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With the onset of the atomic age in 1945, geneticists increasingly spoke out about how nuclear fallout and radiation impacted heredity and reproduction. The scholarship discussing post–World War II activism focuses almost exclusively on males, with little attention given to women who served as public scientists or the role gender played in gaining public trust and influencing policy makers. This paper examines two women, both trained in genetics, who became activists in the 1950s and 1960s to educate the public about the dangers radiation and wartime chemicals posed to the human germ plasm. In Genetics in the Atomic Age (1956), Charlotte Auerbach (1899–1994) described basic genetic principles to explain why radiation-induced mutations could be harmful. In Silent Spring (1962), Rachel Carson (1907–1964) drew on genetics to warn about the possible mutagenic properties of DDT along with other concerns. Both women fostered scientific literacy to empower an informed citizenry that could influence public policy. They appealed both to men and to the growing cadre of middle-class educated women, encouraging an expanded role for maternal responsibility: not only protecting families but also the well-being of all humankind. This essay is part of a special issue entitled THE BONDS OF HISTORY edited by Anita Guerrini.

Although women have long been engaged in science, their participation in large numbers was limited until they gained access to higher education in the last decades of the nineteenth century. The rediscovery of Mendel's work in 1900 coincided with the availability of a well trained female scientific workforce, and women entered the new field in significant numbers. Exploring their activities reveals much about the early development of the field that soon revolutionized biology, and about the role of gender in the social organization of science.

In June 1909, scientists and dignitaries from 167 different countries gathered in Cambridge to celebrate the hundredth anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth and the fiftieth anniversary of the publication ofOrigin of Species. The event was one of the most magnificent commemorations in the annals of science. Delegates gathered within the cloisters of Cambridge University not only to honor the “hero” of evolution but also to reassess the underpinnings of Darwinism at a critical juncture. With the mechanism of natural selection increasingly under attack, evolutionary theory was in disarray. Against this backdrop, biologists weighed the impact of several new developments—the rediscovery of Mendel’s laws of heredity, de Vriesian mutation theory, and the linkage of sex‐cell division (recently named “meiosis”) to the mechanism of heredity. The 1909 Darwin celebration thus represents a significant watershed in the history of modern biology that allows historians to assess the status of evolution prior to the advent of the chromosome theory of genetics.

In the early years of Mendelism, 1900-1910, William Bateson established a productive research group consisting of women and men studying biology at Cambridge. The empirical evidence they provided through investigating the patterns of hereditary in many different species helped confirm the validity of the Mendelian laws of heredity. What has not previously been well recognized is that owing to the lack of sufficient institutional support, the group primarily relied on domestic resources to carry out their work. Members of the group formed a kind of extended family unit, centered on the Batesons' home in Grantchester and the grounds of Newnham College. This case illustrates the continuing role that domestic environments played in supporting scientific research in the early 20th century.

Although the early years of genetics have been well described by historians, it is only now being realized that this was one of the earliest emerging disciplines in twentieth-century biology to benefit from the contributions of women. Many, however, became 'silent scientists' — publishing no paper beyond their dissertation. Although women have long been engaged in science, their participation in large numbers was limited until they gained access to higher education in the last decades of the nineteenth century. The rediscovery of Mendel's work in 1900 coincided with the availability of a well trained female scientific workforce, and women entered the new field in significant numbers. Exploring their activities reveals much about the early development of the field that soon revolutionized biology, and about the role of gender in the social organization of science.