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At a time when women could not vote and very few were involved in the world outside the home, Annie Montague Alexander (1867-1950) was an intrepid explorer, amateur naturalist, skilled markswoman, philanthropist, farmer, and founder and patron of two natural history museums at the University of California, Berkeley. Barbara R. Stein presents a luminous portrait of this remarkable woman, a pioneer who helped shape the world of science in California, yet whose name has been little known until now. Alexander's father founded a Hawaiian sugar empire, and his great wealth afforded his adventurous daughter the opportunity to pursue her many interests. Stein portrays Alexander as a complex, intelligent, woman who--despite her frail appearance--was determined to achieve something with her life. Along with Louise Kellogg, her partner of forty years, Alexander collected thousands of animal, plant, and fossil specimens throughout western North America. Their collections serve as an invaluable record of the flora and fauna that were beginning to disappear as the West succumbed to spiraling population growth, urbanization, and agricultural development. Today at least seventeen taxa are named for Alexander, and several others honor Kellogg, who continued to make field trips after Alexander's death. Alexander's dealings with scientists and her encouragement--and funding--of women to do field research earned her much admiration, even from those with whom she clashed. Stein's extensive use of archival material, including excerpts from correspondence and diaries, allows us to see Annie Alexander as a keen observer of human nature who loved women and believed in their capabilities. Her legacy endures in the fields of zoology and paleontology and also in the lives of women who seek to follow their own star to the fullest degree possible.

Zoologists --- Alexander, Annie Montague, --- Science --- Alexander, Annie Montague --- anno 1800-1899 --- anno 1900-1999 --- United States --- adventure. --- american west. --- annie montague alexander. --- berkeley. --- biography. --- california. --- conservation. --- environment. --- explorer. --- extinction. --- female scientists. --- feminism. --- field research. --- fossils. --- gender. --- hawaii. --- historical women. --- history. --- lesbian. --- lgbt. --- lgbtqia. --- louise kellogg. --- markswoman. --- natural history museum. --- naturalist. --- nonfiction. --- old west. --- paleontology. --- philanthropist. --- pioneer. --- radical women. --- sugar empire. --- the west. --- travel. --- urbanization. --- women and science. --- women in history. --- women in science. --- women in stem. --- womens studies. --- zoology. --- United States of America --- Biography --- Book

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Is the universe infinite, or is it just really big? Does nature abhor infinity? In startling and beautiful prose, Janna Levin's diary of unsent letters to her mother describes what we know about the shape and extent of the universe, about its beginning and its end. She grants the uninitiated access to the astounding findings of contemporary theoretical physics and makes tangible the contours of space and time—those very real curves along which apples fall and planets orbit.Levin guides the reader through the observations and thought-experiments that have enabled physicists to begin charting the universe. She introduces the cosmic archaeology that makes sense of the pattern of hot spots left over from the big bang, a pursuit on the verge of discovering the shape of space itself. And she explains the topology and the geometry of the universe now coming into focus—a strange map of space full of black holes, chaotic flows, time warps, and invisible strings. Levin advances the controversial idea that this map is edgeless but finite—that the universe is huge but not unending—a radical revelation that would provide the ultimate twist to the Copernican revolution by locating our precise position in the cosmos.As she recounts our increasingly rewarding attempt to know the universe, Levin tells her personal story as a scientist isolated by her growing knowledge. This book is her remarkable effort to reach across the distance of that knowledge and share what she knows with family and friends—and with us. Highly personal and utterly original, this physicist’s diary is a breathtaking contemplation of our deep connection with the universe and our aspirations to comprehend it.

Mathematicians --- Cosmology --- Cosmology. --- Levin, Janna --- Diary of a Finite Time in a Finite Space. --- How the Universe Got Its Spots. --- Is the universe infinite or just really big. --- Janna Levin. --- NASA. --- Physics. --- Princeton University Press. --- a leading astrophysicist’s groundbreaking personal account of her life and ideas. --- astronaut. --- astronomy. --- astrophysics. --- books about space. --- chaos. --- contemporary science. --- cosmology. --- female scientist. --- geometry. --- how big is the universe. --- memoir and visionary science. --- planets. --- scientific exploration. --- space travel. --- space: solar system. --- stars. --- string theory. --- telescope. --- topology. --- universe. --- women in STEM. --- Astronomy --- Deism --- Metaphysics --- Scientists