The first female who received a medical diploma from any college in the
United States was Miss Elizabeth Blackwell.
This lady, who now stands only second in years of experience to Miss Hunt,
of Boston, and second to no female in medical knowledge and usefulness,
came to this country from England in 1831, when she was ten years of age.
[A lady, of whom I made some inquiries respecting the above, assured me
"it was only those females who were eligible as nurses, or prospective
widowhood, which would make them eligible, were desirous of concealing
their true age."]
Being persuaded that her "mission" was to heal the sick, Miss Elizabeth
applied, by writing, to six different physicians for advice as to the best
means to obtain an education, and received from all the reply that it was
"impracticable," utterly impossible, for a female to obtain a medical
education; "the proposition eccentric," "Utopian," etc.
It required just this sort of opposition to draw out the true character,
and arouse the hidden abilities of such women as the Misses Blackwell.
Elizabeth, while supporting herself by giving music lessons in Charleston,
S. C., received regular medical instruction from S. H. Dixon, M. D., a
gentleman and scholar, well known to the entire profession of two
continents; also from Drs. John Dixon, Allen, and Warrington, the two
latter in Philadelphia. Being considered by these gentlemen competent,
Miss Blackwell applied to the medical schools of Philadelphia and New York
for admission as a medical student, by all of which she was rejected
"because she was a female." Finally she gained admission to the College at
Geneva, N. Y., and graduated in 1848. Are the _males_ the only
"oppressors" of the gentler sex? No, no; woman is woman's own worst enemy.
Miss Blackwell was two years in Geneva, and so violent was the opposition
of _her own sex_, that no lady in Geneva would make her acquaintance while
there. "Common civilities at the table, even, were denied me." Entirely
different was the treatment which she received at the hands of the
students and professors of the college. "Here she found nothing but
friendliness and decorum, and, on the eve of her graduation, the
cordiality of the students in making way for her to receive her diploma,
and pleasantly indicating their congratulations, was marked and
respectful."
The following morning her parlor was thronged with ladies.
Miss Elizabeth Blackwell visited London and Paris, and was entered as
student at St. Bartholomew's, and also at "_La Maternité_" (The
Maternity).
She returned to New York, and, notwithstanding "she found a blank wall of
social and professional antagonism facing the woman physician, which
formed a situation of singular loneliness, leaving her without support,
respect, or counsel," she gained a foothold, and a respectable and living
practice soon began to flow in and crown her persistent efforts.
Now her sister Emily commenced the study of medicine, first with
Elizabeth, subsequently with Dr. Davis, of Cincinnati Medical College. In
1852 she and her sister were permitted to attend upon some of the wards
(female, we presume) of Bellevue Hospital. In 1854 Emily graduated at
Cleveland College (Eclectic, I think).
Through their united efforts the "New York Infirmary for Women and
Children" was established. "Up to the present time over fifty thousand
patients have received prescriptions and personal care by this means."
Contrary to Mrs. Lozier, "they are firm in their conviction of the
expediency of mingling the sexes in _all_ scholastic training. In their
mode of practice they adopt the main features of the 'regular' system."
Nearly all other physicians are rather of the _Eclectic_ system. Like Miss
Hunt, "she was bound by no regular school, as none had indorsed her."
There are many contemporaries of Miss Hunt and the sisters Blackwell whom
we might mention, but the history of one is the history of the whole, so
far as early struggles, opposition of the profession, and neglect and
disrespect of their own sex, is concerned.
Frances S. Cooke, M. D., of the "Female Medical College," East Concord
Street, Boston, Mrs. Jackson, Lucy Sewall, M. D., recently returned from
Europe, and a half-score others of Boston, much deserve more than a
passing notice, but our limited space will not permit. Also, Hannah E.
Longshore, M. E. Zakezewska, of New York, Miss Jane E. Myers, M. D., Mrs.
Mary F. Thomas, M. D. (Camden, Ind.), Miss Ann Preston, M. D., of
Philadelphia, Mrs. Annie Bowen, of Chicago, and others, "too numerous to
mention," who, in spite of the opposition from their own sex, from the
profession, and the public in general, have gained a name and a competency
through their professional efforts.
"A woman's intellectual incapacity and her physical weakness will ever
disqualify her for the duties of the medical profession," wrote Dr. ----,
of Pennsylvania.
Edward H. Dixon, M. D., of New York, in an article published in the
"_Scalpel_" shows, by uncontroverted arguments and facts, that the male
child, at birth, "in original organic strength," holds only an equal
chance with the female; that "the chances of health for the two sexes at
the outset are equal, and so continue till the period when they first
attain the full use of their legs."
Ask the mother of a family if the labor pains show any respect of sex.
Does not the female show as strong lungs as the male in its _earliest_
disapprobation of this unceremonious world? How about the comparative
strength exhibited in the demonstrations of each when the lacteal fluid is
not forthcoming in proportion to the appetite?
Let us consult Dr. Dixon further,--and charge it to the females!
