Margaret Dampier Anderson (née Whetham; 1900–1997) was a British biochemist and scientific indexer. She published four scientific articles in the 1920s before marrying in 1927 and began indexing books beginning in 1960.

Life

Margaret Whetham was born on 21 April 1900, the daughter of William Cecil Dampier Whetham, a Cambridge-educated scientist and agricultural academic, and his wife Catherine Durning Holt, a daughter of Liverpool merchant

Robert Durning Holt Robert Durning Holt (11 October 1832 in Liverpool – 10 December 1908) was an English cotton-broker and local politician. He was Mayor of Liverpool and the first Lord Mayor of Liverpool (1892–1893). Holt was the youngest of five sons o ...

who had also pursued an education at Cambridge. One of her many great aunts (the “Potter sisters”) was social reformer

Beatrice Webb Martha Beatrice Webb, Baroness Passfield, (née Potter; 22 January 1858 – 30 April 1943) was an English sociology, sociologist, economist, feminism, feminist and reformism (historical), social reformer. She was among the founders of the Lo ...

. She had one brother and four sisters, including

Edith Holt Whetham Edith Holt Whetham (27 December 1911 – 28 January 2001) was an English lecturer and agricultural economist. Early life Edith Holt Whetham was born on 27 December 1911, the daughter of William Cecil Dampier Whetham, a Cambridge-educated scie ...

. Her family owned a small

manor house A manor house was historically the main residence of the lord of the manor. The house formed the administrative centre of a manor in the European feudal system; within its great hall were usually held the lord's manorial courts, communal mea ...

Devon Devon ( ; historically also known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel to the north, Somerset and Dorset to the east, the English Channel to the south, and Cornwall to the west ...

, and also inherited a small estate in Hilfield, Dorset where they spent family vacations. Margaret Whetham attended

University College, Exeter The University of Exeter is a research university in the West Country of England, with its main campus in Exeter, Devon. Its predecessor institutions, St Luke's College, Exeter School of Science, Exeter School of Art, and the Camborne School of ...

and then earned her

M.A. A Master of Arts ( or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA or AM) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Those admitted to the degree have ...

from

Newnham College, Cambridge Newnham College is a women's constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college was founded in 1871 by a group organising Lectures for Ladies, members of which included philosopher Henry Sidgwick and suffragist campaigner Millicen ...

in 1926. While in graduate school, she worked with

Marjory Stephenson Marjory Stephenson (24 January 1885 – 12 December 1948) was a British biochemist. In 1945, she was one of the first two women elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, the other being Kathleen Lonsdale. She wrote ''Bacterial Metabolism'' (1930 ...

including work on the washed suspension technique, which had originated with

Louis Pasteur Louis Pasteur (, ; 27 December 1822 – 28 September 1895) was a French chemist, pharmacist, and microbiologist renowned for his discoveries of the principles of vaccination, Fermentation, microbial fermentation, and pasteurization, the la ...

, for extracting

enzyme An enzyme () is a protein that acts as a biological catalyst by accelerating chemical reactions. The molecules upon which enzymes may act are called substrate (chemistry), substrates, and the enzyme converts the substrates into different mol ...

s from bacteria. Whetham co-authored four scientific papers with Stephenson and held the Old Students Jubilee Research Fellowship in 1926–27. She married Dr. Alan Bruce Anderson, a clinical

pathologist Pathology is the study of disease. The word ''pathology'' also refers to the study of disease in general, incorporating a wide range of biology research fields and medical practices. However, when used in the context of modern medical treatme ...

, on 12 September 1927,Haines, p. 7 and had five children and sixteen grandchildren including Tiffany Margaret Hall.

Work

She abstracted scientific articles for several years before beginning to work as a freelance scientific indexer in 1960, creating indexes for 567 books over her career. Anderson joined the

Society of Indexers The Society of Indexers (SI) is a professional society of indexers based in the UK, with its offices in Sheffield, England, but has members worldwide. The society was established in 1957, while its quarterly journal, ''The Indexer'' has been pub ...

two years later and served as its treasurer, membership secretary, member of the board of assessors, and vice-president over the next several decades. She was awarded the Wheatley Medal by the Society in 1975 for her index to ''Copy-editing: The Cambridge Handbook''. Eight years later, the Society presented her with its Carey Award for "outstanding services to indexing".

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Anderson, Margaret 1900 births 1997 deaths British women biochemists 20th-century British biochemists 20th-century British women scientists Alumni of the University of Exeter Alumni of Newnham College, Cambridge Indexers