Anna Ruth Brummett Papers, 1952, 1957 (1969-83)-1985, n.d.
| Oberlin College Archives
Administrative/Biographical History
Anna Ruth Brummett, daughter of James H. and Lila M. Brummett, was born in Fort Smith, Arkansas on March 25, 1924. She graduated from Forth Smith High School in 1942, receiving the AA degree from Fort Smith Junior College in 1946, the B.A. with honors from the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville in 1948, and the MA from the same university in 1949. From 1949 to 1953, she attended graduate school in biology at Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania. In her doctoral work under embryologist Jane M. Oppenheimer (b. 1911), she applied a new carbon marking technique to the study of early vertebrate morphogenesis. She received the Ph. D. from Bryn Mawr in 1953.
Brummett's teaching career spanned thirty-three years. She held the position of Instructor in Biology at Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania from 1952 to 1953 before accepting an appointment at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. There, she served as Instructor (1953-56) and Assistant Professor of Biology (1956-61). In 1961, she joined the faculty of Oberlin College as Assistant Professor of Biology and was promoted to the rank of Associate Professor in 1967 and to Professor in 1973. Her course offerings at Oberlin included Developmental Biology, Cells and Tissues, and instruction in electronmicroscopy. For students following the "premed" curriculum, she was the most sought-after academic adviser in the department.
During her years at Oberlin, Brummett held several administrative positions and served on many of the important elected committees of the college. In 1967, she was named Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences for Academic Counseling, a newly-created post which she held only for one year. She served as Acting Chairperson (1969-70) and as Chairperson (1974-81 ; 1982-83) of the Biology Department. From 1974 to 1985, she was a member of the College Faculty Council and from 1977-83 served on the General Faculty Planning Committee. During the year 1982-83, she was elected to represent the faculty on the Board of Trustees Development Committee. She chaired the ad hoc faculty Committee on Grading (1969-70) and the Committee to Review Election Procedures (1979-80). Perhaps her most enduring contribution to the college was her service as the first Chairperson of the Committee on the Status of Women (1971-76). In that capacity, she helped to prepare the 1972 report to President Robert W. Fuller (b. 1936), "Final Disposition of the Twenty-Two Recommendations Made by the Ad Hoc Committee on the Status of Women," which advocated making the ad hoc committee a permanent standing committee. The report also brought before the college's governing bodies the issue of economic fairness to its women employees.
Anna Ruth Brummett's research in the early embryology of bony fishes won international recognition. Her scholarly publications were based upon collaborative research conducted at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee (two academic years and nine summers) and at the Duke University Marine Laboratory in Beaufort, North Carolina (one academic year and thirteen summers). She also carried out research at the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole, Massachusetts, the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil, the University of South Carolina in Columbia, and at other universities and marine research institutes.
In addition to her teaching, research, and administrative duties, Brummett supported the cause of science education at the national level. She served for seven years as a reader of Advanced Placement Examinations in Biology for the Educational Testing Service. She sat on the Phi Beta Kappa Qualifications Committee of the United Chapters of Phi Beta Kappa (1971-79) and on several committees of the College Board: the Biology Achievement Committee (1975-82), the Academic Advisory Committee for Biology (1978-80), and the Science Advisory Committee (1980-83). She was Chairman of the Board's Biology Achievement Committee from 1979 to 1983. Brummett was a member of the American Society of Zoologists, the Ohio Academy of Science, the New York Academy of Science, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Society for Developmental Biology, the American Society of Cell Biology, the American Association of University Professors, and the American Association of University Women.
In 1983, Professor Brummett began receiving radiation treatments and chemotherapy. She continued to teach and to meet her professional obligations until the spring of 1985. Anna Ruth Brummett died of cancer in Oberlin on October 21, 1985, survived by her sisters, Margaret Fletcher of Panama City, Florida, and Lila Mae Lehner of Fort Smith, Arkansas.
Sources Consulted
Records of the Office of the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences (RG 9).
Staff File of Anna Ruth Brummett (RG 28).
Author: Valerie S. Komor Subjects (links to similar collections) Forms of Material (links to similar genres) Administrative InformationConsult Record Group 33 for records of college committees. Record Group 9, Office of the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, contains minutes of College Faculty Council meetings, faculty committee files, Biology Department records, and inactive personnel records. There is no documentation in Record Group 9 of Brummett's term (1967-68) as Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences for Academic Counseling.
For the papers of zoologist Hope Hibbard (1893-1988), who taught at Oberlin College from 1928 to 1961, consult Record Group 30/147.
The papers of Oberlin biology professor, Anna Ruth Brummett, mainly document Brummett's service on various college committees. Records of her college-wide and departmental activities reveal Brummett's commitment to equal professional status for men and women and a special interest in promoting science education for women. Notably absent from this collection are Brummett's teaching materials and personal papers.
The collection is organized into four records series: I. Correspondence; II. Council and Committee Files; III. Miscellaneous Files; and IV. Writings. Within series, files are typically arranged chronologically or alphabetically by type of material or topic.
