Jean Langenheim

Jean H. Langenheim
Langenheim in 1962 at Harvard University
Born	Jean Harmon (1925-09-05)September 5, 1925 Homer, Louisiana
Died	March 28, 2021(2021-03-28) (aged 95) Santa Cruz, California
Nationality	American
Alma mater	University of Minnesota (Ph.D., 1953; M.S., 1949) Mills College Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory
Thesis	Vegetation and environmental patterns in the Crested Butte Area, Gunnison County, Colorado
Doctoral advisor	William Skinner Cooper

Jean H. Langenheim (née Harmon; September 5, 1925 – March 28, 2021

Langenheim was born in Homer, Louisiana in 1925 and grew up in Tulsa, Oklahoma. She graduated from Tulsa Central High School in 1943.^[7]

Langenheim received a Bachelor of Science degree in biology from the University of Tulsa (UT) in 1946.^[8] She was the first woman student body president at UT.^[9] She earned her Master of Science in 1949 and PhD in 1953, both in botany with a minor in geology from the University of Minnesota.^[8][5] Her PhD advisor was leading plant ecologist W.S. Cooper, who went against university policy to sponsor her as a doctoral student; at the time, women could pursue up to a Master's degree.^[10] Her dissertation was entitled, "Vegetation and environmental patterns in the Crested Butte Area, Gunnison County, Colorado " and was subsequently published in Ecological Monographs.^[11]

Career and legacy

Langenheim has conducted interdisciplinary research across five continents in the fields of plant ecology, paleobotany, and ethnobotany. She has conducted field work in the western United States, Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, Australia, New Zealand, Angola, Kenya, Ghana, and the Amazon rainforest.^[7] Her work has spanned the fields of botany, geology, and chemistry and included research on tropical plants, redwoods, and Pacific coast plants. She is known internationally for her research and is considered a trailblazer in plant sciences and ecology, and a pioneer for women in the field.^[2][10] She began her career at a time when opportunities for women in sciences were limited. In the introduction to her memoir, The Odyssey of a Woman Field Scientist, she recounts:

"I lived through the period of being the token woman in numerous situations; I was not an activist fighting on the front lines, so to speak, but tried to demonstrate the capability of women through my own hard work and accomplishments." ^[3][12]

She was the first female faculty member in the natural sciences at the University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC) when she joined the faculty in 1966, and the first woman at the university to be promoted to full professor when she became Chair of the biology department in 1973.^[2][12][5] She was an advisor or co-advisor for 41 graduate students during her time on the faculty.^[13] She taught undergraduate and graduate classes at UCSC from 1966-1994, retired from the university officially in 1994, but continued to advise graduate students as emerita faculty until 2009 and remain active in research, the university community, and scientific societies.^{[2][12][10][7]}

Langenheim was the first woman to serve as president for the Association for Tropical Biology (now the Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation) in 1985 and second woman to serve as president for the

Langenheim joined the faculty of UCSC in 1966, one year after the campus was established. She was a founding member of the Adlai E. Stevenson College, where she lived as the faculty preceptor for several years, and helped develop the graduate programs at the university. Her botany course, co-taught with plant physiologist Kenneth Thimann, was "highly popular because of the way it related plants to human affairs"^[10] and led to publication of a textbook in 1982 entitled Botany: Plant Biology and Its Relation to Human Affairs. She also taught graduate courses in tropical and chemical ecology and the history of ecological concepts.^[15][10] She was a visiting professor at Harvard and the Universidade de Pará in Brazil in 1974, and served as Chair of the biology department at UCSC from 1974-1976.^[14]

Plant resins and amber

Langenheim is well known for her more than 40 years investigating plant resins and amber. Her research on plant resins spans from the chemistry, geologic history, and ecological role to their uses throughout human history. In 1961, she began conducting research at

Langenheim has a history of philanthropic giving to UCSC. In 2004, she established the Jean H. Langenheim Graduate Fellowship in Plant Ecology and Evolution with an endowment gift of $200,000, to support students studying terrestrial plant ecology and evolution.[13] When she published her memoir in 2010, all royalties from sales of the book were donated to the fellowship endowment. She also donated copies of her memoir to the UCSC Arboretum gift shop, with proceeds from sales going to support the Arboretum.^[3]

