Healthy World, Healthy Lives:

Posted By: Mark Smith

J. BonasiaTue Mar 21, 7:00 PM ET

Except for Ellen Swallow Richards.

Richards (1842-1911) refused to be limited by that mind-set. Through hard work and patient resolve, she built a groundbreaking career in chemistry, public sanitation and nutrition, and co-founded one of the world's most renowned centers for marine biology.

Known also as the "woman who founded ecology," Richards' studies of air, water and food quality resulted in the establishment of early public health standards.

As she mastered each new discipline, she connected the subtle relationships between diverse fields.

Throughout her prolific career, Richards applied one unifying insight to everything she encountered: She realized that scientific principles could greatly improve homemaking tasks that were a central role for women of her time.

Richards' tireless work drew attention to the crucial links between families, societies and their shared environments.

"The environment that people live in is the environment they learn to live in, respond to and perpetuate," she said. "If the environment is good, so be it. But if it is poor, so is the quality of life within it."

Richards became a role model for generations of female scientists and activists.

Ellen Henrietta Swallow was born an only child to poor schoolteacher parents in Dunstable, Mass., in 1843. She was home-schooled until age 16, when the family moved to nearby Westford, where Ellen would attend Westford Academy.

Young Ellen was blessed with parents who heartily supported their daughter's studies, said Ken Tebbetts, former president of the Westford Historical Society.

"They even sold their farm and moved to get her the best possible education," Tebbetts said.

Once she finished at Westford, Ellen was hungry to keep learning -- but her parents were out of funds. So she taught, tutored and cleaned to help them and earn money for more schooling. Finally, at age 25, she'd saved $300 to enroll at Vassar College, one of the nation's first schools for women. Once there she delved into meaty subjects, showing a gift for astronomy and chemistry.

Officials at Massachusetts Institute of Technology learned of Swallow's academic prowess and invited her to study. Soon she became the first female student at the prestigious institute. By 1873, she earned bachelor degrees from both Vassar and MIT, and a master's degree in mineralogy from Vassar.

Despite her credentials, Swallow was unable to find work as an industrial chemist because she was a woman. In addition, MIT had waived her tuition fees. At first she thought that exemption was a form of financial aid. She later learned she'd been deemed a "special student" who never actually enrolled to avoid any controversies over admitting a woman.

But she didn't let it stop her from pursuing scientific research, said Sarah Simon, a 1972 engineering graduate of MIT and former archivist for the Association of MIT Alumni: "She was a model for getting science into the world to help everyone, both men and women."

In 1875, Swallow married Robert Richards, a professor in MIT's mining engineering department. He was very supportive of his wife's goals. The pair teamed up on many studies of metal ores. Robert Richards later revealed that MIT discouraged his wife from pursuing a doctorate. The administration didn't want a woman to be awarded MIT's first Ph.D. in chemistry.

However, Mrs. Richards was charged with setting up a new Women's Laboratory at MIT. The facility was launched to promote women in the sciences, especially chemistry.

Richards was again penalized for her gender, taking the new job without pay. She even donated $1,000 per year of her own funds to finance the project. But it paid off. By 1883, MIT had launched an official policy to admit women.

Eager for challenges, Richards began work the next year at a new MIT lab for sanitation chemistry. This time, she requested -- and got -- a full salary. She also was hired by the Massachusetts Board of Health to study state water quality.

As it was the first research of its kind, Richards made sure it was painstakingly thorough. She and her team of MIT students took 20,000 water samples from lakes, rivers and streams. Each sample was logged, analyzed and compared, and all observations about it were carefully recorded.

The team's findings prompted the state legislature to pass new water quality standards. Massachusetts soon built the nation's first modern sewage treatment plant, in the city of Lowell.

Richards' research showed that contaminated water, air, food and soil could make people sick. To reach others with her findings, she devoted herself to a movement based on this notion of domestic science -- which came to be known as home economics.

In one speech, Richards noted that the quality of life depends on "the ability of society to teach its members how to live in harmony with their environment -- defined first as the family, then the community, then the world and its resources."

In 1892, Richards introduced the word "ecology" to the English language, based on a term coined by a German scientist for "the household of nature." Keenly aware of the role of the oceans in human existence, Richards urged further exploration and study of the sea and its creatures. To house such study, she helped found the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, which is the largest independent research institution of its kind.

To put her ideas into motion, Richards organized conferences. She set up a new Center for Right Living at MIT so students could test firsthand the theories of nutrition and domestic efficiency. She developed the New England Kitchen, which focused on improving basic knowledge about cooking and health, and cranked out numerous books and articles as well.

During the last decade of her life, Richards earned a great deal of money through speaking deals, writing and consulting. Yet she remained committed to helping others. When she died of congestive heart failure at age 68 in Jamaica Plains, Mass., she left no estate. Lawyers found that she'd given all her money away.

Courtesy Of: Yahoo! News

The information reported above is property of Yahoo! inc. and reprinted or modified with legitimate permission. We thank Yahoo! inc. for the kind cooperation with us and other shareholders.