GEAS Women who study the Earth

Marguerite Thomas Williams She had a dream The banks of the Anacostia River were a place in which numerous Indigenous tribes of North America settled. The river runs slowly through the city of Washington before finally pouring into the Potomac River, dropping its large sediment load like an offering. The fluvial dynamics of the Anacostia drainage basin were the doctoral dissertation subject of a very singular woman, Marguerite Thomas Williams, the first African American person to receive a doctorate in geology. It was the year 1942, in the middle of the Second World War, when the rights of the African American population were not yet recognised. Who would have known that, 13 years later, another Black woman, Rosa Parks, would refuse to give her bus seat to a white man and light the fire of the great African American civil rights movement. MargueriteThomasWilliams was born on Christmas Eve, 1895, inWashingtonD.C.The daughter of Henry and ClaraThomas, she was the youngest of a large family of six siblings. She enrolled in the Normal School for Colored Girls to train to be an educator, and graduated from the program in 1916, securing herself a scholarship to attend Howard University. But her interests were beyond her classroom’s windows; her mind flew across rivers, mountains, lakes and forests because young Marguerite’s true passion was nature. She worked full-time as an elementary school teacher while beginning a program at Howard University to receive a Bachelor of Science degree in geology and graduated with her bachelor’s degree in 1923. The African American professor and biologist Ernest Everett had a pivotal role in her career. He decided to mentor and guide two Black women through their scientific careers: Roger Arliner (the first African American woman to receive a doctorate in zoology) and Marguerite Thomas. Dr. Everett recognized Marguerite’s knack for science, her critical thinking skills, her scientific mind and her academic qualifications. Because of these qualities, Marguerite was appointed to a permanent position at Miner Teachers College, the main school where Black teachers went to get training. Years later, the college would become part of the University of the District of Columbia, where for a decade Marguerite served as the Chair of the College’s Geology Department, teaching young students that were segregated because of the colour of their skin. In her dissertation on the Anacostia River, Marguerite concluded that human activity such as deforestation, urbanization and agriculture contributed significantly to the river’s virulence and were reflected in the tragic floods observed in the Anacostia drainage system. She was not only a visionary regarding the importance of human activity as a geomorphic agent, but also awakened a new way of understanding geological processes. Sixty years after that thesis, well into the 21st century, the scientific community was finally motivated to propose a new geological period: the Anthropocene, the age of humans. While great climbers topped the world’s highest summits, including Mount Everest, with effort and perseverance a Black woman scaled an even tougher peak, to shatter prejudice, inequality and racism. Being Black, a woman and a geologist was of great daring in those post-war times. 20

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