For Hungarian women scientists research experience abroad and international examples and connections were very important and useful. The history of university women in Hungary started with a degree earned abroad by Dr. Vilma Hugonnay, a medical doctor and countess, who had studied in Switzerland. Aristocratic, noble and middle-class women’s education included learning, first of all, German, then French and even English. As women’s knowledge of these languages were, in many cases, outstanding they were successful candidates for postdoctoral foreign grants of the period.

For women striving after scientific careers in the interwar-period Hungary “the example of higher developed countries” as they were called, was a natural source of scientific knowledge and gender tactics in the field. Hungarian women found it quite natural to study abroad for a shorter period. After graduation women frequently went to foreign countries as holders of state or private grants. In the Interwar Period women often obtained 3-5-months postdoctoral grants either from the so-called Collection University or the Federation of Hungarian University Women. The Collection University aimed at centralizing the scarce sources of financial support available to graduated people with scientific and cultural aspirations. Young people could apply to this agency for the support of travel grants – men and women alike. The statutes of the Collection University promised privileges in obtaining state employment after finishing the grant period. We very often find that women could not get employment after returning home.

A very good research place for women physicists was the Vienna Radium Institute. In her outstanding book on women working in this institution, Maria Rentetzi gives a detailed description of the results of the Hungarian woman researcher dr. Elsabeth Róna. The Federation of University Women helped women’s postgradual studies abroad on the basis of individual applications. Such was the case of botanist Erzsébet Kohl. A Smithsonian grant allowed her to collect snow algae in Alaska. Her collection still exists in Budapest.

Examples of the pertinent activities of both organisations will be given in the paper, and it will prove that these grants were not sufficient to start scientific careers in Hungary.