Physics 1906

[purplecat]

This is (according to a marketing email I just recieved), the University of Manchester's Department of Physics in 1906. My immediate take-away is that clearly the hat situation in the Faculty of Science and Engineering has deteriorated. My second thought is a vague curiosity about those women - are my assumptions about how many female academics there were in Physics at the turn of the last century incorrect? Were there an unusual number of female physicists at Manchester in 1906? Or are they support staff of some kind?

Comments

[sir_guinglain]

There was one woman graduate in 1905, according to this book, though I've only glanced at the appendices so far and more information might be revealed in its pages.

[purplecat]

Looks like there were more the following year - see below.

[sir_guinglain]

Other people took a more fruitful direction, I see...!

[oriolegirl]

It looked a little too female heavy, imo, so I Googled the image. This page gives a label of "Uttley, Schuster, physics department staff, and University dignitaries" so I would imagine some of those women are wives, particularly the one square in front with the huge bouquet.

[bunn]

Followed that link and oh wow, I had no idea that Alison Uttley of the Little Grey Rabbit books was a physics graduate! I wonder which one she is.

... Oh! OK, I went and explored further from the link you gave, and according to https://alisonuttley.co.uk/early-writings/ the four women in this photo are indeed all students. Alison Uttley is the one second from the right at the back.

[vivdunstan]

Gosh I recently read her time slip novel “A Traveller in Time”. I had no idea she was an early female physics graduate. I must read more about her life. Thanks.

[purplecat]

When I posted the photo, I had no idea where this would end up!!!

[purplecat]

I feel the need to point out that there are six women in the photo - or at least, six hats on heads. I'm guessing the two women in the front row are wives of some kind while the four in the rows behind are the students.

Still, that seems like an impressive number for 1906 - I wonder if Manchester was particularly progressive or if actually there were a fair number of women studying physics then.

[bunn]

Oh, so there are! I missed the two in front of Uttley. Apparently there were 25 students at her Halls of Residence at the time? Surely not all studying Physics, though.

That website is a bit of a treasure trove. I love her student magazine drawings, they look very familiar somehow!

[sir_guinglain]

Uttley's is one of the first prominent people deaths I remember - the others also being from that year, Agatha Christie and L.S. Lowry - and of course I had or saw several of her books as a child.

[sir_guinglain]

Brilliant discovery!

[purplecat]

I think you may be right about the woman with the bouquet - that does look rather like the sort of thing that gets given to a dignitaries wife, but bunn's research suggests at least four of them are bona fide graduates!!!

[oriolegirl]

Unusual! But, iirc, Manchester was a bit more welcoming to women, at least under Rutherford. Though checking Wikipedia, he didn't arrive there until 1907. So perhaps it was already the case.