Muriel Wheldale Onslow and Early Biochemical Genetics

Abstract

Muriel Whedale, a distinguished graduate of Newnham College, Cambridge, was a member of William Bateson's school of genetics at Cambridge University from 1903. Her investigation of flower color inheritance in snapdragons (Antirrhinum), a topic of particular interest to botanists, contributed to establishing Mendelism as a powerful new tool in studying heredity. Her understanding of the genetics of pigment formation led her to do cutting-edge work in biochemistry, culminating in the publication of her landmark work, The Anthocyanin Pigments of Plants (1916). In 1915, she joined Frederick Gowland Hopkin's Department of Biochemistry as assistant and in 1926 became one of the first women to be appointed university lecturer. In 1919 she married the biochemist Huia Onslow, with whom she collaborated until his death in 1922. This paper examines Whedale's work in genetics and especially focuses on the early linkage of Mendelian methodology with new techniques in biochemistry that eventually led to the founding of biochemical genetics. It highlights significant issues in the early history of women in genetics, including the critical role of mentors, funding opportunities, and career strategies.

“Her Joyous Enthusiasm for Her Life-Work …”: Early Women Authors in The American Naturalist

“…We refer readers interested in a deeper historical and sociological consideration to several outstanding analyses of early women in science: Rossiter (1982), Abir-Am andOutram (1987), andSchiebinger (1989). Valuable works are available on women's experiences in certain subfields of biology, including ecology (Langenheim 1996) and genetics (Richmond 2007b), and at certain key institutions, including Wellesley College (Palmieri 1997) and Radcliffe College (Tonn 2017). Finally, biographies and autobiographies have been written of a handful of our authors (Hyde 1938;Warner 1979;Keenan 1983;Miller 2007;Ogilvie 2007;Richmond 2007a;Palumbi and Sotka 2012;LoPresti and Weber 2016).…”

“…A handful of prominent evolutionary biologists mentored large numbers of women, including David Starr Jordan, Thomas Hunt Morgan, William Bateson, and Charles Davenport. These training opportunities, while essential, did not generally translate to professional success: indeed, women were marginalized in most of these labs even when hired into permanent positions (Richmond 2007b). Further, sometimes these mentors' motives were not entirely admirable.…”

Rose Scott-Moncrieff and the dawn of (Bio) Chemical Genetics

“…It is possible that Scott-Moncrieff 's inherently collaborative predisposition, and her interest in learning from experts in very different fields resulted in more successful and informative results than from Wheldale. Indeed, Wheldale was encouraged to be more competitive and less collaborative by her patron, William Bateson, and in the long run this may have limited the progress she was able to make on her own 17 . Thus the major output in the new field of (Bio)Chemical Genetics…”

“…Undertaking her PhD at the University of Cambridge, she was also eligible only for a titular doctorate, because shockingly, Cambridge University did not award women degrees until 1948. Indeed, following the failure of the senate vote to award women degrees in 1897, many women, especially scientists worked in the University under reportedly hostile conditions 17 . Rose Scott-Moncrieff received notification of her PhD roll from the lab assistant while at her bench in the Biochemistry Department in 1930.…”

Women in the Historiography of Biology

“…(For biochemistry, seeRichmond (2007a), Needham (1982, andŜtrbáňová (2004). For ecology, seeNorwood (1993), Marcil (2015), andSlack (1996)).…”