Marie Stopes the palaeobotanist, Manchester and her adventures in Japan

Abstract

Marie Stopes is best known as a social reformer but before this she was a pioneering palaeobotanist. She was the first woman to be appointed to the scientific staff at Manchester University where she undertook research into coal fossils. Whilst at Manchester, she met Robert Falcon Scott where she showed him examples of Glossopteris fossils. Scott went on to collect fossils of this type on his fateful polar expedition in 1912. Scott's fossils later became a key piece of evidence for a 200 million year old super-continent. Marie undertook a research trip to Japan where she discovered the earliest recorded evidence of angiosperms. The significance of the events of her early life were fundamental in shaping her career and should not be underestimated.