Feminist historians have thoroughly documented the unequal struggle of women who wished to enter the scientific professions, from the very beginnings of modern scientific enquiry in Europe. As long as science remained an amateur occupation of doubtful economic security and without a career structure and public rewards, isolated women from the upper classes – often related to a well-known pioneering scientist – made independent contributions as scientists. But in the nineteenth century matters changed swiftly; while science might still be a hard taskmaster, it brought rewards to many men. Biographies abound of poor boys who found fame as scientists: Michael Faraday, Louis Pasteur, Jean Henri Fabre and others. By the late nineteenth century books aimed at aspiring young scientists appear with titles such as The Romance of Medicine, Microbe Hunters, Famous Men of Science or Heroes of Modern Progress. Women were conspicuously absent in these narratives of scientific adventure. But they did not disappear altogether, either in scientific work itself or in the many biographies for girls. These tokens – Caroline Herschel, Mary Somerville, Marie Curie – were eulogised as much for their feminine qualities as their achievements. Ironically, the women who had fought hardest for access to specialised knowledge for the public good – medical women – were rarely mentioned in nineteenth-century biographies.

An examination of the values promoted in these biographies for adolescent girls may help to explain why so few considered a career in science at the very time when it became possible.