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Edith Clements
Edith Gertrude Clements (1874–1971), also known as Edith S. Clements and Edith Schwartz Clements, was an American botanist and pioneer of botanical ecology who was the first woman to be awarded a Ph.D. by the University of Nebraska. She was married to botanist Frederic Clements, with whom she collaborated throughout her professional life. Together they founded the Alpine Laboratory, a research station at Pikes Peak, Colorado. Clements was also a botanical artist who illustrated her own books as well as joint publications with Frederic.
Both Clementses were involved with the study of phytogeography, especially those factors determining the ecology of vegetation in particular regions, and they would be praised as "the most illustrious husband-wife team since the Curies." It is impossible to entirely disentangle the work of each Clementses as they worked together during their noteworthy years.
Edith Gertrude Schwartz was born in 1874 in Albany, New York, to George and Emma (Young) Schwartz. Her father was a pork packer from Omaha, Nebraska. She was educated at the University of Nebraska (NU), being elected to Phi Beta Kappa and gaining her A.B. in German in 1898. She was also a member of Kappa Alpha Theta. She wrote her dissertation on "The Relation of Leaf Structure to Physical Factors" in 1904.
Schwartz began her career as a teaching fellow in German at NU (1898–1900). During this period, she met her future husband, Frederic Clements, an NU botany professor who influenced the direction of her graduate studies. At the time, the Universities of Nebraska and Minnesota (where she would later teach) were centers for the study of phytogeography—the geographic distribution of plant species—and she chose to make this her area of specialization. She earned her doctoral degree in botany in 1904 (with a minor in Germanic philology and geology), becoming the first woman to be awarded a Ph.D. by NU.
Edith and Frederic married in 1899.
After gaining her Ph.D., Clements got a job as an assistant in botany at the University of Nevada (1904–07), where Frederic was teaching. To raise money, they spent several summers collecting plant specimens and assembled the Herbaria Formationum Coloradensium, a valuable collection of some 530 specimens of Colorado mountain plants carefully annotated and supplemented by 100 photographs. It was issued in 1903 in 24 sets that were sold to scientific institutions. A few years later, they assembled another exsiccata collection featuring some 615 specimens of cryptogams; this set was later (1972) issued in print form by the New York Botanical Garden.
In 1909, Clements was hired as an instructor in botany by the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, where Frederic had been hired two years before to head up the botany department. In 1917, Frederic gave up teaching and began doing research funded by the Carnegie Institution of Washington, D.C. For many years thereafter, Carnegie Institution funding supported their joint research endeavors, and Clements was named a field assistant by the Carnegie Institution.
Beginning in 1917, the Clementses spent the winters doing research at two Carnegie-funded research institutions: first at the Tucson Institute in Arizona, and then (starting in 1925) at the Coastal Laboratory in Santa Barbara, California. Throughout this period, their summers were spent at a botanical station they developed as a test site for plant acclimatization, Alpine Laboratory at Pikes Peak, Colorado. Clements served as instructor in botany for the Alpine Laboratory, and Frederic as director. They trained many botanists and ecologists at this lab during its four decades of activity, before it closed in 1940. They published jointly and individually, and Clements used her language skills to translate some of their books and articles into foreign languages.
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Edith Clements
Edith Gertrude Clements (1874–1971), also known as Edith S. Clements and Edith Schwartz Clements, was an American botanist and pioneer of botanical ecology who was the first woman to be awarded a Ph.D. by the University of Nebraska. She was married to botanist Frederic Clements, with whom she collaborated throughout her professional life. Together they founded the Alpine Laboratory, a research station at Pikes Peak, Colorado. Clements was also a botanical artist who illustrated her own books as well as joint publications with Frederic.
Both Clementses were involved with the study of phytogeography, especially those factors determining the ecology of vegetation in particular regions, and they would be praised as "the most illustrious husband-wife team since the Curies." It is impossible to entirely disentangle the work of each Clementses as they worked together during their noteworthy years.
Edith Gertrude Schwartz was born in 1874 in Albany, New York, to George and Emma (Young) Schwartz. Her father was a pork packer from Omaha, Nebraska. She was educated at the University of Nebraska (NU), being elected to Phi Beta Kappa and gaining her A.B. in German in 1898. She was also a member of Kappa Alpha Theta. She wrote her dissertation on "The Relation of Leaf Structure to Physical Factors" in 1904.
Schwartz began her career as a teaching fellow in German at NU (1898–1900). During this period, she met her future husband, Frederic Clements, an NU botany professor who influenced the direction of her graduate studies. At the time, the Universities of Nebraska and Minnesota (where she would later teach) were centers for the study of phytogeography—the geographic distribution of plant species—and she chose to make this her area of specialization. She earned her doctoral degree in botany in 1904 (with a minor in Germanic philology and geology), becoming the first woman to be awarded a Ph.D. by NU.
Edith and Frederic married in 1899.
After gaining her Ph.D., Clements got a job as an assistant in botany at the University of Nevada (1904–07), where Frederic was teaching. To raise money, they spent several summers collecting plant specimens and assembled the Herbaria Formationum Coloradensium, a valuable collection of some 530 specimens of Colorado mountain plants carefully annotated and supplemented by 100 photographs. It was issued in 1903 in 24 sets that were sold to scientific institutions. A few years later, they assembled another exsiccata collection featuring some 615 specimens of cryptogams; this set was later (1972) issued in print form by the New York Botanical Garden.
In 1909, Clements was hired as an instructor in botany by the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, where Frederic had been hired two years before to head up the botany department. In 1917, Frederic gave up teaching and began doing research funded by the Carnegie Institution of Washington, D.C. For many years thereafter, Carnegie Institution funding supported their joint research endeavors, and Clements was named a field assistant by the Carnegie Institution.
Beginning in 1917, the Clementses spent the winters doing research at two Carnegie-funded research institutions: first at the Tucson Institute in Arizona, and then (starting in 1925) at the Coastal Laboratory in Santa Barbara, California. Throughout this period, their summers were spent at a botanical station they developed as a test site for plant acclimatization, Alpine Laboratory at Pikes Peak, Colorado. Clements served as instructor in botany for the Alpine Laboratory, and Frederic as director. They trained many botanists and ecologists at this lab during its four decades of activity, before it closed in 1940. They published jointly and individually, and Clements used her language skills to translate some of their books and articles into foreign languages.