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001 on1370000179
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005 20231212093828.0
007 ta
008 230530t20232023nyua e b 001 0ceng
010 _a 2023010253
040 _aDLC
_beng
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015 _aGBC3G9455
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016 7 _a021199512
_2Uk
019 _a1406562403
020 _a9781541674172
_q(hardcover)
020 _a1541674170
_q(hardcover)
035 _a(OCoLC)1370000179
_z(OCoLC)1406562403
042 _apcc
043 _an-us-pa
_an-us---
092 _a509.2273
_bM169
049 _aNFGA
100 1 _aMcNeur, Catherine,
_eauthor.
245 1 0 _aMischievous creatures :
_bthe forgotten sisters who transformed early American science /
_cCatherine McNeur.
246 3 0 _aForgotten sisters who transformed early American science
250 _aFirst edition.
264 4 _c©2023
264 1 _aNew York, NY :
_bBasic Books, Hachette Book Group,
_c[2023]
300 _aix, 418 pages :
_billustrations ;
_c25 cm
336 _atext
_btxt
_2rdacontent
337 _aunmediated
_bn
_2rdamedia
338 _avolume
_bnc
_2rdacarrier
504 _aIncludes bibliographical references and index.
505 0 _aIntroduction: Sister scientists -- World of wonders -- In a tangled wilderness without a guide -- An object of peculiar interest -- Webs of correspondence -- Anonymously fierce -- Hidden at the root -- Little time to call my own -- A life of experience -- Planting and preserving -- She is everything now, to me -- Forgetting.
520 _a"The nineteenth century was a transformative period in the history of American science, as scientific study, once the domain of armchair enthusiasts and amateurs, became the purview of professional experts and institutions. In Mischievous Creatures, historian Catherine McNeur shows that women were central to the development of the natural sciences during this critical time. She does so by uncovering the forgotten lives of entomologist Margaretta Hare Morris and botanist Elizabeth Morris-sister scientists whose essential contributions to their respective fields, and to the professionalization of science as a whole, have been largely erased. Margaretta was famous within antebellum scientific circles for her work with seventeen-year cicadas and for her discoveries of previously undocumented insect species and the threats they posed to agriculture. Unusually for her time, she published under her own name, and eventually became one of the first women elected to both the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia. Margaretta's older sister Elizabeth preferred anonymity to accolades, but she nevertheless became a trusted expert on Philadelphia's flora, created illustrations for major reference books, and published numerous articles in popular science journals. The sisters corresponded and collaborated with many of the male scientific eminences of their day, including Asa Gray and Louis Agassiz, although they also faced condescension and outright misogyny: no less a figure than Charles Darwin dismissed Margaretta's (correct) assertion that water beetles help to move fish eggs from lake to lake, and the sisters long suspected that an arsonist who twice targeted their property was motivated by misogynist resentment. Alongside the lives of the Morris sisters, McNeur traces the larger story of American science's professionalization, a process that began, she shows, earlier in the nineteenth century than is traditionally thought. She reveals an early Republic hungry to define itself and eager to keep pace with the scientific culture of Europe, as the sciences transformed from hobbies into careers, with more government and university support, professional journals and organizations. Ironically, while women like the Morris sisters were central to the growth and development of their fields, this very transformation would ultimately wrest opportunities from women in the generations that followed, confining women in science to underpaid and underappreciated positions. Mischievous Creatures is not only an overdue portrait of two pioneering women scientists, but also a vital and revelatory new history of the birth of modern American science"--
_cProvided by publisher.
600 1 0 _aMorris, Margaretta Hare,
_d1797-1867.
600 1 0 _aMorris, Elizabeth Carrington,
_d1795-1865.
650 0 _aBotanists
_zPennsylvania
_zPhiladelphia
_vBiography.
650 0 _aEntomologists
_zPennsylvania
_zPhiladelphia
_vBiography.
650 0 _aWomen scientists
_zPennsylvania
_zPhiladelphia
_vBiography.
650 0 _aWomen scientists
_zPennsylvania
_zPhiladelphia
_xHistory
_y19th century.
650 0 _aScientists
_zUnited States
_xHistory
_y19th century.
651 0 _aGermantown (Philadelphia, Pa.)
_vBiography.
655 7 _aBiographies.
_2lcgft
_9870
994 _aC0
_bNFG
999 _c377881
_d377881