1. Desirae Starr Decoo
Mary Fairfax Somerville
On Dec 26, 1780 Mary Fairfax was born in Scotland.
Mary Somerville is the fifth child of an Irish Vice-Admiral
Sir William Fairfax. She was raised in Scotland and at ten
years old her father sent her to an expensive boarding
school named, the Miss Primrose School. When she came back
from school she had the ability to read, write and speak in
English and also a small amount of French.
Mary Fairfax Somerville was one of the first women to
research outer space. According to the website, Women in
European History, Somerville conducted and published a
study on magnetism. The paper and her later writing
earned her admission into the Royal Society in 1835. This
society was all male and she was one of the first women
admitted. While the Royal Society had at no point been
officially closed to learned women, when Somerville was
admitted in, it showed that were not treated equally and
there were inequalities in the access of education.
Mary Somerville's life was a special and important one
not only because she a female who was involved in
mathematics and science in the early 1800’s but, because of
her research on space Mary Somerville inspired many women
in her time because of her accomplishments. She showed
everyone that females can succeed at high goals. Somerville
also changed the life of women forever by changing the
definition of a “man’s job” to everybody can achieve what
they believe in.