by Lindsay Smith Antonia Caetana Maury (1866-1952) Maury was born on March 21, 1866, in Cold Springs, New York. Her father, Mytton Maury, was an Episcopal minister and amateur naturalist. Her mother, Virginia (Draper) Maury, was the sister of Henry Draper, the first person to photograph stellar spectra. Antonia Maury was also the granddaughter of…
Tag Archive for Industrial Revolution
Annie Jump Cannon
By Lindsay Smith Annie Jump Cannon (1863-1941) Cannon was born in Dover, Delaware on December 11, 1863, to Wilson Cannon, a shipbuilder, and his wife, Mary . Not much is known about Cannon’s early education, but it was her mother who introduced her to her first star constellations and encouraged her curiosity in astronomy. Together, they…
Williamina Paton Fleming
By Lindsay Smith Williamina Paton (Stevens) Fleming (known often as “Mina”) (1857-1911) She was born on May 15, 1857, in Dundee, Scotland. Her father, Robert Stevens, carved and gilded picture frames and furniture; he died when his daughter was seven.[1] Around the age of fourteen Fleming became a pupil-teacher, a common practice for bright students…
Helene Schweitzer Bresslau
Helene Schweitzer Bresslau (1879—1957): Albert Schweitzer’s Wife, Colleague, and “Most Loyal Friend” by Patti M. Marxsen From Berlin to Strasbourg Helene Schweitzer Bresslau was born in Berlin in 1879 to a cultivated family of assimilated Jews. She grew up with two brothers, Hermann and Ernst, as well as the younger sister and brothers of her…
Mary Hays
by Gina Luria Walker Mary Hays (1759-1843) was a novelist, best known for her belief in radical feminism as an expression of enlightened Dissent, and her provocative history of women. She was born in 1759, into a family of Protestants who rejected the practices of the Church of England.[1] Hays was described as ‘the baldest…
Maria Rosa Coccia
by Marie Caruso Italian composer and teacher, Maria Rosa Coccia (1759-1833) was the first woman to achieve the qualification of Maestra di Capella (Chapel Master) of Rome. What historians have most often remembered about her were not her accomplishments, but the controversy that developed over the publication of her extemporaneous entrance exam for the Accademia di S Cecilia. …
Jane Loudon
by Koren Whipp Jane C. Loudon 1807-58 was a British writer best known for creating the first popular gardening manuals, providing an alternative to the specialist horticultural books of the day. Loudon was born into a wealthy family. Following her mother’s death in 1819, she and her father, Thomas Webb, a Birmingham manufacturer, traveled the continent where…
Hertha Ayrton
by Gina Luria Walker Phoebe Sarah Mark/Hertha Ayrton (1854-1923) transformed herself into Hertha Ayrton despite opposition to her sex, religion, poverty, inferior education, and poor health from the male culture of modern Physics. Born to a struggling Jewish watchmaker from Poland and his wife in Portsea, Portsmouth, Sarah quickly gave evidence of unusual intelligence.…
