_Returns to New York to begin practice as an M.D.--Insuperable
difficulties encountered by a woman physician in finding an office
to rent in New York--Dr. Zakrzewska opens her office in one of Dr.
Blackwell’s parlors--No admission for women to dispensaries or
hospitals--Infirmary remains closed for lack of money--Dr. Zakrzewska
meets Mary L. Booth who informs the newspapers and social circles of
the medical women--In desperation, she goes to Boston to visit Mrs.
Severance and to seek contributions for the Infirmary--Meets Mr.
Samuel E. Sewall and his daughter Lucy--Her campaign in Boston is
successful--Its extension to Portland, Maine, is unsuccessful--She
goes to Philadelphia for the same purpose but succeeds only in
convincing the Female Medical College there that it must build a
hospital for itself--A second visit to Boston to ask help for the
long-delayed Infirmary Fair--Meets Mrs. Ednah D. Cheney--Extends
campaign to smaller towns around Boston with no success. (Twenty-six
years of age: 1856.)_
With regret, I made ready to depart from Cleveland. I dreaded the
obstacles which I saw and felt were before me and which I must conquer.
I fully felt the isolated social position which we four women medical
students had occupied in Cleveland. My three companions, belonging
to the orthodox church and disapproving of each and every subject
discussed in Mr. Mayo’s congregation, had absolutely no outside
recreation, “even of the body,” and were shunned even in the boarding
house by the inmates there, where we had found an otherwise comfortable
home during the first winter, in 1854.
I realized the opposition to women physicians still more after I
had learned to speak English. Strange to say, this was far stronger
among women than among men in and outside of the profession. My
discouragement grew the stronger the nearer the end of my stay in
Cleveland approached.
Following Commencement Day, a tremendous snowstorm was the first event
which blockaded my next movements; for days no trains could pass the
roads; the last quarter of my lessons in German had ended on March 1;
my packing made little demand on my time and it was finished. I had
no special interests to keep me longer in Cleveland, and I began to
consider this calamity of snow a bad omen when Mr. Willey brought home
the news that, in a roundabout way and by changing trains four times, I
might be able to reach New York in thirty-six hours.
So I started off and I had really a most tedious journey, suffering
greatly from the cold before I reached my family, after forty hours in
trains, and finding New York just getting free from the snow blockades
of the streets.
The welcome at my sisters’ was cordial. The one next in age to me
had taken a position in a large wholesale millinery establishment,
receiving a good salary, while the next younger one superintended the
household, and the youngest attended school. We were all hoping that
our father would get his furlough for a visit and counsel as to what
to do next with the family. Both brothers had gone to the Far West,
seeking their own fortunes as brothers usually do.
Although our father sent financial aid to the two younger sisters,
eighteen and eleven years old, I had no hope of such assistance from
him, and I could not settle down with the family because they resided
in Hoboken, New Jersey.
This was too far distant from Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell as well as from
the center of the poor among whom it was necessary to seek patients.
I felt the necessity of familiarizing myself with general practice in
which I had had but very slight training. No clinical instruction was
attempted in college, all students depending upon the private practice
of their preceptors for this kind of teaching. We women students had
received scarcely any such opportunities, as even our kind and beloved
Dr. Delamater could not often venture upon such an innovation as to
take a female student with him, even when visiting the poorest patients.
My good brother-in-law, who did not have my father’s prejudices and his
distrust in my eventual success as a practitioner, offered me financial
aid, promising to give guaranties to the people from whom I would hire
rooms where I might begin practice.
Immediately after my arrival in New York, I began to look out for a
suitable office, consulting Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell, with whom I had
maintained a constant correspondence, in regard to location.
My fears concerning the opposition to women physicians were fully
realized. I found no well-regulated household would rent rooms to
me. I investigated everywhere, in all respectable parts of New York
wherever signs announced “Parlor to let for a physician” or where I
was sent by agents. But as soon as it was learned that it was a woman
physician who desired the office, I was denied the opportunity of even
looking at the advertised rooms. Thus days and weeks were spent. I even
began to explain and to remonstrate with those who sought tenants, but
it was all in vain.
