The field of mathematics has been home to many great minds – indeed, perhaps some of the greatest minds that the world has ever seen. Statistics is no exception to this. It is unfortunate, however, that due to deep-rooted cultural and socio-political biases, rarely have we seen a female mathematician, particularly before the beginning of the 20th century. This is a great tragedy, as, in other fields, women have made some of the greatest contributions imaginable. Consider where we would be now if it were not for Cleopatra, Joan of Arc, Betsy Ross, Amelia Earhart, Marie Curie or Rosalind Franklin! One notable exception to the lack of a female presence in mathematics is Florence Nightingale. A great nurse, mathematician, and human being, Ms. Nightingale’s contributions to statistics were of invaluable aid to mankind for years to come, and continue to be relevant today.
Florence Nightingale was born on May 12, 1820 to William Edward Nightingale and Frances Nightingale in Florence, Italy. She took her birthplace as a first name. Her father was the heir of a lead mining empire on his mother’s side. She had one sister, Parthenope – also named after her place of birth – who went on to become a notable journalist. Unfortunately, little information is available about her mother, which is indicative of the greater patriarchal bias in modern history, but we can only assume that she was a great woman to have raised such productive and intelligent children. From a young age, Nightingale felt drawn to the profession of nursing. This was unusual for the time: her family was well-off and well-respected, and it was expected of her to become a wife and a mother and continue the family line. Ever the rebel, Nightingale shucked the burden of socio-political convention and decided to pursue the career that she felt the Lord was drawing her to. She rejected a marriage proposal put forth by Richard Mockton Milnes, an affluent poet and notable person of the time, as she wanted to be able to devote herself completely to helping her fellow man. She had to struggle to attain an education, but did so admirably, despite significant difficulty. In her youth, she travelled the world, sailing as far as Greece and Egypt. Her records of this time display particular literary aptitude, as well as Romantic philosophical inclinations, revering God and nature together as the zeniths of perfection.
Nursing would come to be her lifelong profession and calling. In August 1953, she became the superintendent of the Institute for the Care of Sick Gentlewomen in London, England, and a position that began her career and got her started in the world of healthcare. Her greatest achievements, however, took place with respect to her time helping the victims and soldiers of the Crimean War. In 1854, a year in to her time as superintendent, reports about the horrors of the battlefield in the war abroad began to make it back to the British mainland. Nightingale immediately immigrated to the Ottoman Empire to aid the British troops and care for the sick and suffering. At the time, hygienic protocol was poorly enforced, and adequate supplies of medication were few and far between. Equipment was in short supply and infectious epidemics were common. Nightingale sought to change this, and her first move was to write an op-ed piece for The Times deploring the horrendous conditions and entreating the government to devote more resources to the care of their wounded. Due to her personal reforms and the aid she secured from the government, it is estimated that she reduced the death rate of soldiers abroad from 42% down to a truly astonishing 2%. It is during this time that she acquired the name of “The Lady with the Lamp,” coming to be seen by the wounded soldiers as a sort of Angel of Mercy who came to relieve their suffering and ameliorate their living conditions.
Nightingale continued her career after the war and made significantly more contributions to the science of nursing. She established the Nightingale Training School at St. Thomas’ Hospital, which trained new nurses in the field, and wrote a treatise on the subject, called Notes on Nursing. Notes on Nursing came to be the foundation of nursing curriculum both at her own establishment and many more abroad that were founded later. It is considered to be a classic today, and it codified many of the common sense laws that had been known at the time. She later came to work in the obstetric branch of medicine and was awarded the Royal Red Cross in 1882 for her work.
Nightingale’s contributions to the field of statistics came in the form of more accurate and informative visual depictions of information. While she did not herself invent the pie chart, she popularized it, transforming what was a relatively unknown way of presenting data at the time into the wildly popular and common way we know it today. She invented what we now refer to as the “polar area diagram” – also referred to as the Nightingale rose diagram – essentially, a pie chart whose “slices” have areas proportionate to their relative size. Using statistics, she demonstrated the efficacy of increased sanitation in lowing mortality rates. Due to her reforms, the death rate among British soldiers in India fell from 69 to 18 per 1,000. In 1859, she was the first female member elected to the Royal Statistical Society, and she went on to later become an honorary member of the American Statistical Association.
Florence Nightingale is a formidable character in history. She made advances in the field of nursing which were at times almost unbelievable in their immense rates of success. She developed new tools in mathematics, and she discovered ways to use statistics to save human lives. She defied social and cultural convention to make great achievements despite adversity and the obstacles put in place of affluent women of the time who wanted to pursue a career. It is difficult to say where we would be today had she not had the courage to do so.
Works Cited
"The Institute of Our Lady of Mercy | Home." The Institute of Our Lady of Mercy. Web. 24 Apr. 2012. <http://www.ourladyofmercy.org.uk/>.
Nightingale, Florence, Mary O'Neil. Mundinger, Florence Nightingale, and Florence Nightingale. Florence Nightingale: Measuring Hospital Care Outcomes : Excerpts from the Books Notes on Matters Affecting the Health, Efficiency, and Hospital Administration of the British Army Founded Chiefly on the Experience of the Late War, and Notes on Hospitals. Oakbrook Terrace, IL: Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, 1999. Web. 24 Apr. 2012. <http://books.google.com/?id=dRpgFsQ7nqkC&pg=PA114&lpg=PA114&dq=sanitary+commissioner+Scutari>.
"Speaking of Graphics." DataScope. Web. 24 Apr. 2012. <http://www.datascope.be/sog.htm>.
