🌅 The Woman Who First Understood Climate Change

SOURCE

Foote (1856)

WHAT TO KNOW

• In 1856, American scientist Eunice Newton Foote became the first person to document the underlying cause of global warming: the extraordinary ability of carbon dioxide gas to absorb heat. The results of her experiment were presented at that year’s meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) by Joseph Henry, one of the preeminent American scientists of the time and the founding secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. The AAAS allowed women to join and didn’t prohibit them from presenting their work, however, researchers believe it was uncommon for women to actually do so. Foote’s experiment was covered in the September 1856 issue of Scientific American and published in the American Journal of Science and Arts in November of the same year.

WHY IT MATTERS

• Foote’s discovery led her to conclude that greater concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will cause global temperatures to rise, which modern science now knows is correct. Foote’s work was published three years before Irish physicist John Tyndall—widely recognized as the “father” of climate science—measured the heat absorption of carbon dioxide and concluded that “every variation” of water vapor or carbon dioxide gas in the atmosphere “must produce a change of climate.” Tyndall didn’t credit Foote’s work, though it isn’t clear whether the omission was deliberate or the result of poor communication between American and European scientists at the time.

CONNECT THE DOTS

• One factor in Foote’s success was the excellent schooling she received at the Troy Female Seminary in Troy, New York from age 17 to 19. The school was founded in 1824 by famed feminist and women’s education pioneer Emma Willard as the first institution of higher education for young women in the U.S. Foote—who was a distant relative of legendary scientist Isaac Newton—also attended the first Woman’s Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, New York in July 1848, where the Declaration of Sentiments written by the trailblazing Elizabeth Cady Stanton was presented, demanding social and legal equality with men, including the right to vote. Eunice is the fifth signatory to the historic document, which her husband, Elisha, also signed as a demonstration of support.