"We give the girl two years' start of the boy,--we shall see why as we
proceed. Both have endured the torture of bandaging, pinning (pricking),
and tight dressing; both have been rocked, jounced on the knee, papped,
laudanumed, paregoricked, castor oiled, suffocated with blankets over the
head, sweltered with cap and feather bed, roasted at a fire of anthracite,
dosed according to the formula of some superannuated doctor or
'experienced nurse,' or both, for these people usually hunt in couples,
and are very gracious to each other. We give the girl the start to make up
for the benefit the boy has derived from chasing the cat, rolling on the
floor, or sliding down the balustrade, and the torture _she_ had endured
from her sampler, and being compelled to 'sit up straight, and not be
_hoidenish_.'"
[Illustration: "POH! YOU'RE A GIRL."]
"Well, they are off to school. Observe how circumspectly our little miss
must walk, chiding her brother for being 'too rude.' He, nothing daunted,
(with a '_Poh! you're a girl_'), starts full tilt after an unlucky pig or
a stray dog. If he tumbles into the mud and soils his clothes the result
is soon visible in increase of lungs and ruddy cheeks."
"In school the boy has the advantage. The girl 'mustn't loll,' must sit up
erect, the limbs hanging down, her feet probably not reaching the floor,
and the spinal column must bear the main support for three to six hours!
The boy gets relief in 'shying' an occasional paper ball across the room,
hitching about, and drawing his legs up on the seat, or sticking a pin in
his neighbor, and a good run and jump at recess, changing the monotony of
the recreation by an occasional fight after school. At dinner the girl has
had no exercise to create an appetite, and her meal is made up of pastry
and dessert. 'Remember that her muscles move the limbs, and are composed
chiefly of azote, and it is the red meat, or muscle of beef or mutton,
that she would eat if she had any appetite for it, that is to say, if her
stomach and blood-vessels would endure it. The fact is, _the child has
fever and loathes meat_.'"
While the boy, hat in hand, rushes to the common or rear yard to roll
hoop, fly his kite, or, in winter, to skate or coast down hill, the girl
is reminded that she has "one whole hour to practise at the piano," either
in a darkened room, from whence all God's sunshine is excluded, cold and
cheerless, or the other extreme--seated near a heated register, from which
the dry, poisonous fumes belch forth, destroying the pure oxygen she
requires to inflate her narrowing lungs, and increase the fibrine, the
muscle, and strength necessary to the exhausting exercise. She closes the
day by eating a bit of cake and a plate of preserves.
The hungry, "neglected" boy has returned, and, with swift coursing blood,
strength of muscle and brain, catches a glance at his neglected lesson,
comprehending it all the quicker by the change he has enjoyed, bawls
boisterously for some cold meat, or something hearty, and tumbles into his
bed, forgetting to close the door or window; whereas the girl must be
attended to her room, "she is so delicate," and, being tucked well in on a
sweltering feather bed, and bound down by heavy blankets, the doors and
windows are carefully secured, and, committed to the "care of Providence,"
she is left to swelter till to-morrow.
The period for a great change arrives, often catching the poor, uninformed
girl completely by surprise. Furthermore, the constant deprivation of her
natural requirements--pure air, wholesome, nutritious food, unrestrained
limbs and lungs--now become more apparent. In spite of the constant
drilling which she has received, she feels exceedingly _gauche_. Her face
is alternately pale and flushed; she suffers from headache,--"a rush of
blood to the head." Stays and tight-lacing have weakened the action of the
heart, cut off the circulation to the extremities, and deprived those
parts of blood which now require the nutriment necessary to their strength
and support in the time of their greatest need.
The ignorant mother sends for a physician, perhaps almost as ignorant as
herself; or, what is still worse, being a miserable time-server, seeing
the admirable opportunity for making a bill, straightway commences a
course of deception and quackery that, if it do not result in the death of
the unfortunate patient, leaves her a miserable creature for life, with
spinal curvature or consumption; or worse, by confinement and medication
destroy her chance of restoration; and should some unlucky and ignorant
young man take her as wife, and she become a mother, she surely will drag
out a wretched existence as a victim to uterine displacement and its
concomitant results.
Physically, morally, and intellectually woman is not born inferior to man.
We have briefly shown where and how she has fallen behind in the race of
life in a physical view of the matter. The intellectual sense has kept
pace only with the physical. Morally woman stands alone; by her own
strength or weakness she stands or falls. Man scarcely upholds or
encourages her. Her own sex, we have herein-before stated, is woman's own
worst enemy! "Be thou as chaste as ice, or pure as snow, thou shalt not
escape calumny," and if she fall, who shall restore her? The whole world
is against her; one half makes her what she is, the other's scorn and
neglect keeps her thus! The "ballot" will not keep woman from falling, nor
raise her when fallen. The "church" does not exempt woman from the wiles
of men, nor its adherents raise the fallen to their pristine strength,
beauty, and respectability! Though Christ, the lowly, the magnanimous,
said, "_Neither do I condemn thee_," his followers (?) cannot lay their
hands upon their hearts and repeat his gracious words. Where is the fallen
woman whom the church (not Roman Catholic) ever took in with that good
faith and spirit of sisterly love or brotherly affection, with which a
fallen man can, and is, often received into the church and into society?