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A Part of Our History: Dr. Elizabeth Rebecca Laird By Mitchell Zimmer In November, 1940, Western
was selected by the National Research Council as one of the few Canadian
universities to join in an intensive radar research program. The department
converted itself into a laboratory to study the radiation and detection
of centimetre wavelength waves. At first the Western research was focused
on antenna radiation patterns. That winter the tests on antenna
patterns were carried out first by dragging equipment on a sled (borrowed
from one of the professor's children) around the University campus, and
then the transmissions from the Science Building were monitored in a cold,
unheated, green shed, via a variety of antennas mounted on its roof.
Dr.Laird was a brilliant student
at the University of Toronto, her academic record shows that she had achieved
the honor of being the first in her class for three years running. Despite
this success, her scholarship applications were rejected on the basis of
her gender, preventing her in continuing her graduate studies here in Canada.
Her offer of help for the radar project was quickly accepted, and she became an active member of the radar research team, working without remuneration (and taking her turn making measurements in the unheated 'green shed'). In 1945 her position in the department was formally recognized with an appointment as Honorary Professor. She continued an active research program, including the supervision of several MSc students on the biological effects of microwave radiation. At the occasion of her second retirement in 1953 at the age of 78, Dr. A.D. Misener stated that Dr.Laird was, "the rare combination of a conscientious and productive research worker and an inspiring and able teacher." |
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Flashpoint |
Competent
researchers were in very short supply when, in 1940, a gray-haired
woman walked into the department, asking if she could be of some help.
This was the department's introduction to Elizabeth Laird, one of
the most remarkable individuals in the department's history to date.
Dr. Laird was born in Owen Sound in 1874, and lived in various places
throughout Ontario where her father, a Methodist minister, had charges.
She completed secondary school at the London Collegiate Institute,
and then attended the University of Toronto. 
After teaching for one year at the Ontario
Ladies' College in Whitby, she won a scholarship for graduate studies
at Bryn Mawr College, Pennsylvania. During her time there, she earned
a fellowship to spend one year working with Max Planck in Berlin.
Although women were not regularly admitted to Berlin University at
the time of her fellowship (1898-99), Laird recalled that "there was
no crowding in mathematics and physics, and I had no difficulty in
getting permission from the different professors to attend their lectures."
She returned to Bryn Mawr where she was awarded a Ph.D. in 1901 for
her work on magnetism and spectroscopy. 
Later that year, she joined the staff
of the Physics Department at Mount Holyoke College, and two years
later was named Professor and Head of the department. During her tenure,
she developed a strong undergradaute program of national repute, however
no graduate programs were available at Mount Holyoke to further the
education of her students. During her summers and sabbatical leaves,
Dr. Laird followed her research interests by working with some of
the leading physicists of the day. She was the first woman to be granted
the privilege of working in the Cavendish Laboratory with Dr. J.J.
Thomson and had taken opportunities to work at Chicago, Wurtzburg
and Yale. She "retired" for the first time to London in 1940. 