Women have made important
contributions in fields dominated by men. The sub-field of soil science known
as pedology is not an exception to this rich history of contributions by
females to science. Jennifer Harden was an outstanding USGS geologist that made
significant contribution to soil geomorphology. Following the Jenny/Birkeland
factorial approach to soil geomorphology and quantitative geomorphology,
various other approaches at modeling pedogenesis evolved. However, Jennifer Harden took a very different
approach to quantifying soil geomorphic studies. She had studied under two
great pedologists, Jenny and Arkley at Berkley; in 1982 she developed a “semi-
quantitative” assessment of soil profile morphology as a means of objectively
comparing soil profile development following the work of Bilzi and Ciolkosz
(1977). This development is formally known as the “profile development index”,
or more informally, “Harden index”. The
Harden index has proven useful in soil development studies in a wide variety of
settings. RESPECT#
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