When I was but a wee lad, enrolled in my school district's gifted program, there was one teacher assigned to each major subject area therein. The Science teacher was Mrs. McCarthy. She gave us a brief grounding in many areas of science -- biology, chemistry, geology, botany -- but archaeology was her passion.

She brought back stories and artifacts from an excavation she took part in in Swaziland, she took us to a number of dig sites close to home and guided us through our own excavations, she was tireless in encouraging our own inquisitiveness and curiosity, she wrote a book about her experiences with my class and others, and she was my own inspiration for choosing never to stop learning.

She was my TrowelBlazer. Bless you, Gloria McCarthy, wherever you are.
posted by delfin at 1:10 PM on July 7, 2014 [7 favorites]

Just set my computer on fire sending out this link to every single woman geologist and paleontologist I've ever met. Already getting replies, which could be half divided into "This is the coolest thing ever!" and "I'll be in there someday!" Wheee! Thank-you, thank-you, brundlefly.

Awareness like this is so important. I can't overstate enough the influence of Mary Anning - on TrowelBlazers here - on me as a geologist. One of the greatest thrills of my life was seeing her Fossil Extractor -aka her rock hammer - at the Lyme Regis Museum, near her stomping grounds. I admit I cried. (I also named my own rock hammer Mary Anning, so she's always with me in spirit.) It's not just her dedication to her science and her trail-blazing on our profession that's inspiration- it's what she had to put up with as a woman and still keep on keepin' on. I have her picture above my microscope and look to it for encouragement whenever I experience some of the downsides of my profession. With a site like this, now I'm thinking I'll start an entire wall of inspiration.

This post made me so excited I had to go the bathroom like a little kid.
posted by barchan at 2:15 PM on July 7, 2014 [3 favorites]

I am so, so looking forward to reading through their archives.
posted by Lexica at 7:58 PM on July 7, 2014

Awwww yeahhhhhh lady archaeologists!!! (and fellow trowel-cousins!!)

What an awesome articles on an awesome set of people. Hooray for this! (My personal favorite, Hetty Goldman, gets a shout-out in this exhibit put on my my alma mater a while back-- it looks like the links may not all be active though.)
posted by jetlagaddict at 12:43 PM on July 8, 2014