Agnes Borrowman

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Agnes Borrowman (7 October 1881 – 20 August 1955) was a Scottish pharmaceutical chemist. In 1924 she became the first woman to serve on the

Pharmaceutical Society's Board of Examiners.[1]

Early life and education

Agnes Thomson Borrowman was born on 7 October 1881, at Penicuik, Midlothian, Scotland to Margaret Davidson Borrowman and Peter Borrowman, a farm bailiff.[2]

Her father secured her a four-year apprenticeship with pharmacist Mr D.F. Johnstone in Melrose, but as a woman she had to stay out of sight of customers “lest the prestige of the business should suffer.”

Pharmaceutical Society (PSGB) Minor exam in 1903 at York Place, the PSGB's North British Branch headquarters.[3][5]

She then moved to England, first to Runcorn where she worked for three years managing a pharmacy for Mr J.H. Weston.

Pharmaceutical Journal, and also had a piece published on ‘Cinchonidine and Cinchonine in a Sample of Quinine."[4]

Having subsequently spent three years working for Mr J Beetham Wilson in Dorking, she had saved enough to fulfil her ambition to take the higher PSGB Major exam. She studied at the PSGB

School of Pharmacy in Bloomsbury Square, London and registered as a Pharmaceutical Chemist on 6 April 1909.[3]

Career

After registration, Borrowman was appointed research assistant to Professor Greenish at the

Agricultural Hall, Islington in 1912.[4] During this period, she also attended classes four evenings each week at Borough Poytechnic, Chelsea Polytechnic, and the Cass Institute. She devoted the other nights to reading and searching specifications at the Patent Office library.[4] She also carried out practical work on the 1911 British Pharmaceutical Codex, and later contributed to its 1923 edition.[5]

On her father's death in 1913, the need to contribute financially to support her family meant that she moved back to retail pharmacy, as her research role was poorly paid.

Pharmaceutical Journal
on 10 December 1917 "During the last ten years women in pharmacy have proved by their college careers that they have enthusiasm, that they intend to take first place, that nothing less will satisfy them. Unless I am very much mistaken, the same enthusiasm and determination will carry them through in the business world into which this war [World War One] has given them the entry."

She became the sole proprietor of the business after the First World War. By 1923, of the 15 girls trained at 17 The Pavement who studied at the PSGB

School of Pharmacy, 14 had taken prizes and scholarships. Under Borrowman's leadership, the business was staffed entirely by women. Based on her earlier experiences, virtually everything was made on the premises, and her staff wore her own design of distinctive shop dress with sage green cuffs and collar, in an attempt to overcome prejudice against women pharmacists by presenting a professional appearance.[7]

During World War Two, she carried out fire-watching duties.[5] In January 1945, a V2 bomb fell close to the pharmacy in Clapham, and badly damaged the building, probably with Borrowman inside in the air raid shelter that she had had constructed in the old cellars. Borrowman was “severely shaken” and rested away from London.[5] She later reflected how "irksome" it was to stand back when her nerves failed her.[5] In the same year, she converted the business into a limited company with Miss H.F. Wells and herself as directors.[3] Miss Wells had served her apprenticeship with Miss Borrowman in 1918. The business was described in a 1954 article: “High pharmaceutical standards, judicious arrangement and sheer good housekeeping make the pharmacy a pattern to others, and keep it high in the traditions of its illustrious founder.”[3]

Professional contributions

Miss Borrowman was associated with the (National) Association of Women Pharmacists from its foundation in 1905.[4] She held numerous committee roles: for the South West Chemists’ Association including as President (1929–31);[4] for the South West PSGB Branch;[4] as vice-president of her local branch of the Retail Pharmacists’ Union;[4] and as a member of the Pharmacy sub-committee of the British Pharmaceutical Codex Revision Committee (1934–37), the first woman to be appointed to this body.[5] She was the first female member of the Pharmaceutical Society's Board of Examiners from 1924 until her resignation in 1937 when she felt that she wasn't able to keep up to date with current pharmaceutics.[3] She surrendered her membership of the British Pharmaceutical Codex Revision Committee at the same time.[3]

Later life and death

Borrowman died on 20 August 1955 in a nursing home at 27 Lawrie Park Road, Sydenham, aged 73.

South London Crematorium, Streatham Vale on 24 August 1955 was attended by Lady Jephcott, Sir Hugh and Lady Linstead, Dr Jack Rowson, Miss HF Wells and the staff of the pharmacy.[5]

Borrowman was clearly a formidable and determined character, described in 1954 as having a "robust independence of outlook, accepting nothing that wilts under the probing beam of logic."[3] In her obituary, it was stated that “Even in her last few weeks she remained a fighter, and during spells of consciousness would talk of people and things connected with her earlier days in the business for which she had lived and fought for forty years.”[5] An anonymous tribute to her concluded “she appeared to have an almost indestructible vitality. That she has not lived to any great age is in itself a commentary upon the lavish manner in which she dispersed that vitality.”[5]

In 2019 she was added to the

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.[2]

See also

References

  1. OCLC 464125862
    .
  2. ^
    OCLC 56568095.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link
    )
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h "Agnes T.Borrowman Ph.C.". The Chemist and Druggist. 161: 35. 1954.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m "Agnes Borrowman". The Pharmaceutical Journal: 625. 15 December 1923.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n "Obituary". Pharmaceutical Journal. 175: 155. 27 August 1955.
  6. PMID 11630805
    .
  7. OCLC 1044743584
    .
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