WoW Blog (Woman of the Week)

Sandra Hall Magnus is a former NASA astronaut who spent 134 days in orbit and was part of the crew of the final mission of the Space Shuttle.

Sandra was born in Illinois on October 30, 1964. A career as an astronaut was an interest from the beginning and so she pursued engineering, earning several degrees including a PhD in materials science and engineering. Early in her career she designed sought experience, first designing stealth aircraft for McDonnell Douglas in the 1980s and becoming an astronaut candidate in 1996. Missions she was involved with included:

• Installation of the S1 truss section on the International Space Station (ISS)
• Survival training in an uninhabited area in the case of an emergency landing
• Commander of the NEEMO 11 mission testing lunar gravity and remote-controlled robots
• Flight Engineer on the ISS Expedition 18, logging 133 days in orbit
• Training to fly a rescue mission for a shuttle flight

She cited NASA training as the best preparation for life aboard the ISS. During her time on the ISS she used her love of cooking to help experiment with the limited food choices: Discovery News. The NASA website gives Sandra's perspective of a typical day on the ISS.

Sandra left NASA and became executive director of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) in October 2012. She hopes to play a role in inspiring and recruiting the next generation of scientists, engineers, and technologists.

Resources: AIAA; Wikipedia: Sandra Magnus (image); Womanetics

Margaret Hutchinson Rousseau was a chemical engineer who, during WWII, designed the processes for producing high-octane gasoline and penicillin.

Margaret was born in Texas in 1911. She earned a bachelor's degree from Rice University in 1932. By 1937 she became the first American woman to receive a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Her first career was at E.B. Badger where she worked on the design of production plants. She also met her future husband with whom she would have one child. Some of her early design work focused on the synthetic rubber that was needed for the war.

Penicillin was first mass produced in the U.S. in the early 1940s. In 1942 there was enough penicillin available in the country to treat just 10 patients. Scientists combined the discovery of the best penicillin being found on a moldy cantaloupe with fermentation research. Margaret developed the process of deep-tank fermentation which enabled large-scale production of penicillin.

Later, Margaret worked on improved equipment and methods for refining oil and the development of high-octane aviation fuel. She also improved distillation column design and plants for the production of chemicals like ethylene glycol (anti-freeze) and glacial acetic acid.

Margaret received awards from the Society of Women Engineers and AlChE. She died on January 11, 2000.

Resources: Celebrating 125 Years of Women at MIT; Chemical Engineers in Action - Innovators in Biomedicine; News Medical - Penicillin Biosynthesis; Convey Inc - In Defense; Wikipedia - Margaret Hutchinson Rousseau; image

Florence Wald spent her childhood in and out of hospitals, which led her to pursuing a career in nursing. She eventually became interested in caring for the terminally ill.

Born Florence Sophie Schorske in New York City on April 19, 1917, she suffered from chronic respiratory ailments. Florence went on to develop an interest in nursing and earned several college degrees:

• BA in nursing from Mount Holyoke College in 1938
• MN from Yale School of Nursing in 1941
• MN in mental health nursing from Yale University in 1956

Florence worked as a research technician with the U.S. Army Signal Corps during World War II. It was around this time that the care of the dying shifted from being home-based into the hospital and non-family members began to take a larger role in their care. Family members faced limited visiting hours and the patients' caretakers were often concerned about the big picture rather than the individual.

Florence became a staff nurse with the Visiting Nurse Service of New York before returning to Yale for a second master's degree. She stayed in education as an instructor at Yale and was made Dean of Yale School of Nursing from 1959-1966. During her time as dean she both revamped the curriculum to be more academically rigorous and increased the focus on involving patients and their families in treatment.

Opening the First American Hospice

A 1963 lecture at Yale by Cicely Saunders on the topic of treating terminally ill cancer patients piqued Florence's interest in the topic. After resigning from Yale, Florence educated herself about the hospice movement by visiting St. Christopher's Hospice in London, an organization founded by Cicely Saunders.

Florence formed a team of doctors, nurses, and clergy that eventually founded Connecticut Hospice in 1974. It was the first hospice in the U.S. Florence was driven by the idea of giving people meaningful ways to cope with death. She wanted people to be able to maintain dignity during such a tough time.

Florence died at home surrounded by her family on November 8, 2008. She was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame and named a "living legend" by the American Academy of Nursing that same year. At the time of her death there were over 4,700 hospices in the U.S.

Resources: Boston.com - Florence Wald, 91; The Truth About Nursing - Florence Wald; Wikipedia - Florence Wald; image

Cecile Hoover Edwards is known for her work in nutrition research and advocacy.

Born on October 26, 1926 in East St. Louis, Illinois Cecile's mother was a former schoolteacher; her father an insurance agency's manager.

Education and Early Career

Cecile majored in home economics and minored in nutrition and chemistry. Those minors took a more major focus as she advanced in her education.

• Attended segregated schools until age 15 and then enrolled at Tuskegee Institute
• Earned a bachelor's degree in nutritional chemistry in 1946
• Received a Carver Foundation fellowship sponsored by the Swift Meat Packing Company
• Earned a master's degree in organic chemistry in 1947
• Received a two-year General Education Board fellowship to enter the doctoral program at Iowa State University
• Earned a doctorate in nutrition in 1950

Low-Cost, Nutritious Food

Cecile primarily studied amino acids and wrote a dissertation on methionine, an essential amino acid. She was curious about protein production and how lower-cost foods (such as vegetables) could meet nutritional needs. She studied:

• Which vegetable foods could make the best meals for the least money
• The southeastern American diet, weighing the pros of its protein sources and cons of its fat content
• The effects of nutritional, medical, psychological, and socioeconomic factors on the pregnancies of low-income women (part of a $4.5 million study sponsored by the National Institutes of Health)

After the completion of her Ph.D., Cecile returned to academia as an assistant professor and research associate at Tuskegee in 1950. She was the head of the department of foods and nutrition from 1952-1956.

