mental bacteriologists were concerned with the improvement of methods of processing, and the research bacteriologists, with new products and new uses of old ones. Heads of laboratories supervised routine testing or such projects as virus research or virus production.

In Government, except in military service, job opportunities did not expand to the same extent that they did in industry. The Federal Civil Service Commission reported no marked change in the demand for bacteriologists in Government until late in the war, when they were needed in greater numbers to test new drugs. Women bacteriologists were employed only in small numbers in a few Government agencies. Among these were the Chemical Corps and the Office of the Quartermaster General of the War Department, the Fish and Wildlife Service in the Department of the Interior, the Department of Agriculture, the United States Public Health Service, which also sent bacteriologists to State and territorial laboratories, and the Food and Drug Administration. Only in the last mentioned was there any appreciable expansion caused by the new antibiotic drugs (substances produced from cultures of micro-organisms and used in the treatment of bacterial diseases). For example, the wartime controls which required that all penicillin must meet the Food and Drug Administration's tests and the law, effective in 1945, bringing penicillin under the inspection and regulation of the Administration increased the need for bacteriologists in the laboratory.

In fact, most of the women bacteriologists taken on during the war by the Food and Drug Administration were testing penicillin, streptomycin, and other new antibiotic drugs. However, a few tested foods suspected in connection with food poisoning cases or the sterility of surgical dressings, ampoule drugs, and other products, the safe use of which depends on freedom from bacterial contamination.

Both the Women's Army Corps and the WAVES used the services of bacteriologists during the war. Thirty women bacteriologists commissioned as WAC officers and 84 as WAVES officers were assigned to active duty as bacteriologists. More than 1,500 enlisted women were trained in these services to work as medical laboratory technicians who assisted physicians, bacteriologists, and other scientists in the laboratory by performing routine duties. A report on the outlook for medical laboratory technicians has already been published by the Women's Bureau (42).

Research foundations and university research projects were another source of employment for bacteriologists during the war. Women bacteriologists worked at the Rockefeller Institute, for example, on special war research and at various universities on projects subsidized since 1944 by the United States Public Health Service through grants-in-aid.

In January 1944, nearly three-fifths of the 220 graduate students in bacteriology and more than four-fifths of the undergraduates in the United States were women (40). There was almost no change in the total number of undergraduate degrees in all the biological sciences, including bacteriology, between 1941-42 and 1943-44. In both academic years there were about 4,600. But the percentage awarded to women increased slightly from 43 percent to a little more than half (43) (44).

At the doctorate level, however, losses were suffered during the war. The total number of doctor's degrees awarded in bacteriology and microbiology fell from a high of 71 in 1941 to 49 in 1944 (11). No figures are available on the proportion of women among those receiving Ph. D.'s. Fragmentary statistics from a few schools show no discernible increase in the number of women who took graduate work during the war, although more assistantships were available to women because of the scarcity of men.

Earnings and Advancement

Before the war, bacteriologists with a bachelor's degree usually started at a salary of $1,200-$2,000 per year; the latter was the beginning rate in the Federal service (35). The 1947 starting rate as a bacteriologist at the beginning professional grade in the Federal Civil Service was $2,644 per year. In the Middle Atlantic States, the starting rate in 1947 in industry for bacteriologists with a bachelor's degree

was reported by an industry spokesman to be about $2,700, for those with a master's, $3,000, and for Ph. D.'s, $4,200. As late as 1945 college placement bureaus reported that starting salaries in public health laboratories were usually under $2,000 a year and that most beginning medical laboratory jobs paid about $1,500-$1,600 annually.

In 1947 the annual salaries of 148 women employed in bacteriology were reported in a questionnaire study, the results of which have been made available by the Society of American Bacteriologists. Twentyeight of the women were technicians or combined study with their work. Two had no degree. But 118 were employed entirely in professional work. The range of their salaries and the median salaries by type of employment and academic degree are shown in table 6. The median salary for the entire group was $3,400, although salaries ranged from $1,800 to $6,000. Both median and top salaries were higher for the 75 percent having graduate degrees.

Table 6. Annual Salaries of 118 Women Bacteriologists in Professional Positions, by Type of Employment and Highest Academic Degree Held, 1947

1 Exclusive of research in industry or in government and hospital laboratories. Source: Earnings data from a 1947 questionnaire study made available by the Society of American Bacteriologists. In this study, the proportion of women with higher degrees is considerably higher than that among all women trained in bacteriology.

