Died 3 July 2003 | Books The Early Type Stars | |
Anne Barbara Underhill (June 12, 1920 - July 3, 2003) was a Canadian astrophysicist. She is most widely known for her work on hot stars and is considered one of the world's leading experts. She received many awards throughout her lifetime for her contributions to astronomy and astrophysics.
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Childhood
Anne grew up in Vancouver, British Columbia. Anne was the only girl of five children born to Frederic Clare and Irene Underhill. Anne was awarded the Lieutenant Governer's medal in high school for her outstanding school performance. Anne was close with her twin brother and three younger brothers, and helped to raise them following the death of her mother when Anne was 18. When Anne was 24, she lost her twin brother in World War II.
Education
Anne graduated from the University of British Columbia in 1942 with a degree in chemistry. She continued her education there and received a master's degree in physics and math in 1944. After earning her MA she received a substantial scholarship from the Canadian Federation of University Women which allowed her to enroll at the University of Toronto but she left after a year because their astrophysics program was quite weak at that time. She went on to receive her PhD from the University of Chicago in 1948. Her thesis topic was multi-layered stellar atmospheres and contained the first model for this phenomenon.
Work
In 1949, Anne accepted a position in Victoria at the Dominion Astrophysical Observatory (DAO). While there, she encountered sexism from her male PhD colleagues who limited her responsibilities while giving more to less qualified male coworkers. After twelve years, she unexpectedly received a letter of offer from the University of Utrecht in Holland for the position of second chair in astrophysics. She was reluctant to leave Canada so the decision to take the job wasn't an easy one despite the mistreatment she had experienced by her colleagues. At the University of Utrecht, Anne lectured at the graduate level and published The Early Type Stars. In 1970, another surprise offer arrived from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. She worked there until her retirement fifteen years later.