WOMEN'S EDUCATION IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY: FOUR LIVES IN SCIENCE (MARTIN, LINCOLN, ALLEN, BASCOM)

Various reasons for the disproportionate number of men in science, by comparison with women, have been suggested. However, no major attempt has been made to look at the historical background of the education of women in science for clues as to how this situation developed over time. This dissertation uses the technique of educational biography to determine how women gained a scientific education in the nineteenth century and what the consequences were in the lives of four Americans: Maria Martin Bachman (1796-1863), Almira Hart Lincoln Phelps (1793-1884), Louisa Catherine Allen Gregory (1848-1920), and Florence Bascom (1862-1945).;Women who were educated and engaged in science-related occupations in the nineteenth century were similar to men scientists in their social origins and in the importance of personal relationships in the development of their interests. However, women were greatly outnumbered and largely segregated from the mainstream of science.;Maria Martin exemplifies the tradition of private study and instruction in science. A naturalist and illustrator, Martin gained a field knowledge of natural history from the naturalist John Bachman, in whose household she lived in Charleston, South Carolina. She was also an associate of John James Audubon, to whose Birds of America she contributed watercolor paintings of flowers, plants, and insects. It was in Troy, New York, with its many scientific men and institutions, that Almira Lincoln acquired the education that enabled her to teach science in women's seminaries and to write science textbooks. A sister of Emma Willard and a student of the scientist Amos Eaton, she played a significant role in disseminating scientific knowledge among the next generation of American women. Louisa Allen, a forerunner of the home economics movement, developed a "domestic science" curriculum at the University of Illinois in the 1870s. Her scientific education was used to inflate the traditional female role in the home. The only one of the four to become a scientist, Florence Bascom was trained in research at Johns Hopkins and subsequently taught geology at Bryn Mawr College. There she served as a mentor for a succeeding generation of women geologists.