Preston Rogers an ordinary white boy from Cornfield, Kansas was a nerdy, hayseed kind of a kid. It started the year that his parents bought him a microscope for Christmas. He did not want toys like the other kids; he wanted books on chemistry for the things he needed to learn, beakers for the experiments he needed to do, and slides for the samples he wanted to analyze. At seven-years-old, he was already as scientist.
He did not have any friends growing up, he only had his work. He was only 13-years-old when he graduated high school and awarded a full scholarship to MIT, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He wasn't the youngest freshman in the history of the school; they already had graduated a 12-year-old majoring in mathematics.
Appropriately, the movie "The Graduate" with Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft, and Katharine Ross played in theatres when he graduated Suma cum Laude from MIT the summer of '67 with a perfect 4.0 grade point average. Only, as in the movie when a friend of the family told Benjamin Braddock, Dustin Hoffman, to think about plastics, Preston Rogers took his advice and accepted a research job that defined the role of plastics in modern day medical uses.
Preston worked at the Cambridge Advanced Laboratories in Cambridge, Massachusetts for ten years when, quite by accident, which is usually the case, he stumbled upon something interesting, something intriguing, and something that he did not have an explanation. Preston Rogers did not know it but he just stumbled upon a scientific breakthrough that could change the world.
When he mixed several secret chemicals, instead of getting the reaction he thought he would get, he created something very unique. He created a plastic, rubbery spongy substance, a little like mashed cotton candy. That in itself was no big deal but when he exposed this created substance to cancerous cells, his creation changed the molecular structure of the cancer cells and ate them. Moreover, it left no trace of the chemical and/or the cancer cells. In effect and in the real world, the body, if all things were constant, would harmlessly dissolve both the spongy substance and the cancerous cells within a 24 hour period.
The experiment and the conclusion, although serendipitous, were amazing. At first, he thought that he was tired and did not see what he saw, so he reread his notes and recreated his experiment. There, again, when he took a microscopic particle of his newly designed plastic and applied it to a microscopic cancer cell, it did it again. It destroyed the cancer cell within a few seconds and, then, his created mixture and the cancer cell disappeared before his eyes.
Of course, in the human body the transformation would take much longer because larger concentrations of his plastic creation were needed to fight millions of cancer cells but, under the microscope, the miniscule microscopic substance proved his findings, conclusively. He replicated the experiment again and again. He was able to successfully destroy the cancer cell through chemical science every time and with no apparent harm to the body, as this wonder substance only attacked cancerous cells and not healthy cells. Although, he did not know, yet, why this product only attacked cancerous cells and not healthy ones, he decided to call his new substance, The Preston. Meanwhile, he needed to do more research.
Nonetheless, never again would cancer patients need Chemotherapy or medicines that did not work. He would literally put drug companies out of business with his findings. And if this was the case, he wondered what other diseased cells his substance cured, as well. He imagined altering and customizing his new creation to cure every disease known to mankind. Only, he did not have an endless supply of diseased sample cells. That he would have to get from pathology, later. For now, he had discovered the cure for cancer.
Although, he was excited about testing his creation more in-depth and on other diseases, he needed to focus on his present finding. If he tried to move too fast too soon, he would error in his science and his findings would not hold up to the scrutiny of the rest of the scientific community. He needed to do more experiments and he now needed to refocus his work to cancer instead of plastics. Yet, that was still later. First, he needed to deliver his findings to Mr. Matsorsuki, the President of the company, so that Mr. Matsorsuki could set him up with his own laboratory, assistants, and a budget. Newspaper headlines flashed through his mind, PRESTON ROGERS FINDS CURE FOR CANCER.
Tears ran from his eyes as he slid from a standing position against the wall to a sitting position on the floor. He was in shock. Finding a cure for cancer was not what he was hired to do. Finding a pliable plastic that was able to change its shape without losing its strength was his mission. He only thought to experiment with the cancer specimen because that was how he worked. He tried different things with other known variables with the hopes of something new and to experiment and to see what would happen. That is what he found so exciting about chemicals and chemistry, especially when he started playing around with the molecular structure of known elements to realize the unknown and he did this by introducing foreign or mutated elements to bastardize the mix, which is why it is of paramount importance to keep and maintain accurate notes, so that the experiments can be replicate for the satisfaction of the rest of the scientific community and to publish in a paper.
He sat there staring off in space rehashing the experiment in his mind and contemplating the ramifications. Preston accidentally had found the cure for cancer. His newly designed plastic gel literally ate cancer cells and disappeared without a trace. It was perfect.
He was rich. More importantly, he would save the lives of millions of people and improve the lives of millions more. He imagined himself accepting the Nobel Prize in not only chemistry but also in medicine. He imagined himself establishing the Preston Rogers Research Foundation.
"Well, Preston, you did it and I am so very proud of you," said Mr. Matorsuki shaking Preston's hand. "You did not tell anyone that you found the cure for cancer, did you?"
"No, sir, I came straight to you, as the President of the company, I knew you would know how best to introduce this to the public." He looked at Mr. Matorsuki and unable to control his excitement, he hugged him. "I'm going to need my own lab and assistants and a budget." He was practically jumping out of his skin. "Over the next several years, I want to test this mixture, as well as others, against all known diseased cells. From this moment on, this new creation and chemical cure is my life's work."
"Yes, of course, Preston, first things first, tomorrow morning we will hold a press conference and you can tell the world of your findings. Yet, you must measure what you say. You do not want to give those who are dying false hope, that is, until you have published your research paper for the other scientists to scrutinize. We must redo the science and show it first to the scientific community before allowing our excitement to run away with us."
"Yes, of course, I understand."
"But today, my genius, we are going to celebrate. First, before we begin our celebration, I want you to return to your lab and bring me all of your notes, so that I can lock them away in the vault for safety precautions." Mr. Matorsuki bowed to Preston. "You did it, Preston, you did it. I am so very proud of you."
