MARY ANNING

“Remember to look up at the stars and not down at your feet.” Memorable advice from Professor Stephen Hawking. Perhaps meant both metaphorically and literally. In a figurative sense, maybe an exhortation to remain optimistic and always curious. Consider the big picture, not merely the details of our humdrum lives.

The practical aspect reflects the professor’s outstanding contributions to astrophysics. Much has been learnt from scrutiny of the firmament. Powerful telescopes, some located in space, can now see farther across the universe, capturing information from inconceivable distances. As Ole Rømer deduced, light travels at a finite speed, meaning these telescopes are time machines: the more distant the object, the older it is. Images we now see are of bodies, stars or galaxies, that may no longer exist. We are viewing the past.

Meticulous observation, inspirational mathematics, and supercomputers enable us to roll history forwards and infer the future. New puzzles have been revealed, fixating the latest cohort of astronomers. Curiosity in action.

While the professor was probably right about not contemplating one’s feet too much, beneath them is a trove of knowledge, ready to bring our past to life.

Palaeontology is a relatively recent science, certainly by comparison with astronomy. Culturally, though, a popular field. Jurassic Park was either an instigator or a consequence. Its modern origins lie in the 19^th century, although earlier thinkers pondered the meaning of fossils. Leonardo da Vinci and Robert Hooke were two who mused on this. Their lives, centuries apart, are linked by insatiable curiosity.

The Father of Palaeontology is a title later bestowed on Georges Cuvier, a notable French scientist whose contributions extended to zoology and botany. While, to the present-day mind, there may be discomfort with some of his opinions, his scientific legacy was vital. In particular, vertebrate palaeontology, where he considered physical evidence, applied logic and ingenuity, and tried to relate extinct species to living animals.

The notion of extinction, a controversial idea in his day, was one he established. Global phenomena, catastrophic in nature, had destroyed entire species. Floods were a consistent rationale. He was among the first to suggest that, in an earlier epoch, the reptile, not the mammal, had been dominant. A baron and a philosopher, energetic, original, and provocative, Cuvier’s traits undoubtedly included curiosity.

From the subsequent generation, in another country, with dissimilar social circumstances, we find Mary Anning. Born in 1799 CE, in Dorset, on England’s south coast, the daughter of a carpenter. Her education was modest, largely obtained from the local church, a denomination that emphasised learning. The family pastor had written an essay promoting the study of geology, then a new science. This seems to have attracted her.

Political turmoil in France meant that English coastal resorts became preferred destinations for the better off. Her father, along with other locals, supplemented the family income by selling fossils found in the nearby coastal cliffs to these visitors. Mary, still a child, became an enthusiastic participant.

Difficult times ensued. The family, religious dissenters, were continually at risk of intolerance. Food prices rocketed, reflecting grain shortages arising from the revolutionary fervour across the channel. Then her father died, leaving the family impoverished and with debts. Mary, aged 11, with her brother and mother, focussed on fossils as a survival strategy. They worked hard, enjoyed some early successes, and subsisted. It would be an exaggeration to claim they prospered, but they gained a following among collectors.

In 1820 CE, one of their buyers, James Birch, was sufficiently distressed by the family’s condition that he decided to auction all his purchases from the Annings. A three-day event in London, attended by European buyers, had the effect of stabilising the family finances and raising their profile among geologists.

By 1826 CE, Mary had saved enough to buy a house with a shop window. A fossil emporium now existed. Invertebrates were common while vertebrates remained rare, sometimes riskier to extract from the unstable cliffs, but sold for more. She made important finds, including marine and flying reptiles, some displayed in the British Museum.

Her confidence grew. Despite little education, she read scientific papers. She dissected modern animals to gain an appreciation of anatomy. Such knowledge meant she understood the subject matter better than her wealthy, male counterparts. In the era, science was a field into which few women intruded, even less so if from a working-class background. Recognition that might otherwise have been due was withheld. The Geological Society of London, founded in 1807 CE, did not admit female Fellows until the 20^th century. So, while Mary’s ideas, insights, and discoveries were welcome, her presence less so.

Undaunted, she persevered, her finances rarely better than precarious. She corresponded with Charles Lyell and Adam Sedgewick, two founders of modern geological science, both later associated with Charles Darwin’s analyses and intuition.

William Buckland, another leading geologist of the period but also a friend, petitioned the government to award Mary an annuity, providing a modest level of security to an unusual, middle-aged, female scientist. Invariably, a diligent and devout woman.

Mary’s existence ended, aged just 47, in her native Lyme Regis. A stained-glass window in the local church, commissioned by members of the Geological Society, commemorates her life and influence.

Returning to the wisdom of Prof. Hawkings, his complete words were: “Intelligence is the ability to adapt. One, remember to look up at the stars and not down at your feet. Two, never give up work.”

Imaginative and assiduous, Mary Anning was such a person.