Emma Lucy Braun
| E. Lucy Braun | |
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| Born |
April 19, 1889 Cincinnati, Ohio |
| Died | March 5, 1971 (aged 81) |
| Nationality | United States |
| Fields | Botanist, ecologist, and expert on Eastern US forests |
| Alma mater | University of Cincinnati |
| Notable awards | President of the Ecological Society of America and the Ohio Academy of Science; Ohio Conservation Hall of Fame; Mary Soper Pope medal in Botany, 1952; Certificate of Merit of the Botanical Society of America, 1956 |
| Author abbrev. (botany) | E.L.Braun |
| Notes | |
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Sister: Annette Braun
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E. Lucy Braun (April 19, 1889 – March 5, 1971) was a prominent botanist, ecologist, and expert on the forests of the eastern United States who was a professor of the University of Cincinnati. She was an environmentalist before the term was popularized, and a pioneering woman in her field, winning many awards for her work.
Emma Lucy Braun was born on April 19, 1889 in Cincinnati; she lived in Ohio for the remainder of her life. The daughter of George Frederick and Emma Moriah (Wright) Braun, her early interest in the natural world was encouraged by her parents, who took her and her older sister Annette Frances Braun into the woods to identify wildflowers. Braun's mother even had a small herbarium. In high school, Braun herself began collecting plants for study, the beginning of a huge personal herbarium that she assembled over her lifetime, composed of 11,891 specimens. Her collection is now a part of the herbarium at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington D.C.
In college, she studied botany and geology. She earned a PhD in botany and became the second woman to earn a PhD from the University of Cincinnati; her sister was the first. Braun went on to become an assistant in teaching both geology and biology, and eventually became professor emeritus of plant ecology at the University of Cincinnati. In 1948, she retired early from teaching, but only to more fully devote herself to her research and to various public service ventures. She also conducted extensive field studies with her sister who was an entomologist. They purchased a car in 1930 and used to travel around the East Coast, studying the environment. Braun took hundreds of photographs of the natural flora. These field studies mainly focused on the flora of the Appalachian Mountains and in Adams County, Ohio and largely contributed to her most famous book. Braun and her sister encountered moonshiners during their field studies, although they never turned anyone in, and became friends with the locals in order to explore the forests. They set up a laboratory and experimental garden at their shared home; she was never married. Braun also fought to conserve natural areas and set up nature reserves, particularly in her home state. She died in her home at age 81 of congestive heart failure, and is buried in Cincinnati with her parents and sister.
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