Clarke, Cora, 1851-1916

Cora Huidekoper Clarke was born in Meadville, Pa., on February 9th, 1851 to Anna Huidekoper (1814-1897) and James Freeman Clarke (1810-1897), a prominent Unitarian minister from Boston. Clarke lived with her family in Jamaica Plain, Mass., until after the death of her parents, at which time she removed to Boston.

Due to poor health, Clarke did not formally attend school until she was thirteen. Yet this did not impede her intellectual development as she went on, at the age of eighteen, to study horticulture in Newton, Mass., and went on to make notable contributions to the literature of entomology and botany. Despite the fact that Clarke was a woman operating in a male-dominated field, she was widely respected for her intelligence and capabilities. For example, Francis Parkman, an instructor of hers (in horticulture) at the Bussey Institution, said to her father, "Your daughter has qualities of the mind that most women do not possess."

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