The bulk of the Brummett papers consists of minutes, memoranda, reports, and notes relating to meetings of various college councils and committees on which Brummett served. The most important of these is the College Faculty Council, an elected body. Faculty Council files (1974-85) mainly relate to faculty appointments and reappointments and often contain Brummett's annotations and breakdown of the voting. Also present are records of Brummett's service on the Committee to Review Election Procedures (1977-80), that is, elections to the College Faculty Council, General Faculty Council, and the Educational Plans and Policies Committee. These files include completed questionnaires sent in by faculty. Brummett's work on the General Faculty Planning Committee (1977-83) is also well documented.
The remainder of Brummett's committee files demonstrate her support for equitable personnel policies for faculty and staff and for a vital academic curriculum. Committees represented include the Committee on the Status of Women (1967-83); the Committee to Review Grievance Procedures (1974-75); the Committee to Review Salary Policy (1979), and the Long-Range Planning Committee (1977). Committee files relating to student life and academic programs include the ad hoc Committee on Grading (1969-70), the Admissions Committee (1984-85), the Learning Resources Committee (1973-77), and program review files for the African-American Community and Student Development Program and the Physical Education Department. Related materials, housed in Series III, include numerous Winter Term project evaluations, prepared by students working under Brummett, and a file of correspondence between Brummett and Oberlin College librarians pertaining to the acquisition of certain biology journals for the science library.
The balance of the collection includes a sampling of Brummett's professional correspondence (1963-85) and writings (1952-1985) . Letters, in original and file copy, mainly concern the scheduling of lectures or research work at various institutions. Brummett's writings are represented here by a carbon draft of her Ph.D. thesis (1952), journal offprints, including a bibliography of her articles to 1983, research notes, and drafts for speeches.
SERIES DESCRIPTIONS
Series I. Correspondence, 1963-85 (0.2 l.f.)
Incoming and outgoing professional correspondence, chronologically arranged.
Includes one folder of correspondence (1975-85) between Brummett and former students.
Series II. Council and Committee Files, 1969-85 (2.8 l.f.)
Council and committee files, organized into two subseries in order of importance:
Subseries 1. College Faculty Council Files; and 2. Committee Files. These files may duplicate main divisional holdings and records of college committees in Record Group 33 but are maintained in this collection as they have been annotated by Anna Ruth Brummett.
Subseries 1. College Faculty Council Files, 1974-85
Minutes, memoranda, meeting agendas, ms. notes, and attached and related materials pertaining to meetings of the Oberlin College Faculty Council. Arranged chronologically, as created and received.
Subseries 2. Committee Files, 1969-85
Minutes, memoranda, meeting agendas, correspondence, reports, budget sheets, charts, questionnaires, and ms. notes pertaining to Brummett's service on and chairmanship of various ad hoc committees. Arranged alphabetically by committee.
Series III. Miscellaneous Files, 1969-85 (0.8 l.f.)
Correspondence, memoranda, newsletters, printed materials, and ms. notes, arranged alphabetically by name or topic.
Series IV. Writings, 1952, 1957-85, n.d. (0.2 I.f.)
Carbon draft (annotated) of Ph.D. thesis, typescript drafts of speeches with attached correspondence, journal offprints, and 4 x 6 cards containing research notes and drawings.
INVENTORY
Series I. Correspondence, 1963-85
Box 1
Correspondence, 1963-85 (4f)
Series II. Council and Committee Files, 1969-85
Subseries 1. College Faculty Council Files, 1974-85
Box 2
College Faculty Council (minutes,
memoranda, notes), 1974-77 (6f)
Box 3
College Faculty Council (minutes,
memoranda, notes), 1978-83 (6f)
Box 4
College Faculty Council (minutes,
memoranda, notes), 1983-85 (5f)
Subseries 2. Committee Files, 1969-85
Box 5
Ad Hoc Committee on Grading,
1969-70 (6f)
Admissions Committee (applicant
interviews), 1984-85 *
[Restricted: Permission of
Archivist Required]
Admissions Outlook, Report by the
Special Committee on, 1972
African-American Community and Student
Development Program (AACSDP):
College Faculty Council subcommittee
review of, 1972-75
Box 6
Committee on the Status of Women,
1967-83 (8f)
Committee to Review Election Procedures,
1977-80 (2f)
Box 7
Committee to Review Grievance Procedures,
1974-75
Committee to Review Salary Policy, 1979 (2f)
Educational Plans and Policies Subcommittee
on Physical Education Dept.
Review, 1973 (2f)
General Faculty Planning Committee,
1977-83 (4f)
Box 8
Health Plan Board, 1977-80 (2f)
Learning Resources Committee, 1973-77 (2f)
Long-Range Planning Committee, 1977 (2f)
Series III. Miscellaneous Files, 1969-85
Box 9
American Society of Zoologists, 1982
American Association of University Women, 1975-83
Biology Department journals: acquisition of, 1972-82
The College Board, 1983
Peek, Booker, 1981-85
United Chapters of Phi Beta Kappa, Qualifications
Committee, 1973-79 (3f)
Box 10
Winter Term projects in biology (descriptions and
evaluations of), 1969-85 (12f)
Women in Science Career Workshop at Oberlin,
1976-78 (2f)
Series IV. Writings, 1952, 1957-85, n.d.
Box 11
Dissertation (carbon draft), "The Relationships of
the Germ Ring ... ," 1952
Journal offprints, 1969-85
Research notes, n.d.
Speeches (ms. drafts of), 1957-77, n.d. (2f)