Born: 25 October 1921, United States
Died: 28 October 1997
Country most active: United States
Also known as: Marian Elliott
The following is excerpted from Infinite Women creator Allison Tyra’s book Uncredited: Women’s Overlooked, Misattributed, and Stolen Work.
Immunologist Marian Koshland is known for discovering that the differences in antibodies’ amino acid make-up explain how efficient and effective they are at fighting off foreign elements. But because her husband was a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, she was only made a full professor herself in 1970 when anti-nepotism rules were relaxed and anti-discrimination laws began taking effect. She’d been working there as a researcher since 1965. Decades earlier, when physiologist Matilda Brooks’s husband became a zoology professor at UC Berkeley in 1927, anti-nepotism rules prevented Brooks from being eligible for a comparable position. Instead, she was hired as a research associate, relying on a series of grants instead of a proper salary. It was only when he was incapacitated in 1934 and 1936 that she was allowed to teach in his place.