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History
Ethel Austin was born July 14, 1893, in Storm Lake, Iowa to George and Evaline Austin. Her family moved to Brookings, South Dakota in 1902. She attended grade school and high school in Brookings. She graduated from South Dakota State College in Brookings in 1916. She received a second bachelor's degree (1919) and a master's degree from Columbia University in New York (1923). In 1955, she received an honorary doctor of science degree from South Dakota State College.
After graduation from South Dakota State College in 1916 Ethel taught high school at Faulkton, South Dakota from 1916 to 1918. Over a period of years, she taught home economics and nutrition at Texas State College, the University of Illinois, Urbana (1923-1924), the University of Chicago (1925-1929), and was Visiting Associate Professor at Northwestern University (1957-1959). From 1929 until 1951, she was the director of nutrition services for the National Dairy Council, where she had the opportunity to start the organization's research program and initiate nutrition education publications. After her retirement, she turned to writing. In addition to numerous technical publications, she authored three university-level textbooks in nutrition including a revision of "Robert's Nutrition Work with Children," "Nutrition in Action," and "Nutrition Education in Action."
She was one of ten U.S. delegates appointed by the State Department to the 11th International Dairy Congress in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1949. She was the only woman delegate to the entire Congress. She was appointed to the USDA's Food and Nutrition Advisory Committee between 1950 and 1960.
She served as president and board member for the Chicago Nutrition Association and she was a member of the Advisory Committee to the Nutrition section of the Chicago Board of Health. She was awarded the title Fellow of the Society for Nutrition Education on her 99th birthday.
During of her life, Martin devoted herself to planning, guiding and consulting on the Ethel Austin Margin Chair of Human Nutrition at South Dakota State University. In preparation for the chair professorship, she and her husband established an endowment fund to support an ongoing program of visiting professorships and distinguished lectureships in human nutrition. Her vision was to generate an understanding of the importance of nutrition to all pertinent disciplines of the university.
She married Dr. Edward Moss Martin in 1924. Dr. Martin was a former director of public affairs for the Union League Club of Chicago and led efforts to promote civic and judicial reform in Illinois. Edward Martin died in 1985. Ethel Austin Martin died, Saturday, September 11, 1993 in Chicago, Illinois.