Elizabeth Fagg Olds (1913–1995)

Sheesh. I've never heard of any of these four women, or of their female colleagues and rivals. And yet their accomplishments are both impressively adventurous, and important to scientific understandings of the world. Here are *some* of their accomplishments:

Annie Peck blazed the trail for independent women with specific goals. Before her women would head out into the wilds, but more as tourists, more whimsically observing the quaint. She wanted to climb the highest mountains in South America, and she did so despite the weak men she felt compelled to gather to accompany her. And she did so despite having to be one of the first women to get rid of the heavy dragging skirts even other adventuresses were wearing.

Delia J. Akeley traveled through central Africa, surviving the Belgian Congo where white men feared to go for fear of hostile natives. She went without soldiers, without armaments, with good will & compassion, and did just fine. This, after spending many years being an invaluable resource, in Africa, to the collector for museums, Carl E. Akeley.

Marguerite Harrison, after being imprisoned as a spy, survived to write [b:Marooned in Moscow: An American Woman Imprisoned in Soviet Russia|22746166|Marooned in Moscow An American Woman Imprisoned in Soviet Russia|Marguerite Harrison|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1407416471s/22746166.jpg|42290581]. one of the earliest memoirs in the literature of the Soviet prison experience." She also visited Japan and explored Tibet and eastern Siberia. Then, still restless, she partnered with two male filmmakers to invent the documentary form, to capture the traditional nomads' migration in Persia, as the movie *Grass."

Louise Boyd had money and intelligence, not to mention will, so despite no formal scientific training, she led increasingly successful expeditions to Eastern Greenland that included botanists, geologists, cartographers, biologists.... She gathered so much precise & rich information about the area that, as WWII developed, the US gov't classified her reports and recruited her expertise to help our forces there. The ice was often as much a threat to her Veslekari as it was to Shackleton's [b:Endurance|139069|Endurance Shackleton's Incredible Voyage|Alfred Lansing|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1391329559s/139069.jpg|900140].

Read this engaging, accessible book to learn more about who these inspirational women were, what they did, and why their stories should be remembered. (hint - it's not a book just for women)

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