Some were afraid to let an office to a female physician lest she might
turn out a spiritual medium, clairvoyant, hydropathist, etc. Others,
who believed me when I told them that I had a diploma from a regular
school and should never practice contrary to its requirements, inquired
to what religious denomination I belonged, and whether I had a private
fortune or intended to support myself by my practice. While the third
class, who asked no questions at all, demanded three dollars a day for
a back parlor alone, without the privilege of putting a sign on the
house or the door.
Now all this may be very exasperating when it is absolutely necessary
that one should have a place upon which to put a sign to let the world
know that she is ready to try her skill upon suffering humanity; but
it has such a strongly ludicrous side that I could not be provoked in
spite of all the fatigue and disappointment of wandering over the city
when, with aching limbs, I commenced the search afresh each morning,
with the same prospect of success.
Finally, in a moderate-sized house, I was admitted by an introductory
letter from an agent. The lady was kind and pleasant, entered into
conversation with me and informed me that a cousin of hers had drawn
her attention to the fact that women studied medicine in Cleveland. On
further talk, she spoke of one who was especially liked by her cousin
through the interest which Ralph Waldo Emerson took in her. And thus I
found that this lady was a cousin of Mrs. Emerson, of Hudson, Ohio.
Of course, my heart was delighted to find a cultured woman not only
interested in me and my profession but who was also willing to have me
become a member of her household, if--her husband agreed to such an
arrangement. Alas! in a few days came a letter in which she regretted
that her husband could not reconcile himself to a woman doctor. He
feared all sorts of annoyances should he take such a step as to have a
woman doctor go in and out of his house. At any rate, he could not bear
the thought of having the sign of a woman physician on his house.
Such was the horror that beset every one, that woman would disgrace
decency and undertake abhorred practice. The name of “Madame Restelle”
was on every one’s tongue as typifying the “female physician.” She was
then the leading abortionist, of whom a prominent lawyer said, when Dr.
Blackwell and I called upon him to see if something could not be done
to stop her in her vile career, “She is a social necessity, and she
will be protected by rich and influential personages.” However, I may
here remark that after many years of agitation, her infamous business
succeeded in placing her and some of her disciples in prison, and,
eventually, she killed herself by drowning in the spacious bathtub of
the extravagantly luxurious house on Fifth Avenue, where she resided
under her real name.
Thus time passed, and I could find no abode. My lack of success was
similar to that of Dr. Blackwell who had finally been obliged to rent
a house, and she now proposed that I should join her at her home, she
letting me have the back parlor for office purposes. Thus I was able to
arrange for office work as well as for general practice. Arrangements
were concluded and, on April 17, I established myself with her, yet
independent of her, in business.
Still, small as was Dr. Blackwell’s practice, this association was of
great benefit to me. Her household consisted of her relatives and was
headed by an older sister and her mother, a fine, cultivated lady.
Antoinette Brown Blackwell and her husband joined us just before their
oldest daughter was expected, and there also came Lucy Stone and
her husband, Henry Blackwell. In fact we were a delightful family,
suffering more or less from social ostracism but happy in spirit, and
feeling far above the ordinary run of mankind in the belief of our
superiority in thought and aim.
I love to remember the friendship which developed between Dr. Elizabeth
Blackwell and myself when, wearied and disappointed in waiting for
patients who seldom appeared, we renewed our courage by getting
temporarily away from the field of struggle. On Sundays, we took long,
long walks in Staten Island, in Jersey Heights, yes, even as far as
Hackensack, watching the budding trees, the inspiring scenery and the
glorious sunsets, and renewing our faith in our calling as physicians.
And we discussed all kinds of plans as to how to become of use to our
fellow men and to ourselves.
[These must have been memorable walks, for Dr. Blackwell refers to
them again and again in later life in her letters from England to Dr.
