Geologist. Feminist. Pioneer for gender equality in the geosciences.
Lady MacRobert graduated from Royal Holloway in 1911 with a degree in geology.
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Following her degree, she went to Imperial College, London to continue her studies in petrology and mineralogy. While there, she attended her first mining lecture at the Royal School of Mines:
“I noticed considerable surprise on Cox’s face on entering the room, and much whispering among the students. The next day Prof. Watts rushed up to me with an amused grin and said ‘so you are attending the mining lectures I hear, well you have broken all records. No woman has ever attended mining lectures before!” she continued to attend stating “I had no idea they (women) were not admitted…if I hear any more I shall require to see the Statues which exclude women. Of course there are none, and it simply has not occurred before!”
Lady MacRobert also studied at the Mineralogical Institute of Oslo, where she became a Fellow of the Geological Society of Stockholm.
She was one of the first eight women to be elected a Fellow of the Geological Society in London in May 1919. Even though women were not ‘permitted’ to join learned societies before this time, Lady MacRobert regularly attended the Annual General Meeting of the Geological Society, even though they tried to throw her out in 1913.
“An attempt was made to eject me. The Secretary rushed up and said I was not a Fellow, so I explained this was through no fault of mine but the Society’s and waved him aside and marched in…They need not try any tricks with me because I am a woman, I have always gone to the Annual Meetings and intend to do so if in London!”
At this time, Lady MacRobert was already well accepted in the scientific community and was a regular participant on fieldtrips, such as the Assynt Excursion following on from a British Association meeting in 1912.
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Fieldwork wasn’t always smooth sailing for Lady MacRobert, she said about an expedition to Lapland: “Everyone is most awfully nice, but I had to overcome the usual annoyance man have when women are about on scientific expeditions. Now that they have found that I am not a drag on them or bore them with talk they are very pleasant”
Lady MacRobert and her mother, intrepid explorer Fanny Bullock Workman, were active suffragettes and regularly hosted lunches for suffragette coordinators.
She also actively contributed to the war efforts, providing five planes for the RAF, one Short Stirling bomber called ‘MacRobert’s Reply’ in memory of her three sons killed in service, as well another four Hawker Hurricanes.
You can read more about the first female Fellows of the Geological Society of London here: https://sp.lyellcollection.org/content/317/1/373.abstract
