Rachel Carson
1 book analyzed
Biography
Rachel Louise Carson was born May 27, 1907, in Springdale, Pennsylvania, on a 65-acre family farm. Her mother, Maria, instilled in her a deep love of nature and literature. Carson studied biology at the Pennsylvania College for Women (now Chatham University) and earned a master's degree in zoology from Johns Hopkins University in 1932 — an exceptional achievement for a woman in the sciences at that time. She worked as a marine biologist for the U.S. Bureau of Fisheries (later the Fish and Wildlife Service) from 1936 to 1952, eventually becoming editor-in-chief of all FWS publications. She published three books about the sea — Under the Sea-Wind (1941), The Sea Around Us (1951), and The Edge of the Sea (1955) — establishing herself as one of America's finest science writers. The Sea Around Us spent 86 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. Carson never married. She cared for her mother and, after the death of her niece, adopted her grandnephew Roger. She was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1960, underwent a radical mastectomy, and received radiation and chemotherapy while researching and writing Silent Spring. She kept her diagnosis secret from all but her closest friends, understanding that the chemical industry would use her illness to discredit the book. She died on April 14, 1964, at age 56, eighteen months after Silent Spring's publication. She did not live to see the DDT ban (1972) or the creation of the EPA (1970), both of which were direct consequences of her work. She was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1980.