Marjorie Harris Carr

Who was Marjorie Harris Carr?

Marjorie Harris Carr was an American environmental activist.

Born in Boston, Massachusetts, Harris was raised in rural Bonita Springs in southwest Florida, where her naturalist parents taught her how to identify the state's native flora and fauna. In 1936, she received a bachelor's degree in zoology from Florida State College for Women. Denied funding and/or admission to graduate programs in zoology and ornithology due to her gender, Harris took a position as the nation's first female wildlife technician shortly after completing her undergraduate degree. In 1942, with the assistance of her husband, pioneering conservation biologist Archie Carr, Marjorie Harris Carr completed a master's in zoology at the University of Florida, which was still officially an all-male institution. In the late 1940s, the Carrs lived in Honduras, where Archie taught at the Escuela Agrícola Panamericana Zamorano and conducted research on sea turtle migration. The Carrs explored the Honduran rainforest on horseback. Marjorie Carr completed thousands of scientific bird skins and later published her research on the birds of Honduras in the Wilson Bulletin and CEIBA: A Scientific and Technical Journal.