27th November, 2025 in Biography & Memoir, History, Women in History

Ask the author: Stella Butler on the female pioneers who broke the glass ceiling of science

By Stella Butler

Breaking the Glass Ceiling of Science tells the story of eleven incredible women pioneers who excelled at science, overcame prejudice and made significant discoveries along the way. Author, Stella Butler, pays tribute to these remarkable women and answers our questions.

What inspired you to write this book?

I was interested in the role of women scientists between the two world wars. I realised there were no women Fellows of the Royal Society, the UK’s premier scientific academy, until 1945. That seemed to me outrageous given the contribution women were making by this time to universities and other workplaces. In the first decade to 1954 there were only 11 women elected FRS. It became clear to me that these 11 amazing, pioneer women were little known even among scientific communities. And so I wanted to celebrate their lives and achievements.

Who were the first eleven women FRSs?

There were 2 x-ray crystallographers: Kathleen Lonsdale and Dorothy Hodgkin; 3 biochemists: Marjory Stephenson, Dorothy Needham and Rosalind Pitt-Rivers; 2 natural historians: Agnes Arber and Sidnie Manton; a mathematician: Mary Cartwright; a parasitologist: Muriel Robertson; a cell biologist: Honor Fell and a physiologist, Marthe Vogt.

What scientific discoveries did they make?

Dorothy Hodgkin won the Nobel Prize for her ground-breaking work on large biological molecules including penicillin. She was inspired as an undergraduate by Kathleen Lonsdale who was the first to use X-ray crystallography to work out the 3-d structure of a carbon compound, benzene. The zoologist, Sidnie Manton developed techniques for mapping cells as they divide within the embryos of shrimps and crabs. Dorothy Needham worked out the sequence of reactions that take place in muscle cells when they contract. Honor Fell demonstrated how to grow chicken limbs in the laboratory by dissecting out ‘limb buds’ from embryos and growing them in a petri dish. Marthe Vogt showed that the hormone noradrenaline acts as a neurotransmitter in the brain.

Did their work have lasting legacies?

Marjory Stephenson used bacteria to work out the chemical reactions taking place inside cells, establishing a new sub-discipline of biochemistry.  The work of the mathematician, Mary Cartwright on radio waves in the 1940s contributed to the development of chaos theory by Stephen Smale a decade later. The identification of the thyroid hormone, T3, by Rosalind Pitt-Rivers and her colleague Jack Gross, significantly improved the lives of those suffering from thyroid disorders. Muriel Robertson’s research on trichomonad infertility and abortion in cattle had an enormous and lasting economic impact on dairy farming.

Which of the women’s stories resonate with you the most?

Agnes Arber worked for many years in the Balfour Laboratory, part of Newnham College, Cambridge. When the college sold the building to Cambridge University, the Principal of Newnham made a condition that laboratory space be found for Agnes elsewhere in Cambridge. Agnes felt that what she was offered was unsuitable and so ended up working from a room in her rented house for the rest of her life excluded from scientific colleagues. It must have been a very solitary existence.

Many of the women experienced considerable obstacles to success. What do you think drove them?

Determination, a thick skin, fierce intelligence and love of laboratory work.

Why do you think they have been largely forgotten?

The history of scientific discoveries often begins with a narrative written by scientists themselves. We know that the work of women scientists is referred to less than the work of men. This then obscures women’s work from historians as they try to piece together the steps that lead to solving particular problems or developing certain scientific techniques or ideas.

In the book you state that “family support was crucial to the success of these women”. What form did that support take, and do you think much has changed for women in the scientific community today?

In several cases the support was simply encouragement and financial support for them to follow their academic ambitions in an era when young women, even those with university degrees, were expected to marry and focus their energies on the home. Those women who went on to marry and have children undoubtedly received enormous support from their husbands. When encouraging schoolgirls to consider a career in science, Kathleen Lonsdale who was married with three children, advised them to choose their husbands carefully!  

Class seems to be as significant as sex in the women’s stories. Would you agree?

These eleven women were not a socially diverse group. Most enjoyed very comfortable backgrounds. Rosalind Pitt-Rivers came a landed, aristocratic family. Several of the others could almost certainly rely on family money to bridge gaps in grants or short-term fellowships. Only Kathleen Lonsdale’s family struggled financially. She was fortunate to be the youngest child in a family of ten children so that she was able to take up a a county scholarship to secondary school and go on to win scholarships to university.

Did you uncover anything in your research that genuinely shocked you?

I discovered that legal barriers to women being admitted to the Royal Society had been removed immediately following the First World War by the Sex Discrimination Removal Act (1919) and that legal advice in the 1920s confirmed that women were consequently eligible for election as Fellows. However, the rules of the Society meant that only Fellows could nominate individuals for the Fellowship. So for more than a quarter of a century women were legally eligible for election but none were nominated. Draw your own conclusions.

What would you most like people to take away from reading your book?

Women can do science at the highest level even when they experience prejudice and obstacles. Without those obstacles in the first decades of the twentieth century, more women would have been able to contribute to developing new technologies and to making positive impacts on the health of individuals and communities, just as these first women FRSs did. It is important we learn lessons from the past and, going forward, that we encourage girls as much as boys to enjoy the experience of doing science. We will all benefit.