Other name | WMCP |
---|---|
Former name | Female Medical College of Pennsylvania, Medical College of Pennsylvania |
Active | 1850 | –1970 (became co-ed Medical College of Pennsylvania)
Address | 229 Arch Street (until 1858) and then 627 Arch Street (after Philadelphia's street renumbering) , , , U.S. |
Founded in 1850 The Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania (WMCP) formally known as The Female Medical College of Pennsylvania was a medical college founded by the Quakers. The WMCP was the first American medical school dedicated to teaching women medicine and allowing them to earn the Doctor of Medicine M.D. degree [1]
The associated Woman's Hospital of Philadelphia was founded in 1861. Upon deciding to admit men in 1970, the college was renamed the Medical College of Pennsylvania (MCP).
In 1930, the college opened its new campus in the East Falls section of Philadelphia, which combined teaching and the clinical care of a hospital in one overall facility. It was the first purpose-built hospital in the nation.
In 1993, the college and hospital merged with Hahnemann Medical School.
In 2003, the two colleges were absorbed by Drexel University College of Medicine.
The Womans Medical College of Pennsylvania was the first American medical school for woman dedicated to educating more African American and Native American female doctors than any other predominately white Medical College in the nineteenth century. [2]
R.C. Smedley's History of the Underground Railroad cites Bartholomew Fussell with proposing, in 1846, the idea for a college that would train female doctors. It was a tribute to his departed sister, who Bartholomew believed could have been a doctor if women had been given the opportunity at that time. Her daughter, Graceanna Lewis, was to become one of the first woman scientists in the United States. At a meeting at his house, The Pines, in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, Fussell invited five doctors to carry out his idea. The doctors invited were: Edwin Fussell (Bartholomew's nephew) M.D., Franklin Taylor, M.D., Ellwood Harvey, M.D., Sylvester Birdsall, M.D., and Dr. Ezra Michener. Graceanna also attended. Dr. Fussell would support the college, but had little to do with it after it started in 1850 in Philadelphia. [3]
Ellwood Harvey, who attended the 1846 meeting, but did not start teaching at the college until 1852, helped keep the school alive, along with Edwin Fussell. Dr. Harvey not only taught a full course load but took on a second load when another professor backed out.
Dr. Harvey also continued his medical practice. Among his patients were William Still and his family. Still, a renowned Philadelphia abolitionist, became a historian of the Underground Railroad after keeping extensive records of fugitive slaves aided in Philadelphia rescues.
Harvey was later sued for libel by Dr. Joseph S. Longshore, an instructor at the college who was forced out. Longshore started a rival women's medical college at the Penn Medical University. Using his previous connections from the Female Medical College, Longshore began to raise money for his own college.
Clara Marshall (1847–1931) graduated from the college. She served as dean from 1888 to 1917 and thought of Edwin Fussell as the founder of the school. [4] Other students credited Longshore and William J. Mullen as being primary founders in terms of their contributions. [4] Most considered these three men, whether official founder or not, to be instrumental in the creation of the Female Medical College of Pennsylvania. [4]
The Feminist Movement during the early to mid 19th century generated support for the Female Medical College of Pennsylvania. The Society of Friends in Philadelphia, a large group of Quakers, were supportive of the women's rights movements and the development of the Female MCP. [5]
MCP was initially located in the rear of 229 Arch Street in Philadelphia; it was changed to 627 Arch Street when Philadelphia renumbered streets in 1858. [6] In July 1861, the board of corporators of the Female Medical College of Pennsylvania chose to rent rooms for the college from the Woman's Hospital of Philadelphia on North College Avenue. [7]
The first dean of what was then known as the Female Medical College was Nathaniel R. Mosely, who served in the position from 1850 until 1856. [8] The second dean was also a man, Edwin B. Fussell, who held the position from 1856 to 1866. [9]
From then on, the Woman's College had a long history of female deans, lasting almost 100 years. The first woman to be a dean of this (or any) medical school was Ann Preston. [10] The following women were deans of the college in the years stated:
No woman was found to replace Marion Fay. After her, the position of dean was held by Glen R. Leymaster from 1964 to 1970, [17] at which time the institution became known as the Medical College of Pennsylvania. [18]
In part to provide clinical experience for WMC students, a group of Quaker women, particularly Ann Preston, founded the Woman's Hospital of Philadelphia in 1861. [19] In 1929, the West Philadelphia Hospital for Women merged with the Woman's Hospital of Philadelphia, retaining the latter's name. [20]
The Female Medical College of Pennsylvania faced difficulties in providing clinical training for its students. [21] Almost all medical institutions were confronted with the demand for more clinical practice due to the rise of surgery, physical diagnosis, and clinical specialties. [22] During the 1880s, clinical instruction at the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania relied mainly on the demonstration clinics. [21]
In 1887, Anna Broomall, professor of obstetrics for the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania, established a maternity outpatient service in a poor area of South Philadelphia for the purpose of student education. [21] By 1895, many students cared for three or four women who were giving birth. [23]
In the late 1920s, the college raised money to build a new campus. Designed by Ritter & Shay, the most successful of the Philadelphia
architecture firms in the 1920s, the East Falls Campus was the first purpose-built hospital in the nation. The design allowed both teaching and hospital care to take place in one facility, helping provide for more clinical care. Post-WWII housing shortages in the city were a catalyst for development of additions to the East Falls Campus, the first of which was the Ann Preston Building (designed by Thaddeus Longstreth), which provided housing and classrooms for student nurses.
Today, the building is known as the Falls Center. It is operated by Iron Stone Real Estate Partners as student housing, commercial space, and medical offices. [24]
In 1993, the Medical College of Pennsylvania merged with Hahnemann Medical College, retaining its Queen Lane campus. In 2003, the two medical colleges were absorbed as a part of Drexel University College of Medicine, creating new opportunities for the large student body for clinical practice in settings ranging from urban hospitals to small rural practices.
