A count of articles by women listed in theCatalogue of Scientific Papers, 1800–1900, the nineteen-volume international index brought out by the Royal Society, produced a collection of almost 4000 titles of papers by about 1000 nineteenth-century women authors. Out of 181 geology papers in this collection, 118 (65 per cent) were by British women (see Table 1, columns 1 and 2). This finding is especially remarkable when considered against the more general background of nineteenth-century women's work in science (at least (...) as judged from women's contributions to the journal literature indexed by the Royal Society). In most fields American workers considerably outnumbered British and published many more papers. Geology, however, is an exception, with the British dominating the field by a wide margin. This essay discusses a number of the British women of the period who carried out work in geology, and offers some suggestions that go toward explaining their striking prominence among their contemporaries. (shrink)

Muriel Wheldale, a distinguished graduate of Newnham College, Cambridge, was a member of William Bateson's school of genetics at Cambridge University from 1903. Her investigation of flower color inheritance in snapdragons (Antirrhinum), a topic of particular interest to botanists, contributed to establishing Mendelism as a powerful new tool in studying heredity. Her understanding of the genetics of pigment formation led her to do cutting-edge work in biochemistry, culminating in the publication of her landmark work, The Anthocyanin Pigments of Plants (1916). (...) In 1915, she joined Frederick Gowland Hopkin's Department of Biochemistry as assistant and in 1926 became one of the first women to be appointed university lecturer. In 1919 she married the biochemist Huia Onslow, with whom she collaborated until his death in 1922. This paper examines Wheldale's work in genetics and especially focuses on the early linkage of Mendelian methdology with new techniques in biochemistry that eventually led to the founding of biochemical genetics. It highlights significant issues in the early history of women in genetics, including the critical role of mentors, funding opportunities, and career strategies. (shrink)