Cecily Selby

My life has been framed by the values, interests and tastes I absorbed through the people and places of Woods Hole: in my youth and still today. It all began with my arrival, at age 3, on Gardiner Road, when my parents and I emigrated from London so that my father, Robert Keith Cannan, could continue his biochemical teaching and research at the MBL and at NYU Medical College. A youth spent swimming at Stony Beach, biking the Shining Sea bikeway, and learning to sail knockabouts initiated my lifelong love of the sea, the outdoors and sport. Concerts at the MBL Club, acting in the Penzance Players, the Webster rose garden and the Woods Hole Library fostered my aesthetic and intellectual development. And, above all, it is the nature and culture of science as practiced, taught and promoted at the MBL, and reflected in the Woods Hole community, that has most profoundly influenced what I have chosen to do professionally, and how I have chosen to do it.

My life with and around science began with physics at Radcliffe and physical biology at MIT where I studied and researched while still summering in and around the MBL. Married in 1951 to a New Yorker, Henry M. Selby M.D., Woods Hole summers became impractical by 1957. With 3 sons we turned to Long Island for our seaside. Happily continuing my research on submicroscopic structures in biological cells at the Sloan-Kettering Institute and Cornell Medical College the time did come when I sought a work schedule more compatible with bringing up sons. I found this as Headmistress of a NYC independent school, near my sons' school, staying there, becoming more and more involved with K-12 education, until they headed for college. Thereafter, I expanded my professional skills by accepting opportunities to lead two national non-profit organizations,* to serve as trustee of others,** and to become a Director of three national corporations.***

The best part of my story is that, thirty-three years ago I was back in Woods Hole---and back with science! I came back with a beloved second husband, the physical chemist, James S. Coles, who was closely affiliated with WHOI as a wartime researcher and, later, active trustee. I had held a very short wartime job in his lab in 1945! He and I bought Keith Porter's seasonal house on Oyster Pond and I continued to concentrate on communicating what I know about science and about teaching to promote teacher and community education in the sciences. Co-chairing the National Science Commission's 1982 report on K-12 STEM education led to extensive consulting about schools and museums, and, in 1984, a professorship in science education at NYU. Over these years in Woods Hole, I have relished serving as trustee of WHOI, founding trustee of the Oyster Pond Environmental Trust, Overseer of MBL, singer in the Woods Hole Cantata, and, most recently, student at Falmouth's Art Center---still enjoying all the outdoor and cultural life and friends that I treasured as a child. A grandson put it best. Walking with me down Water Street, after we had visited an annual MBL science street fair, meeting many of my friends and colleagues, Thomas said, "Grandma, it is wonderful for you here because there are so many people who are interested in the same things you are."

Cecily Cannan Selby, Ph.D. (Mrs. James S.Coles)