Elizabeth Losey

Losey was born in East Orange, New Jersey in 1912.[1] She went to high school in Lynn, Massachusetts.[1] She graduated from the University of Michigan with a degree in wildlife management and conservation in 1946.[2] Initially, Losey could not find work because she was a woman.[2] She worked as a research assistant for the University of Michigan until 1952.[1] She created a series of teaching aids in wildlife management, including the Outline of upland game bird management (1947).[3]

In 1947 she was employed by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service as a biologist at Seney National Wildlife Refuge.[4] Her assignment was to understand the importance of beavers in waterfowl management.[5] Losey was the first woman research biologist in the country.[1] She quit when she was told she was being transferred West, as by that time "romance had crept in".[6] She was only employed by the agency for three years, but built up a successful career as an ornithologist.[7] Rachel Carson recognized Losey's preparations for a manuscript on trumpeter swans as "an excellent job of organizing the material for an effective story".[7] In 1964 she published her observation of duck broods at the Seney National Wildlife Refuge.[8]

Losey travelled America and Canada taking photographs of fur trading posts and collecting Native American art, which was later donated to the DeVos Art Museum in Michigan.[9][6] Losey wrote two books. Let Them Be Remembered: The Story of the Fur Trade Forts, the story of the Hudson's Bay Company and the 1600 fur trade, was published in 1999.[10] Her second, Seney National Wildlife Refuge: its story, was published in 2003.[11] She remained a volunteer at Seney National Wildlife Refuge until her death in 2005.[2] She wrote her final peer-reviewed paper at the age of 92 on the history of the Sharp-tailed Grouse, which was published after her death.[12] She was a lifetime sponsor of Delta Waterfowl Foundation.[13] She is regarded as a pioneer in gender equality within fieldwork.[5]