Mary Shaw Shorb

She died in August 1990 from complications of pneumonia.

Before her retirement in 1972, Shorb and various co-authors published 58 papers in refereed journals as well as "numerous" popular articles. She and her students also presented papers at many, many professional society meetings and symposia.

In 1951, Hood Colleges designated her as an Outstanding Woman of Maryland. In 1957, Shorb received the Sigma Xi Research Award. Thirty years later she was inducted into the Maryland Women's Hall of Fame. She also became a Fellow of the New York Academy of Science and was honored by the American Association of University Women.

In 1949, the University of Maryland made Shorb a full research professor. Standing less than five feet tall, Shorb did not like to lecture, although she apparently possessed considerable charisma on a person-to-person level. She chose to work on problems that required a multidisciplinary approach long before that was "fashionable" or common. Thus, she drew graduate students to work in her lab from a number of departments at the University.

In 1949, Shorb and Karl Folkers shared the Mead Johnson Research Award for their work on vitamin B12. That year, Shorb also received the Hematology Research Foundation Award and was recognized as a Distinguished Alumna by the College of Idaho. The College later recognized her as an Outstanding Graduate (1966) and with an Honorary Doctor of Science award in 1983.

Any remote chance for more in-depth study at the Dairy bureau ended in 1946. Shorb was bumped from her position by a returning veteran.

She finally found a job as a social worker in Baltimore. Strictly a New Deal expedience position, it was hardly what Shorb had in mind when she decided on a scientific career. Thus, when the couple's first child, Barbara, was born in 1936, she decided to stay home. Two years later, their son Alan was born. Then, in 1942 their daughter Carole Elizabeth ("Betsy") was born.

By the time the money ran out on the grant, Shorb had decided to pursue a doctorate in immunology. By then she was married to childhood sweetheart Doys Shorb. Doys entered the Johns Hopkins graduate program in parasitology. Shorb received her Sc.D. from Hopkins in 1933.

For her doctoral dissertation, Shorb had developed an antigen that turned out to be a worthwhile treatment for pneumonia. In fact, for a while before the development of sulfa drugs in the late 1930s, her antigen was widely used for such treatments. So she had already proven her abilities to improve human health.

Shorb knew that the same liver extract required to culture LLD was also the only effective treatment for pernicious anemia. That disease earned the designation "pernicious" because it was almost invariably fatal, prior to the discovery of the raw liver treatment method in 1926. Even then, advanced cases might not respond. In fact, Mary's father-in-law had died from the disease. As with the yogurt culture media, no one knew what component of liver extract was the active ingredient. By the time Shorb took an interest, other researchers had only managed to separate the extract into active an inactive fractions. In theory, if you followed the prescribed procedure, the result would contain the active ingredient. That still did not tell you how much of the unknown substance you had. That could be determined only by treating a patient and observing how he or she responded.

Shorb graduated from Caldwell High School and started classes at the College of Idaho in 1924. Outside of her college schoolwork, she served as Director of a Founders Day celebration and as Editor of the college yearbook, The Trail. She graduated in 1928 with a B. S. degree in biology and a minor in Home Economics.

Mary Shaw Shorb (January 11, 1907 – August 18, 1990), a research scientist, was best known for the development of a bacteriological assay procedure for the chemical compound now known as Vitamin B12.

Mary Shaw was born on January 7, 1907, in Wahpeton, North Dakota, about forty miles south of Fargo. Her parents were Mary McKean and Ernest Shaw. The family moved to Caldwell, Idaho when Mary was three years old. She developed an early interest in biology through a neighbor and family friend, Dr. William Judson Boone. Founder and first President of the College of Idaho, Dr. Boone was a well-known botanist, and taught biology at the College. During fishing trips that turned into "teaching moments," he taught her about edible mushrooms and sparked a lifelong interest in native wildflowers.