Zakrzewska, recalling “the picture which is hung up in memory, the
dark-haired young physician with whom I used to walk on Weehawken
Heights.”]
Alas! money was wanting. To resume even the little dispensary work of
two years previous was impossible, for the reëstablishment of that
called for a sum of five hundred dollars and this we could not raise.
Meanwhile, we tried to get opportunities to improve our practical
knowledge by endeavoring to get admission into dispensaries or
hospitals. Everywhere we met objections, and everywhere we found denial.
Many high-stationed professors and physicians to whom Dr. Blackwell
had applied were willing, but the general practitioners objected, just
as remains the situation at present in most instances. The fear that
women doctors would diminish their practice was the real cause of
their objection; although the denials were usually expressed as the
moral conviction that women could not take any serious responsibility,
or, if they did, that they would unsex themselves. However, a
German physician, Dr. Aigner, and a Scotch physician, Dr. McCready,
occasionally allowed me to accompany them to their respective hospital
and dispensary.
Meanwhile, I had regularly attended the Fair meetings which were held
every Thursday, wondering how persons could afford to meet to so
little purpose. There was scarcely any life in these gatherings, and
when I saw ladies come week after week to resume the knitting of a
baby’s stocking (which was always laid aside again in an hour or two,
without any marked progress), I began to doubt whether the sale of
these articles would ever bring ten thousand cents instead of the ten
thousand dollars which it was proposed at the first meeting to raise in
order to buy a house. I used to say on Wednesday, “To-morrow we have
our Fair meeting. I wonder whether there will be, as usual, two and a
half persons present or three and three-quarters.”
After weeks of this idle waiting, for the few patients who came
through acquaintances did not fill much of my time, I began to feel
desperate, especially as social life also was so utterly closed against
us, and this latter was such a necessity to my temperament. I then
proposed to go canvassing with circulars giving information of our
previous experiment, to try to collect money for the establishment of a
dispensary.
The idea occurred to me to go from house to house and ask for a dime
at each, which, if given, would amount to ten dollars a day; and, with
the money thus collected daily for half a year, to establish a nucleus
hospital which, as a fixed fact, should stimulate its friends to
further assistance.
I took my notebook and wrote out the whole plan, and also calculated
the expenses of such a miniature hospital as I proposed, including
furniture, beds, household utensils, everything, in short, that was
necessary in such an institution. With this book which I still have
in my possession, I went one evening into Dr. Blackwell’s parlor and,
seating myself, told her that I could not work any longer for the Fair
in the way that the ladies were doing; and then read my plan to her,
which I advocated long and earnestly.
She finally agreed with me that it would be better speedily to
establish a small hospital than to wait for the large sum that had
been proposed, though she did not approve of the scheme of the dime
collection, fearing that I would not only meet with great annoyances
but would also injure my health in the effort. At that time, after some
discussion, I agreed with her. Now I think that this plan would have
been better than that which I afterwards followed. On the same evening
I proposed, and we agreed, that on a year from that day (the 1st of
May, 1857), the New York Infirmary should be opened.
I went to rest with a light heart, but rose sorrowfully in the morning.
“In one year from to-day, the Infirmary must be opened,” said I to
myself, “and the funds towards it are two pairs of half-knit babies’
stockings.” The days passed in thinking what was the next best scheme
to raise money for its foundation, when an accidental visit from Mary
L. Booth to Dr. Blackwell turned the tide in another direction. Miss
Booth was serving her apprenticeship as a journalist through the
kindness of the editor of the New York _Times_.[7] Her sister who
was a patient of Dr. Blackwell had interested both Mary and him in the
idea of women doctors, so Mary came to interview us concerning our
practical progress.
This interview led to the disclosure of our wishes and plans regarding
the dispensary, and Miss Booth, taking up the idea, made our wishes
known in the _Times_, very guardedly, of course, but decidedly.
The effect of this little notice was remarkable, and it gave both Dr.
Blackwell and myself new hope and also the courage to ask for similar
remarks in other papers.
