Ella Hassett: Phyllis Clinch (1901 – 1984) Plant physiologist, cytologist

Published: Wednesday, May 20, 2015

In the fifth installment of NWCI's "Sharing Stories of Women in History" series, this week we will look at another woman in STEM, Phyllis Clinch, an award-winning scientist.

Phyllis Clinch was an award-winning Irish scientist and professor. Her research into potato viruses led the way for the creation of new virus free potato stocks in Ireland and abroad.

Clinch was born on the 12th of September 1901. Her education was extensive, beginning at Loreto School and progressing to University College Dublin. Here, she completed her BSc. in Botany and Chemistry, obtaining first class honours, which led to a postgraduate scholarship. She received her MSc. in 1924 and was awarded a research fellowship the following year by Dublin County Council. Between 1926 and 1928, she published several papers with Professor Joseph Doyle. This would form the basis of her PhD, which was awarded in 1928. During this time, she also attended Imperial College London, studying plant physiology under Professor V.H. Blackman, and in 1929, worked with Professor Guilliermond at the Sorbonne in Paris, researching Plant Cytology. Following these years of study Clinch’s expertise encompassed several different fields: Cytology, Chemistry, Botany and Plant Physiology. In 1929, she became a research assistant at the Plant Pathology Department in UCD.

Between 1932 and 1949 she collaborated on nine papers with Professor Paul A. Murphy and J.B. Loughnane and these were published in the Scientific Proceedings of the Royal Dublin Society. Her work was also published in the Department of Agriculture’s magazine Eire and the international scientific journal, Nature. In 1942, she was elected as a member of the Science Committee of the Royal Dublin Society (RDS). Her extensive research and publications about plant viruses from the early 1920s to the early 1940s earned her a D.Sc (Doctorate of Science) in 1943. The Royal Irish Academy (RIA), a male only forum since its inception, bowed to external pressure and allowed females to be elected to membership in 1931. Clinch and three other women were finally admitted in 1949 following the war. She was elected alongside Sheila Power, Associate Professor of Mathematical Physics (UCD); Francoise Henry, Art Historian and Archaeologist (UCD); and Eleanor Knott, Professor of Celtic Languages (Trinity College Dublin). She actively participated in the RIA for many years, becoming a council member in 1973 and Vice President between 1975 and 1977. In 1950, after transferring from the UCD Plant Pathology Department to Botany, she was appointed Professor of Botany.

Clinch’s work on plant viruses included diseases that affect potato, tomato and sugar beet plants. Her work on the potato plant, in particular, had both a national and international impact, as she identified several plant viruses, both with and without symptoms. The Department of Agriculture utilised her research to ultimately create virus-free stocks of potatoes which raised the standards of potato crops in Ireland and overseas. It was for these scientific findings that Clinch was awarded the highest honour of her career on the 18th of April 1961, the RDS Boyle Medal. This premier Irish scientific award was inaugurated in 1899 and there have only been two female recipients in its long history, Clinch in 1961 and Margaret Murnane in 2011. At the time of her award, the RDS said, “In awarding the Boyle Medal to Dr. Phyllis E.M. Clinch, the first woman to be awarded this honour, we can feel assured that her name is one fully worthy to be included the list of holders of the medal”.

Clinch passed away in Tenerife on the 19th of October 1984. Today she is remembered as a pioneering professor, an award-winning scientist on an international stage and a woman who contributed hugely to the agriculture and horticulture of Ireland.

Ella Hassett is a part time library assistant in Trinity College, Dublin, with a MPhil in Public History and Cultural Heritage, who devotes much of her time researching remarkable women in Irish history.

The views expressed in NWCI's Blog do not necessarily represent those of NWCI.

Bibliography
Clinch, P. (1961) “Award of the Boyle Medal to Phyllis E.M. Clinch” Scientific Proceedings of the Royal Dublin Society, Ser A, 1(7): 211-212
Cullen, C. Feely, O. (2011) The Building of the State: Science and Engineering with Government on Merrion Street, University College Dublin, available online at: http://www.ucd.ie/merrionstreet/download/the_building_of_the_state.pdf (Accessed: 28-3-2015)
“Ireland’s Greatest Woman Inventor finalist – Phyllis Clinch, tamer of viruses” Silicone Republic, available online at: http://www.siliconrepublic.com/innovation/item/33186-wit2013 (Accessed: 28-3-2015)
Ogilvy, M. Harvey, J. (2000) A Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science: A-K, Routledge
O’Halloran, C. (2011) “Better Without the Ladies” History Ireland, 19(16): 42-45
“Phyllis E.M. Clinch” Royal Dublin Society, available online at: http://www.rds.ie/index.jsp?a=788&n=245&p=182 (Accessed: 28-3-2015)