Dixie Lee Bryant

Dixie Lee Bryant (1862–1949) was a geologist and educator.

Dixie Lee Bryant was born on January 7, 1862, in Louisville, Kentucky. After her family moved to Columbia, Tennessee in 1886, she enrolled in the Columbia Female Institute. Despite her desire to access a full college education, no Southern universities would admit her as a woman to their science programs. She submitted a thesis on the tide water region of the Charles River and was the first student (of any gender) to receive a Bachelor of Science in MIT's Course XII Geology department—now called Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences.

She taught natural science at the State Normal School at Plymouth, New Hampshire following her graduation prior to being hired to teach at the North Carolina State Normal Industrial School in Greensboro, in 1892. There, she taught botany, geology and chemistry, as well as tutoring many of the early students who entered the university with little prior education in the sciences. She led the science department until 1901, and presented at regional conferences on teaching technique and curriculum development. Described by former students as "A vigorous, wide-awake, well trained young woman," Bryant was also attributed as establishing the first chemical laboratory for use by women in the state of North Carolina. Bryant also worked as a faculty for the 1894 Summer School for Teachers and Students held in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where she taught physical geography and botany. Bryant enrolled for graduate work. She graduated with her PhD in geology in 1904, the first woman to receive a PhD in geology at that university.

Upon her return to State Normal in 1904 she was the first faculty member to hold a PhD. She died in 1949.

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