Cecile worked with the Bureau of Human Nutrition and Home Economics, utilizing her knowledge of hard scientific data related to nutrition to help transform home economics into more scientific study.

After leaving Tuskegee in 1956 she became professor of nutrition and research at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. Cecile taught at the university and served as head of the department of home economics in Greensboro, North Carolina until 1971.

In 1971, Cecile joined the faculty at Howard University as a professor of nutrition and continuing economics. She chaired the department of home economics from 1971-1974 and was dean of the School of Human Ecology from 1974-1986. She established the university's Ph.D. program in nutrition and remained associated with the school until her retirement in 2000.

Cecile's other accomplishments included:

• Chair of the White House Conference Panel on Community Nutrition in 1969
• President of the Southeastern Conference of Teachers of Food and Nutrition in 1971
• Chaired the National Conference on Black Youth Unemployment in 1983
• Published more than 150 articles in scholarly journals

Cecile died of respiratory failure at age 78 on September 17, 2005.

Resources: African Americans in Science, Math, and Invention by Ray Spangenburg and Diane Moser; Black Women Scientists in the United States by Wini Warren; Chemical Heritage Foundation - Cecile Hoover Edwards; Encyclopedia of World Scientists by Elizabeth H. Oakes; The Washington Post - Cecile H. Edwards Dies at Age 78; Image - findagrave.com

As the only woman who served on the NASA engineering team responsible for the moon landing, Barbara Johnson Crawford holds a place in the history of space exploration. During the 1960s approximately 30% of Russian engineers were women compared to less than 2% of American engineers. Barbara had a 36-year career at Rockwell International Space Division and was involved with many NASA projects.

Education and Early Career

Barbara, known as "Bobbie", was the first woman to graduate with a degree in general engineering from the University of Illinois in 1946. After graduation she entered the field of aerospace engineering at Rockwell International Space Division.

Some of Bobbie's early assignments included:

• Flight dynamics studies for programs such as Dyna-Soar, the recovery of hypersonic gliders, lunar reentry vehicle research, and orbital rendezvous
• Design and development of the Navaho missile
• Hound Dog air-to-ground guided wind tunnel programs, performance and stability analysis, and aerodynamic loads

Within five years of employment at Rockwell Bobbie moved up from the position of mathematician to senior engineer, aerodynamics.

Apollo Lunar Landing Program

Bobbie began working on projects related to manned space flight programs. She supervised the design and evaluation of the entry monitor systems for the Apollo missions. In 1968 she was named manager of mission requirements and evaluation on the Apollo Program. This was the highest post ever held by a woman in her division. In the position she represented Rockwell in technical meetings with NASA management and astronauts at the Johnson Space Center in Houston.

She was responsible for more than 100 engineers in programs such as:

• Lunar Landing including the Apollo 11 mission landing on the moon
• Skylab
• Apollo-Soyuz (joint USA-USSR) programs

Beginning in 1973, Bobbie became manager of mission requirements for the shuttle system. She received a medallion in 1973 from NASA in recognition of the major role she played in the Apollo 11 mission. Bobbie also received the American Astronautical Society's "Dick Brower Award," the Institute for the Advancement of Engineering's Outstanding Engineer Merit Award.

Resources:

Engineering at Illinois

Society of Women Engineers

Walter P. Reuther Library [image]

Bertha A. Lamme was the first woman to earn an electrical engineering degree. She worked for Westinghouse as a motor designer after graduation.

Born near Springfield, Ohio on December 16, 1869, Bertha didn't show an interest in engineering until her older brother Benjamin obtained a mechanical engineering degree from Ohio State University. He began working at Westinghouse the following year.

Bertha built on her childhood interests of reading and math, and decided to pursue a degree at Ohio State. She graduated in 1893 with a degree in mechanical engineering and a specialty in electricity. Benjamin's connection to Westinghouse proved useful; her thesis was "An Analysis of Tests of a Westinghouse Railway Generator." This degree gave her several firsts:

• First female engineering graduate of Ohio State
• First American woman to graduate in an engineering discipline other than civil engineering

After graduation, Bertha worked at Westinghouse as a motor designer. The company completed several major projects during the time of her employment:

• World's Columbian Exposition lit by alternating current electrical power in 1893
• Electricity supplied to Buffalo, New York by harnessing Niagara Falls' power in 1895

She "took up the work of calculation of machines and stayed until she married" Russell Feicht, another Ohio State alum and her supervisor at Westinghouse, in 1905. She resigned from the company that year and the couple had a daughter in 1910. Bertha died on November 20, 1943.

The Westinghouse Educational Foundation and Society of Women Engineers created a scholarship in her name in 1973. The Westinghouse/Bertha Lamme Scholarship is awarded annually to a female freshman student studying electrical engineering.

Resources:

IEEE Global History Network [image]

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Wikipedia - Bertha Lamme

Wikipedia - Westinghouse