Writing belatedly on this one, but not with any loss of feeling.
In February this year, Heather Couper died.
She will be much-missed, for all sorts of reasons.
Whatever a child sees as they grow is normal and they are likely to perpetuate it. As I grew up, having a Queen and female ex-chemist prime minister were normal. It didn’t occur to me until much later that studying a science or being in a prominent position were not a normal, or for a lot of people desirable, action for a female to do.
During this, Heather Couper, a prominent astrophysicist, was regularly beamed into my living room, explaining the wonders of the universe. Again, it was only much later that I found this wasn’t normal or that she’d changed from a being on a trainee shop manager in clothing fashion to studying physics as she found it more interesting.
What was even stranger as I grew up was that she was called Heather. Everyone else I knew or had heard of prominently had a biblical or classical name, or a fashion name – the idea of a grown up doing something prominent with an unusual name, which was also the same name as mine, was entirely new, but was now normal. Every time Heather Couper came on TV my mother would rush and tell me she was on, reminding me that she was called Heather. I found this odd at the time, but now I can see why she did it.
She shall be missed.
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