Blaze e-catalogue - Catalog - Page 46
Sarah
Hynes
1859-1938
First government
woman scientist
Sarah Hynes faced overt hostility and antagonism
as the State’s first woman scientist.
Hynes was appointed Botanical Assistant, Sydney
Technological (Powerhouse) Museum (1897).
Soon instigating an inquiry ‘on the grounds that
she could not obtain the status she desired in her
position’, her superiors—detractors—concluded
that ‘the position of Botanical Assistant cannot
be filled by a woman’. A transfer to the Botanic
Gardens followed, and Hynes became deputy
to Chief Botanical Assistant, Ernst Betche,
and the sole woman on staff.
“Though only a tiny
handful of a woman,
there is not a vacant spot
in her cosmography—
all is packed with energy.”
Edith Wills, ‘Sarah Hynes, J.P, B.A., M.B.E: Great Botanist
has other strings to her bow’, Sun, 7 January 1934, p. 27
Two inquiries—1905 and 1910—saw Hynes
on charges of insubordination, querulous
and quarrelsome conduct, neglect and
incompetency, and described as ‘more trouble
than a hundred men’. Gardens Director, Joseph
Maiden, described her as ‘so notorious that
she has done untold harm to the cause of the
employment of women in the Public Service’.
Hynes’ qualifications were attacked, despite
her being the only Botanic Gardens employee
with a university degree in botany. Hynes
was transferred to the Department of Public
Instruction as a Special Instructor in botany, and
continued in this role until retirement in 1923.
Above left
Sarah Hynes
Photographer unknown, n.d., University of Sydney
Archives, Series 167/1, Item 1404
STEAM
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