Ida Henrietta Hyde

Born on 8 September 1857 in Davenport, Iowa, Ida Henrietta Hyde was one of the first female physiologists, a champion for women scientists, and the inventor of the microelectrode. The daughter of German immigrants, Hyde grew up in Chicago. Forced to leave school at a young age, she went to work as a milliner’s apprentice. By age 24, she was able to attend one year of college at the University of Illinois and became a teacher in the Chicago public school system. In 1889 Hyde enrolled at Cornell University, earning her bachelor’s degree in biology in 1891. In 1893 she was afforded the opportunity to study in Germany through an Association of Collegiate Alumnae fellowship. Because Germany’s universities did not yet admit women, Hyde was forbidden to attend lectures and lab sessions. At Heidelberg University, she studied the assistant’s lecture notes and worked independently. Despite multiple hurdles and delays, she managed to be given the official examination and received her doctorate in 1896. Thus Hyde became the first woman to receive a doctorate in science at Heidelberg, and the third American woman to receive a doctorate in Germany. She was invited to do research at the Zoological Station in Naples, Italy, and then at Harvard Medical School, where she was the first woman ever allowed to do so. In 1897 Hyde helped found the Naples Table Association for Promoting Scientific Research by Women. Over her career she would also endow several scholarships for women science students. In 1898, at age 41, Hyde moved to the University of Kansas, with which she would remain associated until her retirement in 1920. There, she helped found the physiology department and served as its first chair, wrote two textbooks on physiology, and invented a novel microelectrode that could both stimulate cells and record their electrical activity. She became a specialist in the physiology of both invertebrates and vertebrates. In 1902 Hyde became the first woman to be elected to the American Physiological Society. She died in 1945 at age 87. (Photo courtesy of American Physiological Society)

Date in History: 8 September 1857