I think it was around the year 2000 that I discovered the web site Faces of Science: African Americans in the Sciences. The project of research librarian Mitchell C. Brown, back then it was hosted on a server at Louisiana State University. Dr. Brown has moved around a bit since, but he has taken Faces of Science with him. I am so glad. It was a wonderful resource when I was teaching science and inspired me to make my own “Faces of Chemistry” poster wall in my classroom.
Today I would like to highlight one of the women scientists featured on Faces of Science and the young citizen scientists and environmental activists who are her spiritual heirs.
Marguerite Thomas Williams was the first African American, either male or female, to earn a PhD in geology. Born in Washington, D.C. in 1895, she was a teacher in the Washington, D.C. school district before getting a bachelor of arts degree from Howard University in 1923, where she was a protege of Ernest Everett Just. Williams went on to teach at Miners Teachers College serving as the chair of the division of geography.
She took a leave of absence from Miners to complete a masters degree in geology at Columbia University in 1930. In 1942 she earned a PhD in geology from Catholic University of America. The title of her dissertation was “A History of Erosion in the Anacostia River Basin”.
In her dissertation Dr. Williams concluded that in addition to natural erosion, human activities including deforestation, agriculture and urbanization accelerated the process.
The Anacostia has been called “the forgotten river”. Once a vibrant waterway whose name derives from a Nacotchtank word meaning village trading center, the Anacostia began to suffer in the early 1600s as European settlers cleared forests in the watershed to grow tobacco. The resulting erosion caused silt to build up to the point that by the mid 1800s it was no longer possible to use the Anacostia as a shipping channel. The river was abandoned.
Once settlers started clearing fields for agriculture—which led to heavy erosion and sedimentation—in the early 19th century, the river began to suffer. And its decline accelerated rapidly from the late 19th century to nearly the present day. As the Washington, D.C., area grew, urbanization claimed forest and wetland habitat, altered stream flows, and fed ever-increasing amounts of sewage and polluted runoff into the river.
Healing the Anacostia's Troubled Waters
Under the leadership of Dennis Chestnut from 2009 to 2017, Groundwork Anacostia River DC, began to involve community members in clean-up and environmental education, including Green Team training programs for high school students.
In 2017, Chestnut retired from GWARDC to work with the Anacostia Waterfront Trust. which is working to make
I’m not sure I believe that people “look down” on our earthly doings after they pass, but if they do, Dr. Williams must be pleased and proud, and if they do not it can still be said with certainty that her spirit lives on.
