Career
Burbidge started studying astronomy in 1936, at University College, London, was graduated in 1939 and received her Ph.D. at University College in 1943. She was turned down for a Carnegie Fellowship in 1945 because this fellowship would have meant that she would have had to observe at Mount Wilson observatory, which was reserved only for men at that time.
In 1950, she applied for a grant at the Yerkes Observatory in Williams Bay, Wisconsin, and went to the United States in 1951. She returned to England in 1953 and started research in collaboration with her husband Geoffrey Burbidge, Fred Hoyle, and William Alfred Fowler. The resulting theory was called the B2FH theory after the participants.
After ten years, in 1955, she finally gained access to the Mount Wilson Observatory, posing as her husband's assistant. When the management found out, they eventually agreed that she could stay, if she and her husband went to live in a separate cottage on the grounds, rather than staying in the men's dormitory.
Her 1972 directorship of the Royal Greenwich Observatory was also the first time in 300 years that that directorship was not associated with the post of the Astronomer Royal, which was given to radio astronomer and later, Nobel prize winner Martin Ryle instead. She left this post in 1974, fifteen months after accepting it, when controversy broke out over moving the telescope in the Observatory to a more useful location.
Experiences such as these turned Burbidge into one of the foremost and most influential personalities in the fight to end discrimination against women in astronomy. Consequently, in 1972 she turned down the Annie J. Cannon Award of the American Astronomical Society because it was awarded to women only: "It is high time that discrimination in favor of, as well as against, women in professional life be removed". Twelve years later the Society awarded her its highest honor, regardless of gender, the Henry Norris Russell Lectureship.
In 1978, she becaume a Jury member for The Rolex Awards for Enterprise, one of two from the United States; Luis Marden being the other; 2 from France, Derek Jackson and Jacquest Piccard, and one from Switzerland, Olivier Reerdin. The 1978 laureates were Luc Jean-Francois Debecker of France, Billy Lee Lasley of the United States, Kenneth Lee Martin of Ethieopia, and Francine Patterson also from the United States.
In 1976, she became president of the American Astronomy society. In 1977, she became a United States citizen. In 1983 she was elected president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science; she also has served as vice-president and president of the American Astronomical Society.
In 2003, Burbidge was inducted into the Women's Museum of California Hall of Fame honoring her career and achievements.
Read more about this topic: Margaret Burbidge
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