U.S. Congressman Bruce Westerman is honoring notable women from Arkansas’s Fourth District each Friday during Women’s History Month. The congressman remembered Dr. Mary L. Good of Kirby on Friday the 15th.
Dr. Good originally intended to become a home economics teacher, but she grew interested in chemistry during her freshman year in college and changed her major.
At only 19, as an atomic energy research assistant, she received her first Q-level government clearance, and went on to work on processes of solvent extraction of metal complexes.
Dr. Good taught for 25 years at Louisiana State University and the University of New Orleans, and became the Boyd Professor of Chemistry at New Orleans, the first woman to hold that distinguished rank. She later held government positions under the administrations of four presidents, and in 1988, she became the first woman to chair the National Science Foundation’s board.
Congressman Westerman says Dr. Good’s brilliant mind and strong work ethic are an inspiration to all Arkansans.