At the same time, my social circle became a little widened through this
acquaintance with Miss Booth which I developed when I found that she
also was a beginner in her career and had obstacles to overcome; as,
for instance, hiding her sex by signing only her initials to whatever
she wrote, or not signing at all.
Thus a few new friends were obtained for our cause, and a few of Dr.
Blackwell’s patients who belonged to the sect of Quakers, and who
had sustained the former dispensary, came forward promising small
subscriptions towards a new effort. Yet no sum was large enough to
warrant the expenditure of five hundred dollars, the amount absolutely
needed to open this charity for the poor and the chance for us to gain
practical experience.
About this time, Dr. Harriot K. Hunt, of Boston, sent a patient of
hers to Dr. Blackwell. This patient was accompanied by Dr. W. H.
Channing, who was not in practice but who attended this patient with
Dr. Blackwell. Becoming acquainted with Dr. Channing, I disclosed to
him our financial, professional and social position, enlarging upon the
difficulty of obtaining that practical experience in clinics which is
so absolutely necessary to the young physician.
Then as I told him of the plan of establishing a dispensary which
could have a small number of indoor patients, in fact, the nucleus of
a hospital for which Dr. Blackwell had already obtained a charter from
the Legislature, his enthusiasm created not only hope but courage.
He spoke so ardently of Boston as being liberal and “the hothouse
of all reforms” that I proposed visiting that noble city in the
interest of our plans and asked him for introductions, as I knew
only Dr. Harriot K. Hunt and Mrs. Severance, the latter recently
removed to Boston from Cleveland. He gave me a list of names of Boston
ladies--Miss Lucy Goddard, Miss Mary Jane Parkman, Miss Abby May and
Mrs. E. D. Cheney.
When I look over my diary and see that the time of my receiving my
degree and leaving Cleveland was in March and that this proposition to
go to Boston was only three months later, it seems a fact impossible
to believe. For the restlessness caused by the want of opportunity
to further our desires seemed to turn days into weeks and weeks into
months. I find in one of my notes the words, “It seems an impossibility
to find friends for our cause; nobody seems to feel the need of
hospital or dispensary for the practical training of women physicians.
Even our gentlemen friends in the profession say women must find this
training for themselves among the poor.”
I may here remark, perhaps, a fact which amused me greatly. So far,
I had had but very little opportunity to write prescriptions, but
whenever I gave any I added my initials, M. E. Z., as signature, thus
proving my responsibility. Every time such a prescription was received
by an American apothecary, a messenger called to inquire the meaning
of those mystical signs. And when I explained that it was my name
which was too long to write in full, I was told that signatures to
prescriptions were not customary or needed. However, I continued to
sign mine, for I felt from the very outset that I must establish the
position of being responsible for all I did, so that in case of trouble
from either patient or apothecary I could protect myself. So I never
followed the then prevailing custom of giving prescriptions without
indicating for whom they were intended and by whom they were issued.
Perhaps I may add that my practice by the end of the year had brought
me one hundred and twenty dollars.
The earnestness with which Dr. Blackwell advocated not only the
necessity of having women as physicians but also their thorough
education and training for practice was convincing to a few friends,
who promised to assist with subscriptions as soon as the idea had taken
shape and had materialized itself in a building in which the experiment
could be tried.
Nobody has fathomed the depth of Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell’s soul as I
have had the opportunity to do. On our delightful long walks she was
the speaker, and her reasoning was so sound, her determination so firm,
her love for humanity so true, that she seemed to me a prophet of no
ordinary insight and foresight. Even now, when doubts arise in me
whether women will develop fully all the chances provided for their
higher scientific education, I recall her words and quiet my doubts,
remembering that what one woman has done, thousands can do and will
do. To me she was, and is, not preëminently the physician but the
philanthropic philosopher, the standard bearer of a higher womanhood.
