Annie Lorrain Smith

{{short description|British lichenologist}} {{Use dmy dates|date=August 2015}} {{Use British English|date=August 2015}} {{Infobox scientist |name =Annie Lorrain Smith | honorific_suffix = {{post-nominals|country=GBR|OBE|size=100}} |image =File:Annie Lorrain Smith.jpg |image_size =frameless |caption = |birth_date = 23 October 1854 |birth_place = Everton, Liverpool, England |death_date = {{d-da|7 September 1937|23 October 1854}} |death_place = London, England |field = Botany |work_institutions = British Museum (Natural History) |education = Royal College of Science |doctoral_advisor = |doctoral_students = |known_for = Lichenology |author_abbrev_bot = A.L.Sm. }}

'''Annie Lorrain Smith''' (23 October 1854 – 7 September 1937) was a British lichenologist whose ''Lichens'' (1921) was an essential textbook for several decades. She was also a mycologist and founder member of the British Mycological Society, where she served as president for two terms.<ref name=ox>Mary R. S. Creese, [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/46420 ‘Smith, Annie Lorrain (1854–1937)’], Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, ''Oxford University Press'', 2004; online edn, May 2005, accessed 15 November 2007. {{doi|10.1093/ref:odnb/46420}} (subscription required)</ref>

==Early life and education== Though born in Liverpool,<ref>{{Cite ODNB|url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-46420|title=Smith, Annie Lorrain (1854–1937), mycologist and lichenologist |year=2004 |language=en|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/46420|access-date=2019-10-08|last1=Creese |first1=Mary R. S. }}</ref> she lived with her family in rural Dumfriesshire where her father Walter was Free Church of Scotland minister in Half Morton parish a few miles north of Gretna Green. Her mother was Annie Lorrain née Brown.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|last1=Maroske|first1=Sara|last2=May|first2=Tom W.|date=2018-03-01|title=Naming names: the first women taxonomists in mycology|journal=Studies in Mycology|series=Leading women in fungal biology|volume=89|pages=63–84|doi=10.1016/j.simyco.2017.12.001|pmid=29910514|issn=0166-0616|pmc=6002341}}</ref> She had several talented siblings, including the pathologist, Professor James Lorrain Smith.<ref name=ox/>

After school in Edinburgh she went abroad to study French and German, and then worked as a governess. She moved to London, started studying botany in about 1878 went to classes at the Royal College of Science taught by D. H. Scott.<ref name=":0" />

== Career == Scott found work for Lorrain-Smith at the Natural History Museum to curate Anton de Bary's collection of slides of microscopical fungi,<ref name=":0" /> but she had to be paid from a special fund because women could not officially be employed there. She soon was responsible for identifying most of the fungi which arrived to the museum.<ref name="ox" /> She identified and reported on newly collected fungi, arriving from abroad as well as from the UK, and in total worked in the museum's cryptogamic herbarium from 1892 until 1933.<ref name="ox" /> She published various papers from 1895 to 1920.<ref name="ox" />

Smith led a lichen survey of Clare Island, which was outside Clew Bay in Ireland, in 1910 and 1911. The Clare Island Survey involved not only Irish but also several European scientists who were all looking at different aspects of the island's natural history. The team were credited with the first project aimed at characterising a particular biogeographic area.<ref name="Ask About Ireland - Irish Scientists">{{cite web|title= Ask About Ireland - Irish Scientists - Matilda Knowles| url=http://www.askaboutireland.ie/reading-room/life-society/science-technology/irish-scientists/knowles-matilda/|website=Ask About Ireland - Irish Scientists|access-date=2 November 2014}}</ref> In 1921 Smith wrote the illustrated ''Handbook of British Lichens'' which was a key to all known British lichens. In the same year ''Lichens'' was published and was quickly established as a classic text.

== Honours == In December 1904 she was elected one of the first women Fellows of the Linnaean Society (others included Ethel Sargant and Margaret Jane Benson) after a change in the society's bye-laws.<ref name="ox" /> She was later a member of their council (1918 -1921).<ref name=":0" /> She was a founding member of the British Mycological Society and was the president twice (1907, 1917).<ref name=":0" /> In 1931, when she was nearly seventy-seven, she was awarded a civil list pension "in recognition of her services to botanical science" and she retired the following year. In 1934 came an OBE: "Miss Annie Lorrain-Smith, F. L. S. for contributions to mycology and lichenology."<ref>{{London Gazette|issue=34056|pages=3564–3565|date=1 June 1934}}</ref>

== Other information == She was committed to the cause of women's suffrage and women's rights and enjoyed foreign travel.<ref name="ox" /> She lived with her older sister for 50 years and was affected by her death in 1933.<ref name="ox" /> Lorrain Smith retired in 1934 and died in London in 1937.<ref name="ox" />

== Eponymous taxa == The lichenised fungus ''Verrucaria lorrain-smithiae'' was named after her by Matilda Cullen Knowles.<ref name=":0" />

==Selected publications== *{{cite book|last2=Smith|first2=Annie Lorrain|last1=Crombie|first1=James M.|authorlink1=James Mascall Morrison Crombie|title=A Monograph of Lichens Found in Britain: Being a Descriptive Catalogue of the Species in the Herbarium of the British Museum, Part 1|year=1894|location=London|publisher=British Museum (Natural History)|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=USJVAAAAMAAJ}} *{{cite book|last1=Wrigley|first1=M.|last2=Smith|first2=Annie Lorrain|title=Studies of Trees and Flowers|date=1911|publisher=Methuen|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gyMyAQAAMAAJ}} *{{cite book|last1=Smith|first1=Annie Lorrain|last2=Crombie|first2=James M.|title=A Monograph of Lichens Found in Britain: Being a Descriptive Catalogue of the Species in the Herbarium of the British Museum, Volume 2|date=1911|publisher=London, Trustees of the British Museum|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fvZ_3mE0ZwAC}} *{{cite book|last1=Smith|first1=Annie Lorrain|title=Lichens|date=1921|publisher=University Press|url=https://archive.org/details/lichenssmith00smitiala}} *Smith, Annie Lorrain (1921). ''Handbook of the British lichens''. British Museum.

==References== {{reflist}}

==External links== {{Commons category-inline|Annie Lorrain Smith}}

*[http://archive.scotsman.com/ ''The Scotsman'' archives] *[https://web.archive.org/web/20060901045713/http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/pdf/manton.pdf ''The Admission of Ladies'' - postscript to a Linnaean Society biography of Irene Manton by Barry Leadbetter (Blackwell 2004)]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Annie Lorrain}} Category:British lichenologists Category:Women lichenologists Category:1854 births Category:1937 deaths Category:British suffragists Category:British women botanists Category:British taxonomists Category:Women taxonomists Category:Women mycologists Category:Employees of the Natural History Museum, London Category:19th-century British botanists Category:20th-century British biologists Category:20th-century British women biologists Category:19th-century British women scientists Category:Officers of the Order of the British Empire Category:British women civil rights activists