Lucy Millington

Lucy Ann Bishop Millington (June 10, 1825 – January 17, 1900) was an American self-taught botanist known for her discovery of Arceuthobium pusillum, a species of dwarf mistletoe that was damaging trees in New York State.[1]

Lucy Ann Millington
Born
Lucy A. Bishop

(1825-06-10)June 10, 1825
DiedJanuary 17, 1900(1900-01-17) (aged 74)
CitizenshipUnited States of America
Scientific career
Fieldsbotany

Early life and education

Born Lucy Bishop, she was the second child in a wealthy merchant family that owned several businesses in New Russia (now Elizabethtown), a town in the Adirondack region of New York.[2] Bishop was an autodidact, though she likely attended local schools.[1]

Career and research

Millington had a decades-long career in botany; her first notable publication was the 1871 discovery of A. pusillum.[3] She proceeded to publish a number of articles in popular science and contributed extensively to herbaria in New York. Throughout her career, she corresponded and collaborated with Charles Peck. She is commemorated alongside the rest of her family, with statues in their hometown.[1] She functioned as a mentor to Liberty Hyde Bailey, whom she first met in 1876, when she was already established and he an eighteen-year-old student interested in botany.[4]

References
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Lucy Millington.
  1. Creese, Mary R. S. (January 1, 2000). Ladies in the Laboratory? American and British Women in Science, 1800-1900: A Survey of Their Contributions to Research. Scarecrow Press. ISBN 9780585276847.
  2. Smith, Beatrice Sheer (January 1, 1992). "Lucy Bishop Millington, Nineteenth-century Botanist: Her Life and Letters to Charles Horton Peck, State Botanist of New York". Huntia: A Journal of Botanical History. 8 (2): 111–153.
  3. Bailey, Liberty Hyde (January 1, 1939). "Lucy Millington". Torreya; A Monthly Journal of Botanical Notes and News. 39: 159–163 – via Biodiversity Heritage Library.
  4. Tolley, Kim (2014). The Science Education of American Girls: A Historical Perspective. Taylor & Francis. pp. 115–117, 125. ISBN 9781135339272.
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