Rosalind Franklin was a chemist and X-ray crystallographer whose data contributed to the discovery of DNA’s molecular structure. That data wasn’t stolen from her, newly uncovered evidence suggests.
What we have separately done by looking in real detail at the records — the interviews that Crick did in the ’60s and so on — is we’ve been able to reconstruct the process that [Watson and Crick] went through. Which, if you read their papers really carefully, actually says quite explicitly that they engaged in what they called a process of trial and error. So they knew roughly the size of the crystal of the DNA molecule. They knew the atoms that should be in there from the density.
In other words, Franklin knows that Watson and Crick will have access to this informal report, and she doesn’t care. It’s all, “Hey, if you want it, that’s fine.” So that then shifts the optic away from they got this surreptitious access to this MRC report. So we’re back to this collaborative [picture]. Franklin doesn’t seem to be too bothered.
Today, we focus on Franklin because we’re currently interested in equality, women’s oppression, and so on. We’re also obsessed with DNA. But people weren’t back then. DNA wasn’t then what it is now. [People might think] how could Franklin not have been livid? This was the secret of life and she had had it taken away from her. But it wasn’t and she didn’t.
This is the popular version of the story which we wanted to undermine. That this Photograph 51, which is the B form, is so striking that Watson, when he’s given a glimpse of it, can instantly realize its significance. According to the story he tells and people who are in favor of Franklin tell, this is the moment he steals her data.
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