Janice Gorzynski Smith was born in Schenectady, New York, and grew up following
the Yankees, listening to the Beatles, and water skiing on Sacandaga Reservoir. She became
interested in chemistry in high school, and went on to major in chemistry at Cornell University
where she received an A.B. degree summa cum laude. Jan credits two truly gifted teachers—Sister Rita Boggs in high school and Professor Roald Hoffmann in general chemistry—for showing her the beauty and logic of the subject that has become her life’s work. Jan earned a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Harvard University under the direction of Nobel Laureate E.J. Corey, and she also spent a year as a National Science Foundation National Needs Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard. During her tenure with the Corey group she completed the total synthesis of the plant growth hormone gibberellic acid.
Following her postdoctoral work Jan joined the faculty of Mount Holyoke College where
she served on the faculty for 21 years. During this time she was active in teaching organic chemistry lecture and lab courses, conducting a research program in organic synthesis, and serving as department chair. Her organic chemistry class was named one of Mount Holyoke’s “Don’t-miss courses” in a survey by Boston magazine. After spending two sabbaticals amidst the natural beauty and diversity in Hawai‘i in the 1990s, Jan and her family moved there permanently in 2000. She is currently a faculty member at the University of Hawai‘i at Ma-noa, where she teaches both the one- and two-semester organic chemistry lecture and lab courses, and serves as the faculty advisor to the student affiliate chapter of the American Chemical Society. In 2003, she received the Chancellor’s Citation for Meritorious Teaching.
Jan resides in Hawai‘i with her husband Dan, an emergency medicine physician. She has
four children: Matthew and Zachary, age 9 (margin photo in Section 5.3); Jenna, a student at the University of Hawai‘i; and Erin, who is a student at the Brown University School of Medicine
and co-author of the Student Study Guide/Solutions Manual for this text. When not teaching,
writing, or enjoying her family, she bikes, hikes, snorkels, and scuba dives in sunny Hawai‘i, and time permitting, enjoys travel and Hawai‘ian quilting.
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