“Take Five” with Historian and Philosopher of Biology Jane Maienschein
"Take Five" is an occasional feature in which we pose five questions to a Marine Biological Laboratory community member about their career, dreams, and passions. Here we profile historian and philosopher of biology Jane Maienschein, University Professor at Arizona State University.
Over several decades, Maienschein’s contributions to MBL scholarship have been prodigious. She directs the MBL History Project; co-directs the History of Biology Seminars that have been held at MBL for 35 years; edits the Convening Science: Discovery at the Marine Biological Laboratory book series published by UChicago Press; co-directs the McDonnell Initiative at MBL, which pairs scientists and historians to inform each other’s work; and authored a history of the MBL: 100 Years Exploring Life, 1888-1988: The Marine Biological Laboratory At Woods Hole.
Maienschein is the recipient of the 2024 Sarton Medal from the History of Science Society, the most prestigious award the society annually bestows.
When and why did you first come to the MBL, and what were your impressions? What made you want to come back?
Well, who wouldn't want to come back? I came in 1976 for the first time because I had my first National Science Foundation (NSF) grant. I was a graduate student and it was a dissertation grant to come here and reproduce old experiments, using old lab equipment. I do history of developmental biology, so a lot of the people I was studying did their work at MBL. I got a little grant to sit in a lab in Lillie with old equipment and have old scientists come by and say, “No, that's not the way T.H. Morgan would have done it.” It was phenomenal. And everybody adopted me because they thought it was so cute or weird or whatever. All the courses took me on their field trips, and it was great. I loved it.
I started coming back regularly in 1987. The MBL’s centennial was in 1988 and the year before, then-director Paul Gross said, “I'd like to start a History of Biology course at MBL, and I'd like the first event of the centennial celebration to be that course.” He invited Garland Allen, who was the premiere historian of biology, and Gar said, “Okay, but can I do it with somebody else?” And then Gar asked me. The two of us started the course and ran it for years, and then other people came in to co-lead it as well. We're still doing it, 35 years later.
You have authored much scholarship on the history of the MBL, which was founded in 1888. Are there particular eras at MBL that you feel were pivotal, in a way that still resonates today?
Scientifically, early on, the work on cells and development was really important. It was pivotal the way the MBL brought together research across heredity, development, and cell studies using excellent microscopy equipment and techniques. The MBL encouraged everybody not to specialize too much and to draw on multiple kinds of work. Thomas Hunt Morgan, for instance, came to the MBL every summer to study development in many organisms and later, when he became known as a geneticist, he continued coming to the MBL.
Early on, there was also interest in animal behavior and neurobiology. The first small Neurobiology course was in 1896, but it didn't really take off until much later. Neurobiology became extremely important, of course, in ways that continue to this day. So scientifically, the MBL has carried some traditional fields forward while also adding new questions and new ways of studying them.
Microscopy has been important from the very beginning. It was important to the MBL to have the best available equipment. And representatives of microscope companies like Zeiss have come to MBL in the summer and brought their latest equipment with them. It's not a moment in time, exactly, but a phenomenon that has been very influential on the kinds of work done.
Another phenomenon that's probably most important is the inclusion of women. A lot of women came to MBL at the very beginning—and then in the 1920s and ‘30s [their numbers dropped], and World War II brought all kinds of changes in who could come spend a summer doing research. But then by the ‘40s and ‘50s, a lot of women came here and found a comfortable place to do research, whereas before, they weren't getting a job, or they were in their husband's lab, or they were in a teaching college where they couldn’t do research. This was a place they could come and be taken seriously. If they were doing valuable work, it was recognized, it was embraced.
If you could invite three MBL scientists or community members (living or past) to dinner, who would you choose and what would you talk about?
I would pick E.B. Wilson (1856-1939) first. Wilson was a cell biologist, embryologist, apparently a wonderfully nice man, and an excellent cellist. So you get a lot of things in one person, there. I would like to talk to him about how he did his work.
The others would be Cornelia Clapp and Ernest Everett Just, because they were both clearly talented scientists who did interesting work, but clearly could have done so much more. So I would like to know: What was life like for them? What kept them from doing the work that they each said they really wanted to do?
Cornelia Clapp—now with an MBL auditorium named for her—came to Woods Hole every year; she did research on toadfish and other embryos at MBL. She taught at Mount Holyoke during the year and brought her students here, but while at Mount Holyoke, she didn't have a way to do much research. Career options for a woman in the early 20th century kept her from doing as much as she would have liked. She mostly didn't publish her later work, but she continued her research at MBL. What was she doing when she was at MBL after the first years, and was still working in the lab but not publishing it?
And then for Just, what was it like at the MBL? What was it like in other places he spent time? He commented often that as a Black man, he couldn't find a comfortable place in the scientific world despite going off to Europe and later coming back to the U.S. Clearly it was difficult for him in a lot of ways. I would love to talk to him about what was making him feel excluded and what we could do to change things. Talking to Wilson, Clapp, and Just could help get insight into what it is that makes people feel included or excluded. We all talk about inclusion these days, but what did that feel like to people who we know in hindsight were really talented?
What impact has your affiliation with the MBL had on your career or life?
There are just so many things about the MBL, and what makes it the MBL. Every year you meet new people and hear about new ideas and new ways of doing science. Watching the old classics die away is really sad too, though. Now, a lot of people who were great and were always here, Gerry Weissmann and others, are not here anymore.
For me, there’s also the personal part: MBL is a place where I can get out of Arizona in the summer and come be cool, be outdoors, and interact with so many interesting people doing so many intriguing things. It's such a welcoming place where I can go in the archives and library and write stuff and have a great time.
Aside from the personal things, there’s a practical side. At one point, a prior MBL director invented this category called MBL Fellow, and I was named one. Being listed as a Fellow really helps me get NSF grants, for example—and we've gotten quite a few, probably $2.5 million in grants that I brought to the MBL. The work is all related to the MBL, so I wouldn’t get the funding anyplace else. And my amazing president Michael Crow at Arizona State University says, “Go do your work at MBL. It has good impact, you’re reaching a lot of people, you’re taking grad students with you, keep doing it.”
Outside of your work, what are your passions?
What is work? Mostly I do what others might call “work” all the time and enjoy it. I love teaching. I try to facilitate opportunities for other people. I see people like MBL Director of Research Anne Sylvester—I think she's phenomenally wonderful, because she's constantly helping other people figure out how to navigate things and making the world easier and better for their work and careers. It's inspiring. I admire that, and I try to do that. I also love working with the MBL Library staff, Jen Walton and Matt Person and Samantha Porter, who are so helpful and get engaged in projects. Most recently, Safety Officer Eric Jensen has been working with our history team making truly inspiring videos, which will be coming soon to a theater near you (probably the Cornelia Clapp Auditorium).
But I do take two vacations a year: one week to Santa Fe for the opera and food, and one week to the Tetons for hiking and food. But mostly, it's just continuing to do research and writing and thinking, along with other people. That isn’t really work.