The 90-year-old colour chemist on overcoming discrimination and the three loves of her life; Latin, chemistry and Italian opera
Mary Virginia Orna is a chemist, historian of science and professor emerita of the College of New Rochelle in New York, USA – where she taught for 40 years. She is a pioneer in the field of colour and pigment chemistry and the author of many books and papers on the subject. In 2021 she was awarded the HIST Award for Outstanding Achievement in the History of Chemistry from the American Chemical Society. Orna is also a member of the Ursulines of the Roman Union.
When I was 10 years old, my younger brother received a chemistry set for Christmas, and I received a doll (chemistry sets were not normally gifted to girls in the 1930s). This upset me very much – I grabbed the chemistry set, went off to my room and started to explore the mysteries and wonders of it.
In those days, a chemistry set was a wild thing. You got an alcohol lamp you could light yourself, and you could carry out experiments like burning sulfur and magnesium, which they don’t allow today – I really messed up my room, but I was hooked. If I did not have a brother, I would never have been introduced to chemistry.
I went to a Catholic school where I had to take Latin. When I was first introduced to it, I was absolutely blown away by the magnificent order in the language. It was so fascinating that I devoured my first-year Latin book and had mastered it within three weeks of the course, which was supposed to last the entire year.
I was a senior in high school at the age of 15 and it was then that I was introduced to my first chemistry course, and that blew me away as well. I absolutely fell in love with it again. The problem was, I was also in love with Latin.
When I went off to college I was torn about whether I was going to major in Latin or chemistry. My mother, being a very practical sort, asked me: ‘Well, when you graduate, what would you do with Latin, and what would you do with chemistry?’ Being an independent sort, I didn’t envision depending on someone else for the rest of my life and so I said: ‘Well, I guess it’s chemistry’.
I never did go back to a formal study of Latin, but I could indulge in it whenever I wanted; there was a book called ‘Winnie Ille Pu’ - Winnie the Pooh in Latin – and I just loved reading it.
I developed a third love when my father decided to grace the family with a rather exotic instrument – a record player that you could play 33 1/3 rpm records on. My younger sister and I used to love to listen to the Italian operas – we didn’t know what we were listening to, but we memorised them.
I had set my sights on medical school, but I discovered there was no way I would ever go because my parents were not well off and there were no scholarships at the time. There were, however, assistantships to go to graduate school.
I applied to both Princeton and Rutgers but discovered that neither admitted women into their graduate programmes, let alone their undergraduate programmes. So I went across the river to New York, because I got an offer and a very hefty stipend for my assistantship at Fordham University, in the Bronx.
I never really questioned the idea of women not being admitted to a state university that was supported by everyone’s taxes until later on. It’s kind of ironic now that the president of Princeton is a woman.
I spent two and a half years learning how to become a nun
I never had any intention of teaching when I started graduate school, but in my third year a telephone call came into the head of chemistry from a nearby Catholic school run by Ursuline nuns who were looking for a substitute teacher. I was the only one who could meet that need, so I went (unwillingly, prodded by my department chair) over there, and the first question the headmistress asked me was, ‘What salary do you want?’ I decided I’d name a very high figure, thinking they would never accept it, but she said ‘OK!’
I threw myself into it – it really ate into my time in the research lab – but I loved it. It felt like I was coming home to something that I never knew existed before.
I realised that I had a religious vocation, and I ended up applying to enter the Ursuline order. I went away to Europe for six weeks to travel in the summertime, after I got my doctorate, and then I entered the Ursulines in the fall. I spent the next two and a half years, without any chemistry, learning how to become a nun.
At the College of New Rochelle, my first teaching assignment, there was a very large art department and students were required to take a science course as part of their undergraduate training. The head of the art department suggested I look into developing a course that art majors could take where they wouldn’t be trembling in their boots every time they walked into class. I took a sabbatical for a year and at the end I felt able to design a course called ‘The molecular basis of form and colour’– I was a pioneer, because no one had done that kind of thing before.
One of my most valued achievements is producing a series of books called ChemSource, aimed at helping teachers who are not well versed in chemistry, and yet are thrown into the classroom to teach chemistry, to do it with pride and with ease.
The biggest career challenge for me was discrimination. I remember applying for a job in the chemical industry and I was given an interview by two men who asked me very silly questions, and I could tell that they were just doing it for their entertainment. It made me realise that there was a lot that women were up against. I was very fortunate that I went to an all-women’s college – I might not have survived in another environment.
I’ve had 28 crossword puzzles published in the New York Times and several hundred more published in a variety of scientific journals and magazines – this was a hobby I developed based on my love of Latin.
These days, I live in a senior citizen complex and I enjoy cooking – I cook big batches of soup and then I deploy this in containers out to a lot of people in the complex so they can enjoy a good, homemade soup – I’m always looking out for a new recipe.
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