1. Edith Ellen Humphrey was a British inorganic chemist who carried out pioneering work in co-ordination chemistry at the University of Zurich under Alfred Werner.
17 Facts About Edith Humphrey
1. 2.
Edith Humphrey is thought to be the first British woman to obtain a doctorate in chemistry and the first chemist to synthesize a chiral inorganic complex.
3.
Edith Humphrey was born on 11 September 1875 at 41 Lismore Road, Kentish Town, London.
4.
Edith Humphrey was the youngest of the seven surviving children of Louisa and John Charles Humphrey.
5.
Edith Humphrey's mother had been a dressmaker before marriage, and her father was a clerk at the London Metropolitan Board of Works and later London County Council.
6.
John Edith Humphrey had started life in poor circumstances, his father having been a bootmaker, and he was a great supporter of education for his daughters as well as his sons.
7.
Edith Humphrey grew up in a middle-class household in Kentish Town, London.
8.
Edith Humphrey attended Camden School for Girls and then, from 1891, North London Collegiate School, one of the first girls' schools in the UK to include science in the curriculum.
9.
On 17 October 1898, Edith Humphrey matriculated for chemistry at the University of Zurich.
10.
Edith Humphrey joined a growing band of Alfred Werner's students, working in the inadequate cellars known as the "Katakomben".
11.
Edith Humphrey worked hard, and her account of the time suggests that she found the social life disappointing.
12.
Edith Humphrey was the first British woman to obtain a doctorate in chemistry, though not the first in Zurich.
13.
On completion of her thesis, Edith Humphrey was recommended to move to Leipzig University to continue research under Wilhelm Ostwald.
14.
Edith Humphrey was employed as a research chemist at their factory in Chiswick, but little is known of her work there.
15.
In 1904, Edith Humphrey was one of nineteen women chemists to petition the Chemical Society for admission of women to fellowship.
16.
Edith Humphrey was elected to fellowship on 4 May 1933, twenty-nine years after she signed the first petition to the society.
17.
Edith Humphrey died on 25 February 1978 in Highgate, London.