In the TV series, "Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman [25] ," fictional Dr. Michaela Quinn (Jane Seymour), graduates from this college.
Rebecca Cole was the first black graduate of Women's Medical College to be awarded an MD in 1867. Followed by Caroline Still Anderson and Giorgianna E. Patterson Young who were the next black graduates awarded medical degree in 1878 [2] .
The following is a list of Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania alumni (by century of graduation) notable for their medical career.
Rebecca J. Cole was an American physician, organization founder and social reformer. In 1867, she became the second African-American woman to become a doctor in the United States, after Rebecca Lee Crumpler three years earlier. Throughout her life she faced racial and gender-based barriers to her medical education, training in all-female institutions which were run by the first generation of graduating female physicians.
Drexel University College of Medicine is the medical school of Drexel University, a private research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The medical school represents the consolidation of two medical schools: Hahnemann Medical College, originally founded as the nation's first college of homeopathy, and the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania, the first U.S. medical school for women, which became the Medical College of Pennsylvania when it admitted men in 1970; these institutions merged in 1993, became affiliated with Drexel University College of Medicine in 1998, and were fully absorbed into the university in 2002. With one of the nation's largest enrollments for a private medical school, Drexel University College of Medicine is the second most applied-to medical school in the United States. It is ranked no. 83 in research by U.S. News & World Report.
Anandibai Gopalrao Joshi was the first Indian female doctor of western medicine. She was the first woman from the erstwhile Bombay presidency of India to study and graduate with a two-year degree in western medicine in the United States. She was also referred to as Anandibai Joshi and Anandi Gopal Joshi.
The Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University (LKSOM), located on the Health Science Campus of Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is one of seven schools of medicine in Pennsylvania that confers the Doctor of Medicine degree. It also confers Ph.D and M.S. degrees in biomedical science, and offers a Narrative Medicine program.
Margaret Dorothea Craighill was an American psychiatrist. She was born in Southport, North Carolina, the daughter of Colonel William E. Craighill and Mrs. Mary Craighill. Craighill was a third generation officer following in the footsteps of her grandfather, Brigadier General William Price Craighill, and her father. Both men graduated from the United States Military Academy, commonly referred to as West Point, in West Point, New York. On May 28, 1943, she became the first woman commissioned officer in the United States Army Medical Corps. Major Craighill served through World War II and afterward worked with the Veterans Administration. She died on July 20, 1977, aged 78, in Southbury, Connecticut.
Ann Preston was an American physician, activist, and educator. As head of the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania, she was the first female dean of a medical school in the United States of America.
Rachel Littler Bodley was an American professor, botanist, and university leader. She was best known for her term as Dean of the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania (1874–1888). She helped found the American Chemical Society in New York City.
Clara A. Swain was an American physician and Christian missionary of the Methodist Episcopal Church. She has been called the "pioneer woman physician in India," and as well as the "first fully accredited woman physician ever sent out by any missionary society into any part of the Non-Christian world". Her call to service in India fell from a need to have a female physician provide quality medical care to high-caste women, that were religiously secluded to zenana. Supported by the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, Swain left the United States in 1869, for Bareilly, India, where she spent the next twenty-seven years of her life treating women and children from illnesses, while simultaneously working to evangelize natives.
Mary Bruins Allison was one of the first American women to be trained in medicine in the United States to work as a missionary physician in Arabia. While attending medical college in Philadelphia, she learned Arabic. In 1934, she went to the Middle East to work as a missionary physician. In her forty-year long career, she worked primarily in Kuwait, as well as India, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman. In her capacity in Kuwait, she treated rich and poor women.
Arley Isabel Hare was an American physician, surgeon, author, and lecturer. As a young woman in the early 20th century, Munson was a pioneer in the field of medical mission work with the Wesleyan Methodist Mission in Medak, Andhra Pradesh, India. Along with evangelical motives, Munson had a special interest in the state of the health of Indian women and children and in the treatment of epidemics such as cholera or tuberculosis.
The Woman's Hospital of Philadelphia was established in 1861 to provide clinical experience for Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania students, a group of Quaker women, particularly Ann Preston.
Hannah E. Longshore was an American physician and the first woman to be appointed to the faculty of an American medical college, at the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania, where she was part of the first graduating class. She then taught at the college and later at Pennsylvania Medical University before opening a private practice.
Clara Marshall was an American physician, educator, and author. She was dean of the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania from 1888 to 1917.
Martha Tracy served as dean of the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania (WMCP) from 1917 to 1940, leading the institution through the Great Depression. She created a department of preventive medicine within the college and was the first professor of preventive medicine at WMC.
Emeline Horton Cleveland was an American physician and one of the first women to perform major abdominal or gynecological surgery in the United States. She became one of the first woman physicians associated with a large public hospital in the United States, and she established one of the first nursing assistant training programs in the country.
Henry Leffmann was an American chemist, physician and writer.
Isabel "Belle" Cobb was a Cherokee physician and educator best known for being the first woman physician in Indian Territory.
Marion Spencer Fay was an American physician, dean, teacher, and advocate. She was president and dean of Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania. Fay received her bachelor's degree at Newcomb College at Tulane University. She studied for her master's at the University of Colorado. Her PhD work was at Yale University where she focused on physiologic chemistry.
Anna Elizabeth Broomall was an American obstetrician, surgeon, and educator who taught obstetrics at the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania. She established the first maternal health and prenatal care clinic in the United States, located at the Woman's Hospital of Philadelphia, and used surgical innovations to reduce maternal mortality.
Frances Culbreth Van Gasken was an American physician and suffragist, based in Philadelphia.
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