Ms. Nichols has been extremely helpful. She has sent me three different links about my person of interest, Rosalind Franklin. I have posted these three links under the “link” folder. The first link that I researched had scanned copies of the papers that she wrote years and years ago. It was interesting to read about the research that she conducted and the process of identifying DNA. These copies looked just like any other rough draft report. There are cross outs, misspelled words, and incorrect grammar. Kind of crazy to think that at the time she probably had no idea how famous this identification would make her.
The second link that Ms. Nichols shared with me was the ecampus library link. I didn’t know that I could check out a book online from OSU and have it sent to my community college. I will work on later this week so I can get another book on time.
The third link that Ms. Nichols emailed me was the database page that she has set up for WS 320. I still have to take the time to research through each of these resources but I think I am off to a good start thanks to Ms. Nichols.
I have attempted to contact Ms. Jane Nichols. I am interested to see what kinds of research she points me to. I am going to visit my local library tomorrow and see what I can find about Rosalind Franklin. I would like to find books that compared her to other women of her times and to find out more about the three male colleagues she used to work with. I will keep this updated with the information I receive from Ms. Jane Nichols.
Rosalind Franklin was the first researcher to discern the complex structure of the DNA molecule (Ptacek & Vare 1988). She was a part of a team that consisted of all male with the exception of her and they wouldn’t so much as let her in their meetings to discuss her findings. Maurice Wilkins, James Watson, and Francis Crick would steal her research papers and hand them to her competition. The fact that Ms. Franklin was Jewish didn’t help the fact that she invaded an all-male scientific establishment.
Rosalind was born in 1920 into a socially prominent Jewish banking family in London (Ptacek & Vare 1988). She was a Newnham College graduate in 1941. Her parents were very disappointed that she was awarded a research scholarship to work under Ronald Norrish, they wanted her to take on a career that was more femininie then science. Ronald Norrish was very jealous of Rosalind’s work so she packed up her stuff and relocated to the Central Laboratory of Chemical Science in Paris (Ardell 2006). This is where she made her important discoveries in crystallography (determining the arrangement of atoms and crystals) and molecular structure. Soon after her latest move she relocated to work at King’s College in London. This is where she started her work with Maurice Wilkins who refused to work with female doctoral candidates. He was known to have turned Rosalind’s findings, without her permission, over to his friends Watson and Crick (Ptacek & Vare 1988).
By 1953, Rosalind had become so frustrated with the way the all male colleagues were treating her that she left King’s College. She had published a breakthrough paper on the structure of DNA and conducted x-ray photographs used by Watson. In 1953 Rosalind started her position at Birkbeck College where she delineated important findings about virus particles (Ardell 2006). For an unknown reason she was forbidden to talk about DNA. In 1958 she had an exhibition at the World’s Fair in Brussles but this official recognition wasn’t enought to safe her career or herself. During this same year, Rosalind was diagnosed with incurable cancer.
Because Rosalind had no friends or family she kept her illness private. She never complained about her sickness or pain. Rosalind continued to work until her death at age 39, dying a young, bitter, and frustrated woman. If Ms. Franklin would have been alive in 1962 her hard work and dedication would’ve been recognized because in this year Wilkins, Watson, and Crick received the Nobel Prize (Ardall 2006). It is a sad story that Rosalind’s scientific contributions have gone unrecognized when she lived and even after her death.
Ardell. D. (October 2006). Rosalind Franklin. Retrieved on April 20, 2008 from http://www.accessexcellence.org/RC/AB/BC/Rosalind_Franklin.php
Ptacek. G. & Vare. E. (1988). Mothers of Invention. William Morrow and Company, Inc: New York.
Rosalind Franklin: Dark lady of DNA. (n.d.) Retrieved on April 20, 2008 from http://www.npr.org/programs/atc/features/2002/oct/darklady/
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Katie Mefferd
