Ellen Mosley-Thompson, a professor of geography at Ohio State, is internationally known and locally respected for being a trailblazer.

She has been a pioneer in research on the reconstruction of the Earth’s climate history and her work has been rewarded with one of the state’s top honors.

Mosley-Thompson was inducted into the Ohio’s Women’s Hall of Fame by Gov. Bob Taft on Oct. 7 at the Statehouse in front of 350 people.

“When I found out that I was nominated I was very pleased, but truthfully I didn’t think I had a chance,” Mosley-Thompson said. “Then when I found out that I had won I was surprised and thrilled.”

Mosley-Thompson was nominated by Ohio State University’s Board of Trustees.

Robin Rice, director of the Women’s Hall of Fame, said she received 75 to 100 nominations this year.

“Nominations are open to all people, but we look for people who have achieved greatness or done something significant on the local, state, national or international level,” Rice said. “Ellen has done it all.”

“Not only has she won this award but she has a lot of honors; she was named a Distinguished Scholar at OSU,” said Morton O’Kelly, chair for the department of geography.

Mosley-Thompson is now among 356 other women who have received this award over the last 25 years.

To be on the stage with the other women that have won was very humbling, she said.

“I am glad to see that her work is finally getting recognized because she has given up a lot to do what she does,” said Regina Thompson, Mosley-Thompson’s daughter.

Mosley-Thompson received her bachelor’s degree from Marshall University in physics and her doctorate from OSU in geography with a focus on climatology.

The bulk of Mosley-Thompson’s research has pertained to the chemical and physical properties that are preserved in glaciers and ice sheet. Her work has helped predict that in the next two decades some ice caps in South America and Africa might be lost to global warming.

“I always wanted to be a scientist,” she said. “I never considered any other career, I just had to narrow it down.”

Mosley-Thompson along with her husband and colleague, Lonnie Thompson, co-founded the Ice Core Paleoclimatology Research Group in the Byrd Polar Research Center.

“My wife is a very detailed person, organized and tenacious,” Thompson said. “When she starts something she stays on it until she gets it done.”

Mosely-Thompson also teaches geography 579.02, the undergraduate honors research seminar, and geography 294.