Women Scientists in America’s History

Courtesy of the Office of NIH History and Stetten Museum, National Institutes of Health.

During Women’s History Month in March, it is particularly fitting to recognize women’s vital role and contributions to our nation’s health throughout American history. American women are scientists, doctors, nurses, teachers and researchers, and they are indispensable to strong and healthy families and communities. They are pushing the boundaries of science to cure diseases.

Thanks to the Office of NIH History, here are some stories of only a few of the exceptional women scientists who served our nation in the past:

• Ida Bengtson (1881-1952) was the first woman to be employed as a scientist at the Public Health Service’s Hygienic Laboratory, the forerunner of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), starting in 1916. She earned her master’s and Ph.D. in bacteriology at the University of Chicago. She proved that an infantile paralysis was caused by a new variety of botulism, aiding the development of the typhus vaccine; and developing the test still in use for the detection of such Rickettsial diseases as endemic and epidemic typhus and Rocky Mountain spotted fever.  During her research, she came down with typhus.
• Alice Catherine Evans (1881-1975) could not afford college, and so like many other early women scientists, she began her career as a teacher after high school. But in 1909, she received her bachelor’s degree in science from Cornell University and in 1910, her master’s from the University of Wisconsin.  Evans began her federal career in 1910 with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, where her research played a pivotal role in the recognition of brucellosis as a significant public health problem and in the acceptance of the need to pasteurize milk. In 1918, Evans joined the Hygienic Lab and worked on a team to improve the serum treatment for epidemic meningitis.
• Sara Branham Matthews (1888-1962). Dr. Branham is credited with the discovery and isolation of the virus that causes spinal meningitis. A Public Health Service scientist, she became known for her studies of infectious diseases. In 1928, when she was 40 years old, she was appointed to NIH to study pathogens and investigate causes and cures for influenza. Soon she was also investigating salmonella, shigella, and diphtheria toxins and became an expert on the chemotherapy of bacterial meningitis. She became principal bacteriologist in 1950 and served as Chief of the Section on Bacterial Toxins in the Division of Biological Standards until retirement in 1958.
• Margaret Pittman (1901-1995) came by medicine early, helping her country doctor father in his Arkansas practice. She later attended the University of Chicago and received her Ph.D. in 1928. She came to NIH in 1936, by way of the Rockefeller Institute and the New York State Department of Health, working with Dr. Branham, who had taught her at Chicago.  She is recognized for her work on an improved and standardized pertussis (whooping cough) vaccine. At NIH, she became the first woman to hold the position of laboratory chief, heading the Laboratory of Bacterial Products, Division of Biologics and Standards, from 1957 to 1971. Pittman isolated the influenza strain responsible for most childhood meningitis and made key observations that led to the development of a Salmonella vaccine. She also served as president of the Society of American Bacteriologists and the Washington Academy of Sciences. Although Pittman “retired” in 1971, she kept working at NIH as a guest until 1993.