Merrillyn Leigh Hartridge

While not what I'd call a fascinating story, this is a fascinating discovery. As a family researcher, it gives me motivation and ideas for finding out and sharing what I can about other obscure women.
The bulk of the book is transcriptions of news articles and correspondance between Hattie Bell Merrill and a major professor (Birge) she worked with. H.B. studied a particular variety of zooplankton, those minute animals which are so important to the health of lakes and which are the basis on which all marine life depends. She was born in 1863 in Stevens Point, WI, graduated from the UW in 1890 as one of the first female students admitted. In 1893 she received her MS then worked as head of the science department at Milwaukee Downer College, director of physiology and biology departments at 2 Madison high schools, hired as assistant professor at the University of WI in 1900, and later enrolled in the PhD program at the University of Chicago (UW not having such an option at the time). She did research in 1902-3 and 1907-09 in South America, travelling alone and under difficult conditions, to research these zooplankton: Cladocera.
The first chapter gives her biography, and the final chapters describe how the author came to learn about her aunt's importance.
Why "anandrous"? I believe the author meant it to mean "without a husband", tho that doesn't follow the botanical meaning.… (meer)