Ida Henrietta Hyde
1857-1945
American Physiologist
Ida Hyde was a pioneering woman scientist whose academic and professional successes established a foundation for future female researchers. Earning an esteemed foreign doctorate, Hyde set precedents for other women who were interested in studying with international experts. She also enabled women scientists to have access to more laboratories with superb equipment and facilities. By securing university recognition for her expertise, funding scholarships, evaluating scholarly candidates, and establishing groups supportive of female researchers, Hyde assured opportunities for talented, dedicated women scientists to achieve desired educations and careers.
Born in Davenport, Iowa, Hyde was the daughter of Meyer H. and Babette (Loewenthal) Heidenheimer. Her parents changed their surname to Hyde when they emigrated from Wurttemberg, Germany, to Chicago. Hyde worked in a millinery shop and attended night classes at the Chicago Athenaeum before enrolling at the University of Chicago in 1881. After one year, she taught Chicago elementary students, initiating science courses in public schools.
By 1888 Hyde had enrolled at Cornell University, completing her bachelor's degree in biology within three years. She earned a scholarship to study biology at Bryn Mawr College, where she studied jellyfish embryos. A professor at the University of Strassburg, Alexander Wilhelm Goette, asked Hyde to collaborate with him. Although women were unwelcome as students at the university, Goette insisted Hyde have laboratory privileges. When the faculty refused to grant her a Ph.D., Hyde contacted the University of Heidelberg, asking if she could receive a doctorate from that institution. A group of administrators said that school's rules did not prohibit female doctoral students. Hyde participated in zoology and chemistry classes but was denied access to the physiology courses of Wilhelm Kuhne (1837-1900) at the medical college. Despite this obstacle, Hyde was the first female to earn a Ph.D. at Heidelberg, finishing with honors in 1896.
The university paid for Hyde's research trip to the Naples Zoological Station, where she studied octopus salivary glands. She also conducted investigations at the University of Bern, where she was introduced to Henry P. Bowditch (1840-1911) of the Harvard Medical School. Bowditch arranged for Hyde to become the first woman employed to research at Harvard's medical laboratories. From 1896 to 1898 she analyzed heart blood flow. In 1898 Hyde accepted the position of assistant professor of zoology at the University of Kansas. She was selected as the first female member of the American Physiological Society in 1902. Three years later, Hyde was named head professor of the new Department of Physiology and also received a university medical school position. She initiated a program to detect schoolchildren with contagious diseases and presented public health lectures. She studied several summers at Chicago's Rush Medical School, the University of Liverpool, and the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. Hyde wrote two textbooks—Outlines of Experimental Physiology (1905) and Laboratory Outlines of Physiology (1910).
Angered by conflicts with students concerning academic performance, Hyde resigned in 1921. She returned to Heidelberg to study radium's biological effects. She also conducted the first scientific studies of how music influences physiology. Hyde invented the microelectrode, a device for stimulating a single cell whichenabled researchers to further understand cellular properties and behavior. She published an article in the 1921 Biological Bulletin about her device. Concerned about assisting female scientists, Hyde established a group that accrued funding for American women to research at the Naples Zoological Station. She also secured laboratory space for women at Woods Hole and served on an accreditation board to insure women applicants were qualified to pursue graduate science work at foreign universities. Hyde financed scholarships for women scientists. She wrote about her professional frustrations in an article, "Before Women Were Human Beings." Hyde moved first to San Diego then Berkeley, California, where she died.
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