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auxiliary tools useful as entering wedges. These, of course, are in addition to and not a substitute for basic preparation not only in geology but in mathematics, physics, and chemistry. Courses in biology and botany are especially important for women interested in paleontology. Although the undergraduate training of the woman geology student should be broad rather than specialized, she would do well to become acquainted with the content of such fields as micropaleontology, economic geology, stratigraphy, petroleum geology and sedimentation, before selecting a specialized field for graduate study (19).

Further suggestions on training as well as a full discussion of geological occupations, conditions of employment, and qualifications for geologists may be found in the pamphlet prepared by the National Roster of Scientific and Specialized Personnel, "Geology as a Profession" (61). As in many of the sciences, there is a growing preference for the geologist who has completed a 5-year rather than a 4-year college course in geology (28).

There is no list of approved schools awarding degrees in geology, but in 1946 there were 40 institutions of higher education which granted the doctor's degree in geology listed in the "Directory of Colleges and Universities Offering Graduate Degrees" compiled by the National Roster (58). The American Geophysical Union has also prepared a list of specialized courses in geophysics offered in colleges and universities in the United States (3).

In 1946, over half the men and the women registered in geology with the National Roster had only the bachelor's degree. A larger proportion of the women than of the men had their master's degree, but at the doctorate level, there was a larger proportion of the men than of the women. (See table 2.) One author, writing about postwar trends in geology, stated: "Initial employment and subsequent advance in geology will go more and more to the man with the Ph. D" (75). This statement is doubly significant for women.

Table 2. Distribution by Highest Academic Degree Held of Geologists Registered With the National Roster of Scientific and Specialized Personnel, 1946

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Occupational Summary of the Profession of the Geographer by the National Roster of Scientific and Specialized Personnel (68)

"The geographer studies the nature and use of areas and is trained to interpret the distributions, interrelationships, and interactions of physical and cultural phenomena on the earth's surface. He is concerned, for example, not only with the nature of the land surface, vegetation, climate, mineral resources, soils, and water supplies, but also with the people and the ways in which they live together and utilize land and other resources. Geography, therefore, is considered both a physical and a social science."

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THE OUTLOOK FOR WOMEN IN GEOGRAPHY

The modern concept of geography as a physical and a social science has evolved through many centuries. Over the years, the emphasis in research and in instruction in geography has shifted a number of times. In the middle of the last century, for example, geography was usually closely allied to history, but later, emphasis was placed upon physiography, which deals with the form, structure, and distribution of land surface features.

During the past 40 years, however, recognition of the dual role of geography has led to research which analyzes the relation between the natural environment and such human activities as national and international politics; commerce and manufacturing; crop and animal agriculture; mining; and naval, air, and land warfare. This is reflected in such specializations as: political geography, economic geography, military geography, historical geography, or social geography. Another type of specialization is that of regional geography in which the relationship of human activities to the natural or physical environment of land form, soil, climate, water resources, mineral resources, area or size, location, vegetation, and coast line of a given region is studied.

In 1946, there were about 800 professional geographers in the United States, about 140 or 17 percent of whom were women, according to a study made by a subcommittee of the Division of Geology and Geography of the National Research Council (35).

Prewar Distribution

Before the war, most professional geographers in the United States were teaching in colleges and universities. The total number was then estimated at 500, although some authorities consider this estimate too low (26). A small number were engaged in research or were doing cartographic work (map making) in the Federal Government or in research institutions like the American Geographical Society and the National Geographic Society (29). A few held research and writing positions in firms publishing geography textbooks and journals, and a few others were working as map librarians in government and college libraries. Recognition was very limited in industry,

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where only a few persons trained both in geography and economics were employed by firms engaged in foreign trade.

Outside the colleges and universities, instruction in geography was given little attention. In the elementary schools, teachers with little or no training in the subject matter were teaching geography, usually with little comprehension of its broad outlook (33). Only a few high schools in the larger cities offered instruction in geography, and this was sometimes limited to physiography or given as part of the social science curriculum. Even the colleges offered little, for courses in geography were often confined to those given in departments of earth science or geology. In 1943-44, only 15 institutions of higher education offered the Ph. D. in geography (23). This limited instruction at the college level not only diminished the number of teaching positions open to geographers but made it necessary for many of them to teach other subjects, such as geology or economics. Nevertheless, college teaching was the major outlet for professional geographers. In 1940, 88 percent of the 131 persons who had received a Ph. D. in geography in the previous decade were teaching or combining teaching with research or administrative functions in institutions of higher education (23). Women geographers secured positions in teachertraining institutions and women's colleges with greater ease than in the universities, where men were usually preferred. More than a third of the geography instructors in teachers' colleges were women, about twice the proportion that women formed of all geographers. Women teaching cartography were even more unusual, since few courses were offered in the subject, and they were usually given in schools of engineering rather than in liberal arts colleges (10).

Annual Addition to the Supply

The number of professional geographers produced by the colleges and universities at the beginning of the war was very small. About 1,000 undergraduate students were enrolled as geography majors in 1942 (the first year for which figures are available), more than half of whom were women. Approximately 140 students were enrolled in graduate courses in geography (60). From 1936 through 1940 an average of only about 14 persons annually secured the Ph. D. in geography, among whom seldom more than one was a woman (47).

Wartime Changes

Warfare on an international scale requiring detailed knowledge of the physical, economic, social, and political characteristics of many foreign countries brought new responsibilities and new opportunities

to geographers. During the war, more than 200 professional geographers were called to Washington by the Federal Government for research studies covering such diversified projects as the analysis of munitions industries in enemy countries; the problems arising in the wartime control of our own economy; and the compilation of topographical data of foreign and domestic areas for purposes of military strategy.

Many of the positions to which women were appointed were directly related to military planning. In the Office of the Quartermaster General of the War Department, for example, women trained in physical geography were doing research on the different topographical, climatological, and soil conditions to be met in foreign terrain, to develop data useful in planning the clothing, food supplies, and packaging for the military forces in the different theaters of war. In the Foreign Economic Administration, women economic geographers compiled information on the supply lines of food and military equipment for Army landings, studied the fishing industry of Japan, determined areas of the world where additional supplies of durable goods could be produced and exported, and surveyed relief and rehabilitation requirements in liberated areas. The Office of Strategic Services also employed women geographers for research needed in the planning of military strategy, and others for work in photogrammetry (the making of maps from aerial photographs).

The wartime expansion of peacetime government agencies also created opportunity for women geographers. Before the war, the United States Board on Geographical Names in the United States Department of Interior had employed only 1 person trained in geography, but in 1944, there were 18 women of this type employed there, comprising one-third of the professional staff. Other Federal agencies which employed women geographers during the war were the State Department, the War Department, the National Archives, the Library of Congress, the Weather Bureau, and the United States Forest Service in the Department of Agriculture. A few women economic geographers were also employed on economic analysis in such wartime agencies as the Office of Price Administration and the War Production Board (14).

In 1943, the Federal Civil Service Commission reported that while the need for geographers in general was not critical, as it was in many other fields, the demand substantially exceeded the supply in cartography. Women who were specialists in this field were urged to apply for civil service positions. Actually, however, the number of women employed as professional cartographers in the Federal Government was very small. There were only 2 women employed as cartographic engineers at the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey and a few

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