Drosophila Genetics

Women in Drosophila Genetics in the United States, 1934-1970

• 
  Michael R. Dietrich and Brandi Hevalow
  Department of Biological Sciences
  Dartmouth College
  Hanover, NH 03755

  In the early twentieth century, Thomas Hunt Morgan's network of Drosophila researchers transformed the science of genetics and made the Drosophila fruit fly into one of the most powerful genetic tools of the twentieth century. Historians of genetics have justifiably spilled gallons of ink describing Morgan's group and its efforts. Despite large numbers of women within Morgan's group, however, the model accepted by most historians is one of the Boss and the boys. This project seeks to recover the history of women within Drosophila genetics and analyze the gendered division of labor within Drosophila laboratories that rendered women invisible yet indispensable.

  Figures:
  Figure 1:

  
  
  Figure 2: Division of Labor within U. S. Drosophila Genetics, 1934-1970
  

  

  
  Figure 3:
  

   

   

  Method
  The demographic data represented in Figures 1-3 was obtained from the geographic directories included in the Drosophila Information Service, Numbers 1-45 (1934-1970). Directories were not available for 1938, 1950, 1951, 1952, and 1955. Drosophila workers listed in the directories were counted and categorized first by gender, then by position. Gender was often denoted in the directories by including a prefix of Miss or Mrs. Entries without a prefix were sorted by first name. If the name was listed with only two initials and a last name, the person was counted as male. This sorting convention was corroborated by independent sorting of a sample directory by R. C. Lewontin and J. F. Crow.

  
  Position descriptions were grouped into three categories as follows: the Professor category includes Associate Professor, Assistant Professor, Adjunct Professor, Lecturer, Instructor, Assistant Instructor, Investigator, Visiting Professor, Scientific Director, Principal Geneticist, Director of Lab, Senior Geneticist US Department of Agriculture, Zoologist, Acting Director, Captain in US Army, Physicist, Research Supervisor, Acting Chairman; the Research Associate category includes Independent Researcher, Visiting PhD, Associate, Associate Member, Fellow, Teaching Fellow, International Fellow, NRC Fellow, Doctoral Candidate, Researcher, Project Associate, Staff Scientist, National Research Fellow, Research Fellow, Research Biologist, Graduate Research Geneticist, Independent Investigator, Guest Investigator, Guggenheim Fellow, Research Chemist, Research Geneticist, Research Scholar, Women’s Club Scholarship, Research, Gregory Fellow, Predoctoral Fellow, Junior Research Biophysicist, Visiting Scholar, Research Executive, Gosney Fellow, Visiting Investigator, Research Executive; the Assistant category includes Technician, Stock Keeper, Technical Assistant, Research Assistant, Curator of Stocks, Graduate Assistant, Undergraduate Assistant, Student Assistant, Experimentalist, Stock Custodian, Artist, Laboratory Attendant, Lab Helper, Preparator.