Mathew Carey Lea

Who was Mathew Carey Lea?

Mathew Carey Lea was a Philadelphia-born American chemist. The son of the naturalist and publisher Isaac Lea and the botanist Frances Ann Lea née Carey, he was also brother to the historian Henry Charles Lea.

Mathew Carey Lea was educated with his younger brother Henry Charles Lea under tutelage of the eminent U.S. mathematician Eugenius Nulty, who like Mathew Carey Lea's grandfather and namesake the publishing family's patriarch Mathew Carey, was Irish born. Mathew Carey Lea thereafter read the law and became a member of the Pennsylvania Bar.

Mathew Carey Lea, though also an attorney, devoted himself chiefly to the chemistry of photography, to which he made a number of important contributions. His publications include numerous papers on the chemical action of light and an excellent Manual of Photography. He is also known for his development of Carey Lea Silver, a photochemical, still in use today.