A Degree in Medicine

Anonymous
"Some Famous Women"
[essay on Elizabeth Blackwell]
Page 2
Ink on paper, n.d.
Manuscript Division
Gift of the National American Woman
Suffrage Association, 1960-1961 (104A.1)

In 1849, Elizabeth Blackwell (1821-1910) completed her medical education at central New York's Geneva College, the only school to have accepted her application, despite the fact that she had studied medicine privately for four years. She was the first woman to obtain a medical degree in the U.S. This anonymous essay, highlighting the careers of various pioneering women, states that by the time the Blackwell died "there were more than 7,000 women physicians and surgeons" practicing in the United States.

Sketch of Elizabeth Blackwell,
ca. 1850s
Offset lithograph
Manuscript Division
Gift of the National American Woman
Suffrage Association, 1960-1961 (107.4)