Lucy Emma Braun

By Ashley Moulton

 

Emma Lucy Braun is best known for her pioneering work in many fields including plant & forest ecology, vascular plant taxonomy, and plant geography. She was born in 1889 in Ohio and quickly developed a curiosity of nature during family trips to neighboring woods with her sister Annette Braun. Later she received her B.A. and Masters at the University of Cincinnati which helped further her early interest in plant geography and distributions. She then went to get her PhD in Botany in 1914. Her sister Annette was the first female PhD recipient at University of Cincinnati and studied entomology and she was the second.

 

 

Following her doctorate studies she became employed for the university. During this time she went on many road trips all over the country with her sister in their Model T. Ford. Together they explored many remote areas together and made friends with moonshiners. During their trips, Lucy made observations on the vegetation and prepared herbarium samples while her sister Annette studied moths. She took numerous photos during her travel, which she used later for teaching classes as a professor at the University of Cincinnati.

 

 

Over the next 31 years she ascended up the ranks from an Assistant in Botany to Professor of Plant Ecology at the University of Cincinnati. During her time as a professor she had 13 Master students and one PhD student, 9 of which were females which was highly unusual at this period of time for woman professors. Lucy’s focus on graduate mentoring and publishing her research made her rather unique in comparison to her contemporaries who at this time often focused solely on teaching. 

Lucy had an early retirement from teaching in 1948 at age 59, which allowed her conduct more specialized research. In total she wrote 4 books as well as 180 articles that were published in over twenty journals. Most notably was her book, Deciduous Forests of Eastern North America, published in 1950 which was a huge success and went out of print numerous times. This book was a culmination of her 25 years of fieldwork and over 65,000 miles of traveling with her sister. The book itself describes in detail the plants of deciduous forests and their evolution since the most recent ice age to the middle of the 20^th century. Also in 1950 Lucy was elected the first female president of the Ecological Society of America.

 

 

She made several floristic contributions including organizing the Ohio Flora Committee, within the Ohio Academy of Science which lead to the publication of “the Woody Plants of Ohio (1961)” and “The monocotyledoneae of Ohio (1967)”. Her published articles comparing her floristic studies in Ohio to a previous flora notes from hundreds of years prior served as a model for comparing change over time in flora now known as longitudinal studies. Also during her time she fought to preserve over 10,000 acres of natural areas and set up nature reserves, particularly in her home state. She also collected an Extensive herbarium of nearly 12,000 species that now resides in the National Museum in Washington, D.C. She received numerous awards and honors before her death in 1971 at age of 82. Her strong willed and forceful personality was noted by many as one of her greatest strengths as well as the inseparable relationship she had with her sister Annette.