Bucking the System: Women in the Health
Sciences at the University of Iowa, 1874 - 1950

Iowa Child Welfare Research Station

Women in Science at the Iowa Child Welfare Research Station

Until the 1960s and 1970s when the feminist movement promoted equal opportunity for both women and men, women were typically denied access to careers in the sciences. They were often refused faculty positions in colleges and universities. The Iowa Child Welfare Research Station provided women with a supportive work environment where they could pursue their scientific studies in child development. The Station fostered pioneering work in all aspects of this developing field: nutrition, psychology, behavior, physical growth and education. The predominance of women faculty and students in the Station reflects the segregation in science, and especially in psychology, characteristic of the first half of this century. Women's work in nutrition, child guidance and child welfare was believed to be kindred to their "special talents, interests and abilities." Their work was often devalued--considered to be secondary to the "real" science and psychology in academe. Yet current scientists, sociologists and political activists continue to base their ideas on the theories of child development first proposed at the Station.

27. Weighing Infants Children's Hospital circa 1920 Ruth (Frederick) Dunlap, School of Nursing class of 1921, is on the right. #145-27

Amy Daniels, Beth Wellman and Ruth Updegraff were each pioneers in their respective fields of biochemistry and nutrition, psychology and intelligence testing, and developmental psychology in relation to preschool education. Although their setting and choices of profession may today seem "traditional" for women in science, their enduring careers and outstanding contributions to their fields attest to their tenacity as well as their dedication to the understanding of human development through scientific study and its practical application. ©1992. The University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics Medical Museum, Iowa City, Iowa 52242. All rights reserved./depts/medmuseum/galleryexhibits/womeninhealth/

28. Bathing Infants
Children's Hospital
circa 1920
Ruth (Frederick) Dunlap, School of Nursing class 1921, is on the left.
#145-67/depts/medmuseum/galleryexhibits/womeninhealth/