Read Tom Kennedy’s thoughtful essay here about the book, and women in science (from Science Spin magazine).
Read the Irish Medical News review here.
Lab Coats and Lace: The lives and legacies of inspiring Irish women scientists and pioneers
Edited by Mary Mulvihill
Meet the fabulous Boole sisters, and the ‘flying feminist’ Lilian Bland, who was probably the first woman in the world to build and fly a plane. Physicist Alice Everett was among the first people researching television technology in the late 1920s. A type of diamond is named after Dame Kathleen Lonsdale, whose work revealed the structure of many chemical compounds.
Then there’s mathematician Kay McNulty, who worked on the ENIAC computer during World War II, helping to inaugurate the field of modern computer programming. Dr Dorothy Price introduced the BCG vaccine to Ireland, and saved hundreds of lives from TB. And a trio of women professors who headed up UCD science departments in the 1960s.
These are just some of the Irishwomen who, over the last 150 years, have led the way, many of them in non-traditional careers and often fighting institutionalised discrimination, yet going on to achieve national and international recognition. From 19th-century amateurs to 20th-century professors, their stories will inspire you.
This is a companion volume to Stars, Shells and Bluebells (WITS, 1997), and presented in the same easy to read style and attractive manner, with numerous contemporary illustrations and photographs, and an introductory foreword and chapter to set the context.
Authors: include broadcaster Éanna ní Lamhna, author and mathematician Prof Des MacHale, science writers Claire O’Connell and Karlin Lillington, as well as academic subject experts and historians.
Contents: Foreword; the 19th-century: 1. ‘Laurels for fair as well as manly brows’; 2. ‘The glorious privilege’; 3. First in their field; 4. Erratics, intrusions and graptolites; 5. The fabulous Boole sisters; 6. Torch-bearing women astronomers. The 20th Century: 7. Revolutionary doctors; 8. Anatomy of a bog body; 9. An inspiring zoologist; 10. Queen of the plant viruses; 11. The doyenne of Irish chemistry; 12. The stuff of diamonds; 13. One of the world’s first computer programmers. INDEX
Audience: General, second-level, women’s studies, history of science
WITS (Women in Technology & Science), Dublin www.witsireland.com
ISBN 978-0-9531953-1-2
pbk 200pp, 57 illustrations, RRP €20 March 2009
