Almroth Wright: Provocative Doctor and Thinker. Numerous honors were bestowed upon Wright for his scientific work, including a knighthood and election as a Fellow of the Royal Society of London, both of which were awarded in 1906.

Wright was born August 10, 1861, in Middleton Tyas, Yorkshire, England. He was the second son of Reverend Charles Henry Hamilton and Ebba Johanna Dorothea (Almroth) Wright. His father was an Old Testament scholar and a militant protestant. His mother was the daughter...