Maude Delap and Her Mesmerizing Medusas
A TRUE TALE WITH
A CHERRY ON TOP
Charlesbridge
(pub. 4.22.25)
32 pages
Ages 7 - 10
Author: Michelle Cusolito
Illustrator: Ellen Rooney
Character: Maude Delap
Overview:
"Maude scoops a jellyfish out of the water and embarks on more than a year of observation of the animal, accomplishing something countless other scientists were unable to do: trace the life cycle of a jellyfish and understand the creature’s metamorphosis from larva to adult.
Her painstaking observations of a compass jellyfish in 1899-1900 laid the foundation for research still ongoing today."
Tantalizing taste:
"Maude didn't attend school because she was expected to become a wife and mother. She's neither. Instead, she's an expert in the marine life on Valentia, her island home...
Caring for the polyps is tedious, but Maude never wavers...
Throughout the winter - in heavy gales and stormy seas - Maude battles the surf to collect food and ocean water."
And something more: The section, Maude Delap (1866-1953) Her Life and Work, explains that "Maude's scientific work was so respected, she was offered a fellowship at Plymouth Marine Biological Station in England in 1906. According to Maude's great-nephew, Maude's father said, 'No daughter of mine will leave home except as a married woman.' Maude was forty. She didn't go, but she was named an honorary associate fellow anyway."
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