Background
She was born on April 26, 1836 at Marcellus, New York, United States, the daughter of Joseph Platt.
(This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)
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She was born on April 26, 1836 at Marcellus, New York, United States, the daughter of Joseph Platt.
She attended the Troy Female Seminary at Troy, New York, and was graduated in 1853. She studied crystallography at Strasburg, German language and literature at Heidelberg. She also graduated from Bergakademie at Freiberg.
Her interest in geology and botany, which she had demonstrated from childhood, did not wane, however, and received new impetus when she took advantage of an opportunity to study geology, mineralogy, crystallography, and other branches of science, while educating her four sons in Germany. She visited and investigated the amber industry on the coast of the Baltic Sea.
Upon her return to the United States she lectured on scientific and cultural subjects and attained a reputation for lucid and eloquent address. She became interested in the New York Indians of her neighborhood, and was led to study ethnology. In 1880 she received an appointment on the staff of the Bureau of American Ethnology of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, District of Columbia. The director, John Wesley Powell, detailed her to study the language, customs, and myths of the Iroquois Indians.
She spent two summers among the Tuscaroras in Canada. The Tuscaroras adopted her as a member of the tribe, giving her the name "Beautiful Flower. " Her book, Myths of the Iroquois, published in the Second Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology in 1883, was an outgrowth of these studies of tales which she obtained from older informants possessing the fastfading lore of the tribe.
She held the secretaryship of the section of anthropology at the time of her death in 1886.
Erminnie Smith gathered one of the largest collections of minerals in the United States. She completed an Iroquois-English dictionary, published famous book, Myths of the Iroquoisthe, that was the first to base on tales of Tuscaroras. In recognition of her attainments she was the first woman to be elected a fellow of the New York Academy of Sciences. She founded the Aesthetic Society of New Jersey and became the first president. One of the pioneers of the woman's movement, she was very active in promoting the organization of cultural societies and clubs. In 1883 a geological prize was founded in her honor at Vassar College.
(This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)
She became a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She was a member of the London Scientific Society, Numismatic and Antiquarian Society of Philadelphia, and others.
In 1854 she was married to Simeon H. Smith, of Jersey City, New Jersey. They had four children.
