Elizabeth Blackwell

We define moral courage as the ability to act rightly in the face of popular opposition, shame, scandal, or discouragement. When we say a person has moral courage, we speak of things like ethics, good and evil, right and wrong. This is the kind of person who does bold things. They do these things not because they are trying to make a name for themselves or impress their peers, but because it is the right thing to do. A person with moral courage stands up in the face of adversity. There are many examples of moral courage throughout the history of our country. Certainly, we would think that Abraham Lincoln was a man of moral courage. He was the leader of our country, and took a stance on slavery that was not popular to everybody. We would say that Lincoln was an ethical man, and he knew right from wrong. His moral courage eventually united the country in a way that it never had been before. Jackie Robinson was the first African-American player in major league baseball. He too showed his moral courage on a daily basis. In his case, it was the right time for the color barrier to be broken, and a man of Robinson’s talent and moral courage made him the right man to do it. Women face many challenges that men did not have to face. In the early days of our country, it was a man’s world. Women served their men. They were not offered the same opportunities that men were. To some extent, this still exists today. Women don’t always receive equal pay for equal work as their male co-workers. That was true in the 1840’s when Elizabeth Blackwell became the first woman to earn a medical degree in the United States. That shows amounts of moral courage that many of us could never achieve. Elizabeth Blackwell was born on Feb. 3, 1821, in Bristol, England. She was the third of nine children born to Samuel and Hannah Blackwell. They were known to be considerate people. Samuel owned a sugar refinery business and taught all of his children to be the best