Leila Clark

Leila Gay Forbes Clark (1887-1964) was an entomologist and librarian at the Smithsonian Institution.[1] She was the second woman to direct the Smithsonian's library.[1] Prior to her work at the Smithsonian, she worked as a librarian at Wellesley College, Randolph-Macon Woman's College, and the US Department of Agriculture.[2] She joined the Smithsonian in 1929 and spent the rest of her career there becoming director in 1942. During her tenure she oversaw the merger of the main Smithsonian Library with the U.S. National Museum Library which resulted in the centralized Smithsonian Libraries system currently in place.[3]

Leila Clark
Occupation(s)librarian, entomologist

She and her husband went on frequent butterfly expeditions and coauthored The Butterflies of Virginia in 1951. A new form of golden banded-skipper, Autochton cellus leilae, was named for her by her husband.[4]

Personal life

Clark was born in Canton, New York to Henry Prentiss Forbes and Harriet E. Wood.[1] She received a B.S. from Saint Lawrence University in 1908.[1] She married Austin Hobart Clark on September 23, 1933.[5]

References
  1. Henson, Pamela (2018-03-13). ""Muse of Scientific Literature": Leila Forbes Clark". Smithsonian Institution Archives. Retrieved 2019-03-31.
  2. Cornelius, Roberta (2011). The History of Randolph-Macon Woman's College : From the Founding in 1891 Through the Year of 1949-1950. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 978-0-8078-6968-0. OCLC 830170838.
  3. "Leila Clark Appointed Director the Smithsonian Library". Smithsonian Institution Archives. 2018-04-06. Retrieved 2019-03-31.
  4. "Austin Hobart Clark". The Lepidopterists' News. 9 (4–5): 154. 1955. Retrieved 31 March 2019.
  5. "Alumni News". Harvard Alumni Bulletin, Volume 36. No. 5. 1933.


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