Elizabeth Blackwell's Contributions

Elizabeth Blackwell was the first woman to graduate from medical school in the United States. She became a leading public health activist during her lifetime. Elizabeth Blackwell was born on February 3, 1821, in Bristol, England. As a girl, she moved with her family to the United States, where she first worked as a teacher. Despite widespread opposition, she later decided to attend medical college and graduated first in her class, thus also becoming the first woman to receive her M.D. in the United States. She created a medical school for women in the late 1860s, eventually returning to England and setting up private practice. Blackwell died on May 31, 1910, in Hastings. Physician and educator Elizabeth Blackwell was born on February
Deeply affected by her friend's words and struggling with an affair of the heart as well, Blackwell opted to pursue a career in medicine. But the road to becoming a doctor was not an easy one. As some other women did at the time, she studied independently with doctors before getting accepted in 1847 to Geneva Medical College in upstate New York. Her acceptance was deemed by the student body as an administrative practical joke. The male students at the Geneva Medical College treated her well. Medical students in the college used to be boisterous during lectures often passing crude remarks at the lecturer. However due to the presence of Blackwell, her classmates turned into well behaved gentlemen. James Webster, the professor of reproductive anatomy, asked Blackwell to not attend his classes as the topic was too “unrefined” for a woman’s “delicate sensibilities”. However Elizabeth’s eloquent response convinced him otherwise. When she first started attending classes, her professors would remove her from the classroom demonstrations because it was deemed that having a woman present was “unsuitable.” Blackwell eventually won everyone at the college over with her persistence and ability to learn medical concepts. By 1849, she graduated at the top of her class to be the first woman doctor
She was ostracized by educators and patients alike at times, though it was also reported that uncouth male students became particularly studious and mature in her presence. Blackwell held firm despite myriad challenges, earning the respect of many of her peers and eventually writing her doctoral thesis on typhus fever. Ranked first in her class, Blackwell graduated in 1849, thus becoming the first woman to become a doctor of medicine in the contemporary