Jane Blankenship

Jane Blankenship won high science honors while at Oak Ridge High School before graduating in June 1958 from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville with a B.S. in chemistry. She worked summers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, where her father Dr. Forrest F. Blankenship was a physical chemist, and then married Carl H. Gibson, a chemical engineer, and became employed as a spectroscopist for Lockheed Research Laboratory in Palo Alto, California.
Life and Times.
Jane Carruth Blankenship and twin sister Elizabeth Ann Blankenship were born on June 20, 1936 in Paris, Texas to Forrest Farley Blankenship and Margaret Berry Burke.
Forrest Blankenship entered college at the age of 14 and had obtained his Bachelor and Master of Science degrees at the University of Texas by the age of 19. He then became head of the sciences department at Paris Junior College. He alternately taught at PJC to support his young family and pursued graduate studies at the University of Chicago and University of Texas. He earned his Doctor of Philosophy degree in physical chemistry at the University of Texas in Austin in 1943. Margaret Burke was a hometown Paris girl who was a student and valedictorian at Paris Junior College. The pair met on the tennis courts which led to romance, marriage and a lifetime of tennis rivalry.
The family moved to Norman Oklahoma where Dr. Blankenship joined the faculty in the chemistry department. Jane enjoyed the articles in Science News available in her classroom and at age 7 decided she wanted to become a scientist. She loved to read and learn everything she could about the sciences and whenever her schools offered a Science Fair she developed and entered a project.
When Jane was age 15 Dr. Blankenship accepted a position at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN. As a senior at Oak Ridge High School Jane was a winner of the regional science fair and a finalist at the National Science Fair in 1954. She also entered the Westinghouse Science Talent Search and won honorable mention in the national competition. The application included conducting a research project at home, writing a scientific paper and taking nationally competitive exam.
Jane attended University of Tennessee and graduated in 1958 with a major in physical chemistry and a minor in math. During her undergraduate years, Jane worked summers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Jane married Carl H. Gibson on May 31, 1958 and they went to Palo Alto, CA. Carl pursued graduate studies at Stanford University in the chemical engineering department studying turbulent mixing on a National Engineering fellowship (post sputnik).
Jane accepted a position at Lockheed Research Laboratory adjacent to the Stanford campus. There she performed spectroscopic studies of species in high temperature air using a shock tube. Soon she enrolled in a master's program at Stanford because she wanted to study quantum mechanics and continued to work at Lockheed.
Jane and Carl were very interested in President Kennedy's proposal to start the Peace Corps. They took the application screening test when it was first offered. To their surprise they were invited to be in the first Peace Corps group to be fielded (Ghana). This was in April 1962 and they were still in the middle of getting their theses approved. They had to decline saying they would not be available until June. The Peace Corps responded with an assignment to Hyderabad, India where they would be lecturers at Osmania University.
In June 1962 Carl received his PhD in chemical engineering and Jane graduated with an MS in physical sciences. They set off immediately for two months of Peace Corps training at the University of Illinois. Carl and Jane value the two-year experience in India and knew once they were immersed with jobs and children the opportunity would be lost.
After a lengthy journey home from India (crossed the Indian Ocean on a freighter during Monsoon season, tour of East Africa by jeep, down the Nile River by paddle wheel boat, Egypt, Europe from Greece to the top of Finland) Carl visited many campuses and applied for post docs. They selected University of California San Diego (UCSD) which was just being formed (some graduate students but no undergraduates when they arrived in January 1965).
Time to start the family. Greg arrived March 1965 and sister Robin 19 months later in Dec 1966. Jane chose to enjoy parenting and took a hiatus from her career. Greg became a civil engineer and Robin earned a PhD in biochemistry at UCSD. Carl and Jane divorced in 1974.
Jane became a Staff Research Associate in Professor Donald Helinski's molecular biology lab at UCSD in 1975. There she learned to use restriction enzymes to delete and add genes to plasmid DNA in E-coli bacteria. In those days it was called "recombinant DNA".
In 1979 Jane transferred to General Atomics with the title Senior Scientist. She spent the rest of her career at GA working on various energy, fission and fusion research contracts.
Jane retired in June 2007 and is happily playing in San Diego. She is a photography enthusiast. She attends several lectures each week at UCSD under the auspices of the Osher Life-Long Learning Institute. She enjoys reading various journals to stay abreast of the latest science developments. Yes, she still reads Science News and is a fan of Tom Sigfried. Science Service has played an influential role in her life!
Hobbies have included scuba diving and a lot of tennis. Jane was always at home when backpacking in her beloved Sierra Nevada Mountains. Walking, hiking and camping in the wilderness is still a favorite pass time.
National Attention
In 1961, a news story was written regarding "sex desegregation" in the sciences and a photograph of her was utilized to illustrate the critical significance of inspiring women to pursue careers in science.
As of 2008 Professor David Kaiser of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology began offering a graduate level course titled "Cold War Science" that discussed the role women featured during the Cold War and included Jane Blankenship Gibson as an example.