In 2006, she established the Jean H. Langenheim Endowed Chair in Plant Ecology and Evolution with a gift of $350,000 to the university "to support and encourage research and teaching in the area of terrestrial plant ecology and evolution, including studies of human impacts on plants, such as global warming, introduction of invasive plants, and ecosystem destruction."^[17]

Documenting women's contributions to ecology

In 1986, Langenheim began a project to document the careers, experiences, and accomplishments of other women contemporaries in ecology. She started the project because she was the second woman president of ESA at the time, and wanted to highlight the accomplishments of other women in the field:

"Since there have been so few women officers, and I was the only woman president, except E. Lucy Braun, I decided that I would do my Presidential Address on the history of women’s contributions to ecology. This would not only ”educate” many, but would also provide the opportunity to give tribute to the accomplishments of women, and to many who have remained essentially “invisible” (and hence unrecognized)." ^[6]

The project took two years, with surveys received from 55 women ecologists, and culminated in a speech to ESA members entitled "The Path and Progress of American Women Ecologists", which was subsequently published in the ESA Bulletin in December 1988. In 1996, she contacted colleagues again as an update to this project, with a focus on women's research contributions. The results of this second survey were published in the Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics in 1996 in an article entitled "Early History and Progress of Women Ecologists: Emphasis Upon Research Contributions". Her work to document the careers and accomplishments of women in ecology made her the ESA de facto expert on the subject, and created a rich history, commentary, and legacy of women in ecology.^[6] ESA's efforts to document women's contributions to the field continue today based on her work in their "Women in Ecology Series."^[18]

Honors and awards

• 1967 Elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science^[5]
• 1972 Cooley Award from the American Society of Plant Taxonomists^[14]
• 1973 Elected Fellow to California Academy of Sciences^[19][20]
• 1974-76 Chair, UCSC biology department^[14]
• 1975-77 Academic vice president, Organization for Tropical Studies^[5][4]
• 1979 University of Tulsa Distinguished Alumna Award^[9][5]
• 1981 Fellow of the Institute of Advanced Studies, Research School of Biology, Australian National University^[14]
• 1985 President, Association for Tropical Biology (now the Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation)^[14]
• 1986-87 President, Ecological Society of America^[11][14]
• 1986-87 Founder and President, International Society of Chemical Ecology^[2][14]
• 1993-94 President,
  Society for Economic Botany^[14]
• 2004 California Botanical Society dedicated its 2004 volume of the journal Madroño to her^[21]
• 2006 Centennial Award from the Botanical Society of America for "contributions to the advancement of the plant sciences"^[9][5]
• 2006 Fellows Medal of the California Academy of Sciences for "decades of excellence in contribution to the advancement of science and to the life of this institution"^[19][22]
• 2011 Sigma Delta Epsilon (Graduate Women in Science) national honorary membership^[23][14]
• 2012 Elected Fellow of the Ecological Society of America^[5]

Selected works

Langenheim has published over 130 scientific papers, book chapters, and several books,^[7][14] including:

• Jean H. Langenheim. 1962. Vegetation and Environmental Patterns in the Crested Butte Area, Gunnison County, Colorado. Ecological Monographs. Vol. 32, Iss. 3, pp. 249–285.^[24]
• Jean H. Langenheim. 1969. Amber: A Botanical Inquiry. Science. Vol. 163, No. 3872, pp. 1157–1169.^[25]
• Langenheim, J. H., Thimann, K. V. 1982. Botany: Plant Biology and Its Relation to Human Affairs. United Kingdom: Wiley. 624 pp.
• Jean H. Langenheim. 1988. Address of the Past President: Davis, California, August 1988: The Path and Progress of American Women Ecologists. Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America. Vol. 69, No. 4, pp. 184–197.^[26]
• Jean H. Langenheim. 1996. Early History and Progress of Women Ecologists: Emphasis Upon Research Contributions. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics. Vol. 27, pp. 1–53.^[27]
• Jean H. Langenheim. 2003. Plant Resins: Chemistry, Evolution, Ecology, and Ethnobotany. Timber Press, Oregon. 586 pp.
• Memoir and biography: Jean H. Langenheim. 2010. The Odyssey of a Woman Field Scientist: A Story of Passion, Persistence, and Patience. Xlibris. 539 pp. https://books.google.com/books?id=IjNWRwAACAAJ

External links

• Society for Economic Botany
• Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation
• International Society of Chemical Ecology
• Ecological Society of America Women in Ecology Series

References