To such a nature, it is given to inspire others with an idea or an
ideal but not the faculty of execution or organization. I was able to
supply these latter qualities, and, encouraged by the description of
Boston’s liberal element, I proposed to Dr. Blackwell to search for a
house which would suit our purposes and to get an estimate of the rent
and the expense of furnishing it, so as to have a definite sum for
which to beg, since simple statements were not sufficient.
[Dr. Blackwell refers to such complementary relations in a letter to
Dr. Zakrzewska, written in later years, in which she alludes to the
days here described and says:
“I work chiefly in Principles, and you in putting them into practical
use; and one is essential to the other in this complex life of ours.”
Again she refers to these days, “as we sat in Fifteenth Street planning
those everlasting bazaars,” and she writes:
“You are a natural doctor, and your best work will always be in the
full exercise of direct medical work.... You know I am different from
you in not being a natural doctor; so, naturally, I do not confine
myself to practice.
“I am never without some patients but my thought, and active interest,
is chiefly given to some of those moral ends--for which ends I took up
the study of medicine.”]
The house was found in Bleecker Street close by the poor quarters,
at an annual rental of one thousand, three hundred dollars, and an
estimate was made of another five hundred dollars for furnishing, as
well as an outlay of one hundred dollars for fuel. My proposition was
now to go to Boston and try to get half of the rent pledged for a three
years’ lease, Dr. Blackwell to raise the other half of the three years’
rent from friends in New York, and then to hold a Sale or Fair to raise
the remaining six hundred dollars.
On the next day, the regular Fair meeting was held at Dr. Blackwell’s.
The new plan was brought forward, and, although it was as yet nothing
but a plan, it acted like a warm, soft rain upon a field after a long
drought. The knitting and sewing (for which I have a private horror
under all conditions) were laid aside, to my great relief. And the
project was talked of with so much enthusiasm that I already saw myself
in imagination making my evening visits to the patients in the New York
Infirmary; while all the members present (and there were unusually
many--I think, six or seven) discussed the question the next day among
their circles of friends whether Henry Ward Beecher or a physician of
high standing should make the opening speech in the institution.
This excitement increased the interest exceedingly, and the succeeding
meetings were quite enthusiastic. The babies’ stockings were never
again resumed (don’t think that because I detested those stockings so
much I am cruel enough to wish the little creatures to go barefoot),
but plans were made for raising money in New York and for getting
articles for sale on a larger scale.
Thus it happened that I went to Boston for the second time in the
beginning of July, visiting Mrs. C. M. Severance and using my
introductions to begin a regular, systematized campaign “to beg for an
institution for American women.” For myself I could never have begged;
I would sooner have drowned myself. Now I determined to beg money
from Americans to establish an institution for their own benefit. Dr.
Blackwell agreed to this plan, as there was nothing risked in it, I
taking the whole responsibility.
In spite of finding the women of Boston quite ready to listen to me,
it was not an easy task to get a three years’ promise of six hundred
and fifty dollars. The first question put to me was always, “Can you
not raise this small sum in rich New York?” The explanation had to
be repeated over and over that only a very few women in social life
dared to connect themselves openly with “such radical reformers” as
we appeared to them. To turn upon “the sphere of woman” and declare
openly that she can take the whole responsibility of managing a public
institution, as well as the care as a physician of sick women and
children, seemed so monstrous to most men and women that in New York
money was intrusted to us only with incredulity.
The second and more important question was as to “why we needed and
wanted a dispensary and a hospital for women physicians.” Nobody at
this present time would or could believe that this need then had to
most people a preposterous sound.
And here I may tell you an episode which occurred to me in
Philadelphia, to which city I went after returning from Boston with
my six hundred and fifty dollars pledged. In Philadelphia, the first
medical college for women (the Female Medical College of Pennsylvania),
had been established in 1850, and it was housed in extremely modest
quarters in a rear building on Arch Street. I was introduced through
Dr. Ann Preston, one of the first graduates of this college and now
one of its professors. And I spoke to the friends of this enterprise
at a gathering of both men and women, explaining the need of a
practical professional training after a merely theoretical course of
instruction. I tried to make plain the greater difficulties which beset
the introduction of the young women students to the private patients
of their preceptors even though these patients were ever so poor, and
I illustrated the situation by quoting Dr. Ann Preston’s conscientious
refusal to practice under such circumstances, she simply teaching
physiology in the college. I also spoke of others going to Europe to
seek this clinical instruction from foreign physicians and maternity
hospitals.
