The mathilda effect
The case of Marion Donovan
The Matilda Effect is the name for a type of discrimination suffered by many female scientists. Throughout history, many women researchers have been denied their contributions and the credit for their findings was given to their fellow male researchers. This injustice has prevented that women were renowned as they should.
Marion Donovan's life
Born in Fort Wayne, Indiana in 1917, Marion O'Brien grew up surrounded by machinery and invention. Her father and uncle invented the "South Bend lathe," used for grinding automobile gears. After her mother died when she was seven, Marion spent most of her free time in their factory. O'Brien moved East to attend Rosemont College in the suburbs of Philadelphia. After graduating in 1939 with a BA in English Literature, she took a job as Assistant Beauty Editor at Vogue magazine in New York. Soon she married James Donovan, a leather importer, resigned from her position, started a family, and moved to Westport, Connecticut. She earned a degree in Architecture at Yale University in 1958. After that she designed her own house in Greenwich, Connecticut in 1980, and she died in 1998.
Marion Donovan's inventions
During her life Donovan invented a 30-garment compact hanger (the "Big Hangup"); a soap dish that drained into the sink; and the "Zippity-Do," an elastic cord that connected over the shoulder to the zipper on the back of a dress, eliminating the contortionism previously required to put on most women's dress clothes.
Motherhood gave Donovan good reason to revive the innovative instincts of her own childhood. Like all mothers, Donovan struggled with her babies' exasperating habit of nearly instantaneously wetting her diapers as soon as they were changed – which at that time meant soiled sheets as well. Donovan's first breakthrough, in 1946, was to design a waterproof diaper cover. Steadily working her way through a series of shower curtains, Donovan used her sewing machine to design and perfect a reusable, leakproof diaper cover that did not, like the rubber baby pants of the time, create diaper rash. Donovan called her diaper the "Boater" because it helped babies "stay afloat." The final product was actually made of nylon parachute cloth and featured an additional innovation: Donovan had replaced safety pins with metal and plastic snaps.
Her big invention
The disposable paper diaper
Donovan subsequently had begun an even more essential innovation: the disposable paper diaper. This was not as easy to create as it may sound, since in order to prevent a rash, a diaper's material must "wick" the moisture away from the baby's skin, rather than absorbing the moisture and retaining it inertly. After much experimentation, Donovan designed a composition of sturdy, absorbent paper that did the job well. She was ignored by executives and it wasn’t until a decade later that Pampers® began mass-producing disposable diapers.
The Matilda Effect
Luca Cometti
Created on March 13, 2024
Luca Cometti, Simone Benini
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Transcript
The mathilda effect
The case of Marion Donovan
The Matilda Effect is the name for a type of discrimination suffered by many female scientists. Throughout history, many women researchers have been denied their contributions and the credit for their findings was given to their fellow male researchers. This injustice has prevented that women were renowned as they should.
Marion Donovan's life
Born in Fort Wayne, Indiana in 1917, Marion O'Brien grew up surrounded by machinery and invention. Her father and uncle invented the "South Bend lathe," used for grinding automobile gears. After her mother died when she was seven, Marion spent most of her free time in their factory. O'Brien moved East to attend Rosemont College in the suburbs of Philadelphia. After graduating in 1939 with a BA in English Literature, she took a job as Assistant Beauty Editor at Vogue magazine in New York. Soon she married James Donovan, a leather importer, resigned from her position, started a family, and moved to Westport, Connecticut. She earned a degree in Architecture at Yale University in 1958. After that she designed her own house in Greenwich, Connecticut in 1980, and she died in 1998.
Marion Donovan's inventions
During her life Donovan invented a 30-garment compact hanger (the "Big Hangup"); a soap dish that drained into the sink; and the "Zippity-Do," an elastic cord that connected over the shoulder to the zipper on the back of a dress, eliminating the contortionism previously required to put on most women's dress clothes.
Motherhood gave Donovan good reason to revive the innovative instincts of her own childhood. Like all mothers, Donovan struggled with her babies' exasperating habit of nearly instantaneously wetting her diapers as soon as they were changed – which at that time meant soiled sheets as well. Donovan's first breakthrough, in 1946, was to design a waterproof diaper cover. Steadily working her way through a series of shower curtains, Donovan used her sewing machine to design and perfect a reusable, leakproof diaper cover that did not, like the rubber baby pants of the time, create diaper rash. Donovan called her diaper the "Boater" because it helped babies "stay afloat." The final product was actually made of nylon parachute cloth and featured an additional innovation: Donovan had replaced safety pins with metal and plastic snaps.
Her big invention
The disposable paper diaper
Donovan subsequently had begun an even more essential innovation: the disposable paper diaper. This was not as easy to create as it may sound, since in order to prevent a rash, a diaper's material must "wick" the moisture away from the baby's skin, rather than absorbing the moisture and retaining it inertly. After much experimentation, Donovan designed a composition of sturdy, absorbent paper that did the job well. She was ignored by executives and it wasn’t until a decade later that Pampers® began mass-producing disposable diapers.