Person
Elliott, Amy Marion (1874 - 1913)
- Born
- 2 January 1874
Hobart, Tasmania, Australia - Died
- 29 May 1913
New Norfolk, Tasmania, Australia - Occupation
- Chemical analyst and Teacher
Summary
Amy Elliott, the first woman Bachelor of Science from the University of Tasmania, and its first Master of Science of either sex, belongs to a vanguard of middle-class women who accepted the challenges of a higher education in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. She died of 'chronic brain disease' in 1913 following the breakdown of her employment with the Commonwealth Public Service in Melbourne in late 1903.
Details
Chronology
- 1887 - 1891
- Education - Third girl to enrol in The Friends' School, Hobart
- c. 1890 - c. 1892
- Life event - Active in The Friends' Natural History and Essay Society
- 1891
- Education - Completed the first Tasmanian Senior Public examination with 17 others
- July 1891 - 1896
- Career position - Recruited to The Friends' School, Hobart as a junior teacher
- 1892 - c. 1903
- Life event - Active in the Hobartville Association, successor to The Friends' Natural History and Essay Society
- 1894
- Education - Enrolled in a Bachelor of Science at the University of Tasmania, passing English, Mathematics and Chemistry
- 1898
- Education - Awarded Bachelor of Science (BSc) at the University of Tasmania, the first women to achieve that goal
- February 1899 - July 1903
- Career position - Appointed Assistant Government Analyst, Tasmanian Public Service, working for William Foule Ward
- December 1900
- Education - Awarded Master of Science (MSc) at the University of Tasmania, the first woman anywhere in Australia to achieve that goal
- 1902
- Event - The Commonwealth Public Service Act of 1902 excludes married women from employment
- c. August 1903 - c. October 1903
- Career position - Customs Analyst, Commonwealth Public Service, Melbourne, a probationary appointment that was terminated
- December 1903
- Career event - Chief Secretary of Tasmania officially terminates her position as Assistant Government Analyst
- January 1904
- Career event - Unemployed
- October 1904 - 15 October 1904
- Life event - Admitted to the Hospital for the Insane, New Norfolk, Tasmania, by her father
- 25 July 1908
- Life event - Admitted, for the final time, to the Hospital for the Insane, New Norfolk, Tasmania, by her brother Charles
- 29 May 1913
- Life event - Died of 'chronic brain disease' at the Hospital for the Insane, New Norfolk, Tasmania
Related entries
See also
Published resources
Books
- Theobald, Marjorie, Knowing Women: Origins of Women's Education in Nineteenth-Century Australia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). Details
Journal Articles
- Whitehead, Kay, 'Higher Education, Work and "Overstrain of the Brain": Amy Marion Elliott, MSc, University of Tasmania, 1900', History of Education Review, 29 (1) (2000), 16-31, http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-2853080272. Details
See also
- McCarthy, Gavan, 'Thinking of the future while looking deep into the past: the continuing evolution of the Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation [Paper 400]', in 27th International Congress of History of Science & Technology (Melbourne: Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation, 2025)., https://eoas.info/bib-pdf/ASBS16789.pdf. Details
Gavan McCarthy
Created: 16 June 2025, Last modified: 20 June 2025