User:TheBlueWizard/Florence Meier Chase

Florence Meier Chase (1902 - May 6, 1978) was an American botanist who researched the interaction of sunlight and algae at the Smithsonian. Dr. Chase received her B.A. from Wellesley College and her Ph.D. from the University of Geneva in Switzerland. She was a research assistant at the botany department at Columbia University before moving to Washington, D.C..

In Washington, she worked for the Smithsonian Institution at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, where she studied photosynthesis. She was a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and an honorary member of the Washington Botanical Society. She was married to Dr. William Wiley Chase.

Life changing injury
While showing the visitors around in the Smithsonian Castle on February 14, 1937, Dr. Meier stepped back, and forgetting that the trap door was open behind her, fell down through it to the floor below, and broke her back. She was taken to Garfield Memorial Hospital. At the hospital, she would be cared for by Dr. William Wiley Chase, the head of the surgery department. This was the first meeting of the two, whom would eventually marry.