Elizabeth Blackwell

Elizabeth Blackwell was the first American female to receive a doctor of medicine degree. A bit of trivia - she was sister-in-law to Lucy Stone. Dr. Blackwell was involved in the abolitionist movement, and believed that women deserved equal education. It is said she became involved in medicine because she "visited a family friend who was dying of cancer and who told her how much she had suffered from the humiliation of being treated by male doctors. This woman also mentioned that Blackwell, who had such a "love of study," would make an ideal doctor" link.

Throughout her medical career she was met with great opposition, but perservered nonetheless. Born in England, she moved back there for the later part of her life. She taught at the first British college of medicine for women.

- Hobart and William Smith's Blackwell site
- Letter, Elizabeth Blackwell to Baroness Anne Isabella Milbanke Byron concerning women's rights and the education of women physicians, 4 March 1851.