Dr Mary Ethel Florey - Infinite Women

Born: 1 October 1900, Australia
Died: 10 October 1966
Country most active: United Kingdom
Also known as: Mary Ethel Hayter Reed

The following is excerpted from Infinite Women creator Allison Tyra’s book Uncredited: Women’s Overlooked, Misattributed, and Stolen Work.

Other women whose work on penicillin went largely unrecognised included lab assistant Mary Hunt, who reputedly found the mold that led to penicillium rubens strain NRRL 1951—the “parent” of all strains that would later be used commercially. Another Mary, Dr. Mary Ethel Florey, ran the first clinical trials of penicillin in 1941 alongside her lab partner and husband Howard Walter Florey. Yet, like so many other wives, she was left out when he won a Nobel in 1945 for the work they had done together to transform Alexander Fleming’s discovery into a useful and effective drug. The only mention of her in his Nobel bio is the last two sentences: “He married Mary Ethel Hayter Reed in 1926. They have two children, Paquita Mary Joanna and Charles du Vé.” Although the male Florey reportedly said, “It must never be forgotten that if it wasn’t for Ethel penicillin would not have been introduced into medical practice when it was,” he doesn’t seem to have done much to promote or ensure her legacy. He didn’t even mention her in his lecture, which Nobel Prize winners deliver about their work, despite name-dropping more than a dozen other scientists.

This biography has been shared from The Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation, published by the Centre for Transformative Innovation, Swinburne University of Technology, under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Mary Florey, then Mary Reed, met Howard Walter Florey while studying medicine at the University of Adelaide in 1921. They married in 1926 and moved to London. Mary Florey initially worked with the Oxford Regional Blood Transfusion Service in 1939-1941, then took part in clinical trials of penicillin. These were conducted at the Radcliffe Infirmary, at military hospitals and at the Birmingham Accident Hospital. She went on to complete a Doctor of Medicine (MD) and write several publications, mainly under her maiden name, including The Clinical Application of Antibiotics (London). This was a remarkable achievement because Mary Florey was plagued by ill health for most of her life and she was also partially deaf. She died of myocardial infarction on 10 October 1966 at Marston and was buried at Fairspear House, Leafield, Oxford.

Chronology
1924
Education – Bachelor of Medicine (MB) and Bachelor of Surgery (BS), University of Adelaide
1926
Career position – Moved to England
1939 – 1941
Career position – Worked with the Oxford Regional Blood Transfusion Service
1941 – ?
Career position – Took part in clinical trials of penicillin at the Radcliffe Infirmary, military hospitals and the Birmingham Accident Hospital
1950
Education – Doctor of Medicine (MD), University of Adelaide