Dr. Juliet Stillman Severance (fl. 1860s) overcame personal and professional resistance to become one of the first female physicians in the United States and a staple on the anti-slavery and women’s suffrage convention circuits. Fondly called “a radical of the radicals” in Willard and Livermore’s Women of the Century (1893), Severance also led the Knights […]

Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell (1821-1910) overcame ceaseless harassment and partial blindness to graduate from Geneva Medical College with honors, becoming the first American woman awarded an allopathic medical degree, and the first woman placed on the British Medical Register. A single woman in 1854, Blackwell further defied social mores when she adopted a young daughter and

Dr. Charlotte Denman Lozier (1844-1870) earned her medical degree from the controversial NY Medical College for Women, which advocated homeopathy and preventative medicine. Lozier became the first vice president of the National Working Women’s Association, and helped found Sorosis, a professional women’s network. At Lozier’s urging, Bellevue Hospital conceded to grant clinical privileges to women.

A great-granddaughter of President John Adams, Sarah F. Norton (1840-1910) was a noted philanthropist and suffragist whose membership in the Working Women’s Association focused on equal education for girls, and equal job opportunities and pay for women. In 1869, Norton and Susan B. Anthony successfully lobbied Cornell University to admit women. Throughout her life, Norton