Legacy

Abstract

Edith stayed in Bournemouth following Florence’s death, travelling to London and sometimes to Cambridge for meetings. In 1934 she paid a visit to her relatives in Australia. There was considerable press interest in her visit, during which she spoke at the meeting of the National Federation of University Women in Adelaide. She met her nephews, Gerald and Archie, and their families in Melbourne and in Brisbane. Here she met her two great nieces, namesakes Edith and Florence, and gave them bicycles, remembering her pleasure as a cyclist as a girl. Returning to England, she funded the ‘Johnstone and Florence Stoney Studentship’ with the British Federation of University Women, to support women scientists to carry out research in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. She eventually placed £4500 in this fund. She also contributed to the work of the Marie Curie Hospital by donating £1000 for diagnostic X-ray equipment, in memory of her sister. Edith Stoney died on 25 June 1938, her life widely admired in obituaries. In her will, she bequeathed another studentship in the names of her father and sister to support a Newnham physicist to study medicine at the London School of Medicine for Women.