Dr. Joan Baier Peterson and family

This scholarship honors the late Joseph G. Baier and is funded by his family. His daughter, Dr. Joan Baier Peterson, notes that “dad’s love of science was passed on to me.” She is a graduate of UW-Madison where she earned undergraduate and graduate degrees in biochemistry and zoology, specializing in cell biology and electron microscopy. She was a scientist in the UW-Madison Department of Biochemistry for fifteen years prior to making a career change to follow her passion – writing guides to foreign cuisines. She is the president of Madison’s Ginkgo Press, which publishes the Eat Smart series of travel guides for food lovers. She’s written ten volumes including Eat Smart Brazil, Turkey, Indonesia, Mexico, Poland, Morocco, India, Peru, Norway, and Sicily.

Her father, Joseph G. Baier, began teaching at the former University of Wisconsin Extension Center in 1932 and played a major role in the merger of the Center and Wisconsin State College to form UWM. As the first Dean of the UWM College of Letters and Science, Dr. Baier was instrumental in the construction of Lapham Hall, the home of the Department of Biological Sciences.