Doris Mable Cochran

Doris Mable Cochran
Cochran measuring a turtle shell
Born	(1898-05-18)May 18, 1898 North Girard, Pennsylvania
Died	May 22, 1968(1968-05-22) (aged 70) Hyattsville, MD
Nationality	American
Fields	Biology, herpetology
Institutions	Smithsonian Institution
Alma mater	George Washington University University of Maryland, College Park
Doctoral advisor	Leonhard Hess Stejneger
Known for	Study of reptiles, frogs
Notable awards	Distinguished Fellow of the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists

Doris Mable Cochran (May 18, 1898 – May 22, 1968) was an American herpetologist and custodian of the American Natural Collection at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. for many years.

Born in North Girard, Pennsylvania, she grew up in Washington after her father transferred there for a government job.

While an undergraduate student at George Washington University (A.B. 1920, M.S. 1921), she worked for the War Department and became Aide in the Division of Herpetology at the United States National Museum. Although the museum was under the curatorship of Leonhard Hess Stejneger, Cochran was responsible for the administration of the herpetological collections. In 1927 she became Assistant Curator and in 1942, Associate Curator just prior to Stejneger's death. She earned a Ph.D. at the University of Maryland in 1933 with a thesis on blue crab musculature. She became the first woman Curator in 1956 until her retirement in 1968 on her 70th birthday.

After completing studies at Corcoran Art School and developing her talents as an artist, Cochran became a scientific illustrator not only for her own works, but for those of her colleagues.

Cochran's research was focused primarily on the herpetofauna of the West Indies and South America, particularly Haiti. She published 90 taxonomic papers between 1922 and her death (four days after her retirement in 1968) in which she described eight new genera and 125 species and subspecies as well as wartime booklets for the military identifying venomous reptiles. Her 20 years of studies of the West Indies culminated in The Herpetology of Hispaniola in 1941. She visited Haiti twice, in 1935 and 1962-1963. In Haiti she would work with Adolpho Lutz and his daughter, Bertha.