There were substantial differences in the average salaries received by women in different types of work. Although the teaching and research group contained by far the largest proportion of the women with doctorates, this group was the lowest paid. Higher salaries were paid in industry, in which only a few persons held the doctorate. Highest salaries were reported by women employed in government and hospital laboratories.

These 118 women bacteriologists averaged between $3,000 and about $4,100 per year, except for those few within the teaching and research group who had no more than the bachelor's degree, who averaged

only $2,500, usually for an academic year of 9 months. These figures substantiate the Ohio State Employment Service report that a reasonable expectation of earnings for an average experienced bacteriologist is $3,000-$4,000 a year (16).

In spite of the relatively large number of women in bacteriology, most of the higher positions are held by men (46). Although a number of women are engaged in research jobs and become group leaders, only a few are heads of laboratories. Those who serve in this capacity are more likely to be found in industry than in a medical laboratory, where a male physician is often in charge, although some State departments of health are headed by women. There are many women instructors of bacteriology, but few women head bacteriology departments in colleges and universities. Evidently advancement is slow for women scientists, even in those sciences in which they form a significantly large proportion. However, the 1947 meeting of the Society of American Bacteriologists, at which 68 women were among the 430 who presented papers, afforded ample evidence of the professional achievements or contributions of women bacteriologists.

Organizations

The chief professional organization is the Society of American Bacteriologists, organized in 1899 with 57 members (47). In 1947 there were over 3,000 members, of whom about one-fourth were women. There are no special' requirements for membership except interest in bacteriology, although most of the members are engaged in bacteriological or related work. Two women have served as presidents. One, who held office in 1928, worked at the National Institute of Health and is noted for her work in brucellosis (an animal disease that occurs in cattle, hogs, and goats and, when transmitted to humans, is commonly known as undulant fever). The other, who served as president in 1943, carried on studies that have led to an orderly grouping of streptococci, so that potentially pathogenic strains may be readily recognized and their significance in causing epidemics may be investigated; her immuno-chemical studies have been far reaching. She is now a member of the staff of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research. There are several other professional societies, in which women form varying proportions of the total membership, such as the Laboratory Section of the American Public Health Association.

The Outlook

In 1947 there were at least 1,000 women bacteriologists in the United States, if we assume that the membership of the Society of American Bacteriologists with about 800 women members represents about four-fifths of all professional bacteriologists.

Almost 600 women bacteriologists were registered with the National Roster of Scientific and Specialized Personnel at the end of 1946. Although incomplete in coverage, Roster figures give some indication of the proportion of women in bacteriology in the early postwar period and of the extent of their training. Although women constituted about 22 percent of the Roster's bacteriologists, they were only 13 percent of the Ph. D.'s but nearly 30 percent of those with bachelor's degrees in bacteriology, as listed at the end of 1946 (30).

It is perhaps because the Ph. D. is so important and because so few women have it that, according to one prominent bacteriologist, probably no more than 5 percent of those in research and teaching are women. Here, too, the turn-over is lower and openings fewer than in more routine work. The same authority estimates that in work done primarily by women with the bachelor's degree-such as control work or testing in biological supply houses and other industries and in hospital, public health, and other medical laboratories-40 to 50 percent of the personnel are women. This estimate is verified in part by a recent survey of employment in State and local health departments undertaken by the United States Public Health Service. In 1945, 57 percent of the bacteriologists and serologists employed in State and local health departments were women. Altogether, 525 women classified as bacteriologists or serologists were employed in the 38 State health departments or in the 80 percent of the full-time local health departments reporting in the survey. Because turn-over is rapid in the bachelor's degree group, there will be continued opportunity for new graduates, certainly in hospital and other medical laboratories.

For women with undergraduate training only, hospital, public health, and other laboratories will continue to be the largest source of employment. Research in medical schools and other medical research centers, as well as in hospitals and public health research laboratories, was retarded during the war, which diverted to the armed forces those who normally supervise such work. Furthermore, the volume of routine work was too great during the war to permit research. Research work, therefore, may be expected to offer some expansion in opportunity to women bacteriologists, especially to those with graduate training, as long as the shortage of physicians and of men scientists continues. There are limiting features however. Few hospitals have special divisions of bacteriological work for which advanced training in bacteriology is necessary. Expansion of services results primarily in a greater increase in the use of the less highly trained medical technicians rather than in the employment of bacteriologists with graduate training.

Other employment outlets for bacteriologists are such research projects as those financed by the United States Public Health Service.