American Chemical Society honors Professor Emerita Bojan Jennings

The American Chemical Society (ACS) announced that it will honor Bojan Hamlin Jennings, Professor Emerita of Chemistry, with the distinguished ACS Award for Encouraging Women into Careers in the Chemical Sciences at the group's national meeting in Chicago in March.

''As I was thinking about why I thought I had any influence--if I did--on students' choice of a career in chemistry or related sciences, I recalled what several alums have said to me over the years,'' Jennings recalled. ''The gist is that they could see for themselves that I was married, had kids, and seemed relatively normal. They could see for themselves that marriage and a career (in my case, chemistry) were not incompatible, with a little bit of luck. They probably also could see that not the least in the equation was my husband, Addison, a model of support.''

The ACS award is accompanied by a $10,000 gift to Wheaton from The Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation and a $5,000 award to Jennings, which she plans to donate to the college.

Jennings began her career at Wheaton in 1943 after receiving her bachelor's degree at Bryn Mawr College and a master's degree at Radcliffe. She earned a Ph.D. at Harvard in 1955. During World War II, Jennings recalled, opportunities for women in the sciences--and in higher education--were more plentiful as so many men, including her husband, enlisted in the military.

''[The late Chemistry Professor] Mildred Evans interviewed me, then let me wander around campus. I fell in love with Wheaton instantly,'' she said. ''I was hired that same day.''

Her tenure in Wheaton's Chemistry Department was one of innovation and opportunity in student research. She was instrumental in establishing a rigorous chemistry major, and saw it approved by ACS in 1955. In the 1980s, she designed the major in biochemistry, with a full year of physical chemistry included. She developed the ''Senior Seminar in Chemistry'' to teach critical reading of primary literature, and published research papers with several students.

In 1959 she won one of Wheaton's first summer research grants--$2,190 from Research Corporation--that allowed Suzy Purrington '60 to gain valuable experience in the lab.

''I met Dr. Jennings when I was a junior taking advanced inorganic chemistry; she was a dynamic teacher and had me hooked by the end of the school year,'' Purrington wrote to the ACS in nomination of Jennings. ''As a result of the research experience and the strong education that I received at Wheaton, she encouraged me to apply to graduate school. I went to Harvard and obtained my Ph. D. in 1963 under the direction of Professor Paul D. Bartlett, the same mentor that Dr. Jennings had had. After a postdoctoral stint at Duke University, I taught at two small Raleigh colleges before joining the chemistry faculty at North Carolina State University, where I had a successful career for 25 years.''

It's estimated that Jennings encouraged more than 150 chemistry majors at Wheaton, at least 30 of whom went on to doctoral work in the sciences. Among those are Donna S. Amenta '65, professor and head of the Chemistry Department at James Madison University and Elita Pastra-Landis '69 of Wheaton's Chemistry Department. They also nominated Jennings for the ACS award.

''Professor Jennings is a dynamic and gifted teacher whose seemingly inexhaustible energy has been devoted unselfishly to developing students to their fullest potential and aspirations,'' Amenta said. ''Learning from her was an active experience with a message that rang clear that chemistry was alive and not a stagnant pool of knowledge.''

Pastra-Landis called Jennings a ''model woman of endless energy, initiative and compassion.... Bojan was a ball of fire, her office and lab a center of energy. Her expectations were high of herself and others, though she did not suffer fools easily; she praised effort and admonished indolence.''

Although Jennings retired in 1985, she didn't leave Wheaton. A faculty chair in chemistry bears her name, and each year she hosts a group of chemistry majors in her home to discuss their research and interests in the field. Still, she is reluctant to claim a legacy at Wheaton without acknowledging those who came before her.

''I inherited a great legacy from the strong, wise, and helpful women from whom I learned the rudiments of teaching young women and with whom I worked in Wheaton's Chemistry Department for many years: Mildred Evans and Maud Marshal,'' Jennings said. ''They were the pioneers who earned their advanced degrees in chemistry and went on to their productive careers at a time when such things were almost unheard of. Wheaton was one of the few academic institutions where they were welcomed, and they influenced many Wheaton students in their day.

''It was the sustaining friendships that grew between many of my students and me that fed my enthusiasm to encourage more of them. They, in turn, are doing the exact same thing with their students. That is important to emphasize.''