Marie clark biography

Gardening is a powerful practice that can restore wildlife habitat, grow edible sustenance, and provide solace in backyards and on balconies. Gardens—both personal and public—have a long tradition of putting scientific research into practice, and women have frequently been at the vanguard of advancing knowledge in botany and advocating for public horticulture.

Although this makes it more difficult to celebrate their contributions, expertise and labor, some botanical gardens—like the Norfolk Botanical Garden—are trying to unearth these hidden histories. As part of their 80th anniversary in , the Norfolk Botanical Garden remembered the African-American women and men who—through a Depression-era employment program—were employed to clear thick underbrush and swampland.

In some Tribal Nations located in the United States, women serve their communities as medicinal herbs experts. After the Civil War, the study of botany was characterized as a feminine academic pursuit and, because access to education was available, large numbers of middle-class White women readily adopted coursework. Although few became professional botanists, they furthered their knowledge by joining gardening clubs.

These social venues, where women could congregate around a shared passion for nature, provided opportunities to cultivate leadership skills.

Marie Clark Taylor was the.

Although excluded from other academic fields and careers, these professional and amateur botanists would play a vital role in burgeoning civil movements. Gardening clubs soon proved to be crucial to the young conservation movement during the Progressive Era. Although societal barriers dissuaded or prevented many women from seeking employment as botanists, a small number of women were hired by the U.

Florence Hedges, a career public servant, researched plant diseases as an associate pathologist for the U. Department of Agriculture. She was notably one of 20 women who worked in Erwin F. Her legacy includes research on the influence of light on plant growth photomorphogensis and a near year tenure as the chair of the botany department at Howard University.