After having exhausted the subject, as well as myself, one of the
ladies present said--it was in the parlors of Lucretia Mott--“Then
thee thinks that a hospital must be connected with the college?” I
replied, “Yes.” “Then thee thinks that practical training cannot be got
by the young physician among the poor?” I said, “No.” “We thank thee
for thy coming to tell us so, and we promise thee that we shall exert
ourselves at once to get a hospital of our own.”
Thus ended my efforts in that noble city. But the Philadelphia Woman’s
Hospital was established there within the five years following my visit.
In Portland, Maine, where I went by the advice of Mr. Samuel E. Sewall
and his aunt, Miss ----, I also met with no success for the Infirmary.
Here, in spite of my being the guest of some of their relatives, none
dared to expose themselves to the ridicule of asking acquaintances
to see or hear a woman doctor. To illustrate again something of the
feeling regarding a woman doctor, I must tell an incident which in
after years caused us great amusement.
Dr. Harriot K. Hunt had introduced me, in Boston, to Mr. Joseph Sewall,
and we had been invited to meet Mr. Samuel E. Sewall, Miss Lucy E.
Sewall and Miss ----, their aunt. While sitting in the parlor waiting
for the dinner hour, Lucy Sewall went upstairs and, as she told me in
later years, examined my cloak, bonnet and gloves in order to find out
whether they were neat and respectable, she feeling a great uncertainty
as to whether a regularly graduated and practicing woman physician
could attend to the minor details of proper habiliments. Dr. Hunt was
accepted by them as a curiosity but she had never been a regular
student in a college. However, all this company became our truest
friends, as the history of the New England Hospital for Women and
Children testifies.
The season being July, it was not favorable for doing any more than
securing signatures, guaranteeing for the New York Infirmary for
Indigent Women and Children six hundred and fifty dollars, for half
the rent annually for three years. But friendly invitations to revisit
Boston caused me to return in early October.
The encouragement which I brought back to New York from the Boston
friends rendered it easy for Dr. Blackwell to secure among her friends
the other half of the rent. However, we also needed money to furnish
and to prepare the house as a hospital and dispensary. But we hoped to
obtain this additional money from the Fair which had been so long in
preparation, and it was in connection with this that I again appeared
in Boston.
It was then that I made the most valuable acquaintance of Mrs. E. D.
Cheney who has ever since been a true and devoted friend of the medical
education of women.
This visit was rich in experience as I was introduced by my
acquaintances made in July to a great number of the leading women in
the anti-slavery cause. From these I learned how the anti-slavery
bazaars were managed, and I obtained a promise to provide a table at
our New York fair in December, as well as the names of several ladies
who would superintend it, so that accommodations for their sojourn in
New York might be made. Another table was promised by Dr. Blackwell’s
English friends to whom she had appealed by letters.
I also visited a number of the smaller towns around Boston for the
same purpose but without success. A list of the Boston people in whose
houses I spoke, creating enthusiasm, and who subscribed towards the
half of the Infirmary rent as well as towards the table for the Fair,
is still in my possession and I will here copy the names:
Miss Lucy Goddard
Miss Abby May
Miss Mary Jane Parkman
Mrs. George Hildreth
Mrs. George Hilliard
Miss Anna Lowell
Mrs. Mary G. Shaw
Mrs. Sarah S. Russell
Mrs. W. L. Garrison
Mrs. E. D. Cheney
Miss Sarah Clarke
Mrs. James Freeman Clarke
Mr. George W. Bond
Mr. Samuel E. Sewall
besides a goodly number of others not so prominent in benevolent and
advanced work for women.