Fabulous Female Physicians

Patricia Morley is professor emerita of English and Canadian Studies at
Concordia University and an avid outdoor recreationist. She is the
author of several books, including The Mountain Is Moving: Japanese
Women’s Lives, Kurlek and Margaret Laurence: T

Although women have been caring for the sick and delivering babies for
thousands of years they were not welcomed as doctors until relatively
recently. Originally they were self-taught. The 10 pioneering women
celebrated here all graduated from medical schools and made great
sacrifices to reach their goals. Each was the first to do something no
woman had done before in the field of medicine.

Emily Stowe (1831–1903) and her five sisters grew up in the farming
community of Norwich, Ontario. Because the University of Toronto Medical
School did not accept women students in the 1860s, Emily attended and
graduated from the New York Medical College for Women in 1867 at the age
of 36. It took her several more years of study to be allowed to practise
in Canada. Dr. Stowe raised a daughter who became the first woman to be
accepted into medicine at Victoria College, Toronto, and fought for a
women’s medical college. Her dream was realized when Toronto’s
Women’s College Hospital opened in 1883.

Maria Montessori (1870–1952) grew up in Rome, studied at a technical
school and the University of Rome, and was accepted—to everyone’s
surprise—at medical school. After four years of general medicine she
studied pediatrics and psychiatry, graduating with high marks in 1896 as
Italy’s first female doctor. Maria surmounted incredible obstacles to
establish “children’s houses.” She also wrote The Montessori
Method (1909), a book on educating children, which was soon translated
into many languages.

Other doctors profiled in the book include Lucille Teasdale, Joy
Seager, Nadine Caron, and Susan LaFlesche Picotte. Fabulous Female
Physicians, an inspiring book for young women, takes a well-earned place
in The Women’s Hall of Fame Series. Highly recommended.