12 / 116
D
id you ever believe strongly in something?
Even if everyone told you your idea was
silly or wrong? A scientist named Barbara
McClintock (1902–1992) faced that problem
for much of her life. But she never stopped
believing in what she knew was true.
Barbara McClintock was born in Hartford,
Connecticut. Even when she was little,
McClintock liked to do things her own way.
She enjoyed all kinds of sports. Her favorite
sport was playing baseball with the boys in
the neighborhood. McClintock was the only girl
on the boys’ team. She knew that the boys didn’t want her to play with
them. But McClintock didn’t care what other people thought. She kept
on playing because she wanted to play.
McClintock did well in school, where she discovered science. When
she graduated from high school, she wanted to go to college. In those
days, most women did not go to college. But her father agreed that she
should go. In college, McClintock studied plants and how to grow them.
She loved college life. She began to focus on her studies in the field of
genetics
and graduated in 1923. She did advanced studies and received
her PhD in botany in 1927.
Barbara McClintock
Barbara McClintock
McClintock in
her cornfield
12