Phyllis Sanderson

Phyllis Mary Sanderson70 also spent 40 years teaching at the LSMW. Sanderson, daughter of a medical doctor, was born in Hove, Sussex, in 1901, and completed her B.Sc. in chemistry at UCL in 1924. After a year s postgraduate research at the Children s Hospital, St. Vincent s Square, which resulted in her first publication, she was appointed as Demonstrator at LSMW in 1925. 

During her time at the LSMW, she rose through the ranks to Senior Demonstrator in 1933, Assistant Lecturer in 1934, and Lecturer in 1946. She undertook some research in heterocyclic chemistry, but her interests changed to research in the history of science, as her obituarist commented  

Dr Sanderson loved to delve into the history of chemistry and scientific thought in general. It was typical of her sense of justice that in one of these studies she should have rescued from oblivion a hitherto obscure 18th Century scientist William Cruickshank, by re-establishing his claims to several important discoveries that had been erroneously ascribed to another investigator. Not the least of the results of these efforts was her familiarity with all the great libraries of London. Her lively tales of the peculiarities of their arrangement and procedure, and the idiosyncrasies of both librarians and readers were a source of much amusement to her friends.70(b) 

---

In a lengthy obituary, her successor, Phyllis Sanderson, noted how Widdows had been one of the last of the remarkable women who staffed the School during the first forty years of this century, an uphill and critical period in the history of this medical school. 09 Sanderson added As so many of her contemporaries, she was an ardent feminist and willingly sacrificed her own career as a chemist for the cause most dear to her heart, the training of women doctors at Hunter Street, the only training ground in Medicine open to women in England at that time. 69... 

---