Barbara Lawrence (July 30, 1909 – 1997), sometimes known as Barbara Lawrence Schevill, was an American paleozoologist and mammalogist known for her studies of

canid Canidae (; from Latin, '' canis'', " dog") is a biological family of dog-like carnivorans, colloquially referred to as dogs, and constitutes a clade. A member of this family is also called a canid (). There are three subfamilies found withi ...

s, porpoises and

howler monkeys Howler monkeys (genus ''Alouatta'', monotypic in subfamily Alouattinae) are the most widespread primate genus in the Neotropics and are among the largest of the platyrrhines along with the muriquis (''Brachyteles''), the spider monkeys (''Atele ...

and her work as the mammal curator at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

Museum of Comparative Zoology A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make thes ...

(MCZ).

Early life and education

Lawrence was born on July 30, 1909, in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

to Theodora (née Eldredge) and Harris Hooper Lawrence, their third child. She married William E. Schevill on December 23, 1938, while still attending

Vassar College Vassar College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Poughkeepsie, New York, United States. Founded in 1861 by Matthew Vassar, it was the second degree-granting institution of higher education for women in the United States, closely foll ...

, where she was awarded a bachelor's degree in 1931.

Career and research

After taking a position as the Curator of Mammals at the MCZ, she took her first trip to do field research on the howler monkeys of East Africa, where she returned on other trips. In 1936 and 1937, she traveled to the Philippines and Sumatra to study

bats Bats are mammals of the order Chiroptera.''cheir'', "hand" and πτερόν''pteron'', "wing". With their forelimbs adapted as wings, they are the only mammals capable of true and sustained flight. Bats are more agile in flight than most bir ...

. She collaborated with her husband, William Schevill, on studies of cetacean communication and echolocation, where they made the first recordings of porpoise and whale calls, forming in many ways the founding framework for “literally hundreds of scientific studies produced by other workers from the 1960s until the present day." While working at Harvard, she pioneered the practice of collecting full skeletons of mammals. She also traveled to

Nyasaland Nyasaland () was a British protectorate located in Africa that was established in 1907 when the former British Central Africa Protectorate changed its name. Between 1953 and 1963, Nyasaland was part of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasala ...

(modern-day Malawi) in her field studies of mammals. Lawrence did field work in New Mexico and Iraq on the evolution of

domesticated animals This page gives a list of domesticated animals, also including a list of animals which are or may be currently undergoing the process of domestication and animals that have an extensive relationship with humans beyond simple predation. This includ ...

, and later went to Turkey to study fossil dogs there. She was especially known for her work in canids: her 1967 collaboration with William Bossert on the genus ''

Canis ''Canis'' is a genus of the Caninae which includes multiple extant species, such as wolves, dogs, coyotes, and golden jackals. Species of this genus are distinguished by their moderate to large size, their massive, well-developed skulls and de ...

'' was noted for its innovative application of statistics to evolutionary and ecological questions.

Legacy

Barbara Lawrence died in 1997, three years after her husband's death and survived by her daughter, Lee, and son, Edward. The Society of Ethnobiology awards the Lawrence Award each year to a promising graduate student in

ethnobiology ] Ethnobiology is the scientific study of the way living things are treated or used by different human cultures. It studies the dynamic relationships between people, biota, and environments, from the distant past to the immediate present.culture ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lawrence, Barbara American mammalogists Women zoologists 1909 births 1997 deaths American curators American women curators Scientists from Boston Vassar College alumni Harvard University faculty 20th-century American zoologists 20th-century American women scientists Women mammalogists Paleozoologists Primatologists Cetologists American women academics