Danny Federico
Reporter3@riverbendnews.org
Women's History Month is upon us once more. This is the time to honor and recognize the important moments in history that advanced women's rights, as well as advocates that pushed for them. Women's History Month has been celebrated annually in March since its original creation in 1978, when the event grew out of a week-long celebration of women's contributions by the school district of Sonoma, Calif. Later, in 1980, President Jimmy Carter issued the first presidential proclamation declaring the week of March 8 as National Women's History Week. In 1981, the U.S. Congress passed a resolution establishing it as a national celebration and, six years later, the National Women's History Project successfully petitioned Congress to expand the event to cover the entire month of March.
This year, the National Women's History Alliance has designated the theme of Women's History Month to be “Women Providing Healing, Promoting Hope,” which is “both a tribute to the ceaseless work of caregivers and frontline workers during this ongoing pandemic and also a recognition of the thousands of ways that women of all cultures have provided both healing and hope throughout history.” Going off of this theme, lets focus on some of the important contributions women have made to the advancement of the medical field.
Starting the journey was Elizabeth Blackwell, who was born in Bristol, England. On Jan. 23, 1849, Blackwell graduated from Geneva Medical College in Geneva, N.Y., with the highest grades in her entire class. She proceeded to set up a small clinic to treat the poor in New York City and later founded the New York Infirmary for Women and Children in 1857. Both she and her sister, Emily Blackwell, even trained nurses during the Civil War for Union hospitals. Then, in 1868, Blackwell opened her very own medical college in New York City. However, a year later, she put her sister in charge of the school and returned to London, where she became a professor of gynecology at the London School of Medicine for Women in 1875.
Fifteen years after Blackwell graduated from Geneva Medical College, Rebecca Davis Lee Crumpler became the first African American woman doctor in the U.S. after graduating from the New England Female Medical College on March 1, 1864. She began practicing medicine in Boston, specializing in the care of women, children and the poor. In 1865, after the Civil War ended, she moved to Richmond, Va., to care for freed slaves who didn't have access to medical care through the Freedman's Bureau. Crumpler returned to Boston in 1869, where she worked out of her home on Beacon Hill and gave nutritional advice to poor women and children.
Then, Clara Barton, a name most people are already familiar with, founded the American Red Cross on May 21, 1881. Barton, who was born in North Oxford, Mass., moved to Washington, D.C. and began working at the U.S. Patent Office, becoming one of the first women to work for the federal government. Barton still resided in Washington when the Civil War began in 1861. At this time, she provided nursing care and supplies to soldiers, earning her the nickname “Angel of the Battlefield.” Even after the war ended, Barton continued to search for ways to help the military and, after receiving permission from President Abraham Lincoln, she opened the Office of Missing Soldiers, helping to reconnect over 20,000 soldiers with their families. In 1869, while in Switzerland, Barton learned about the Red Cross movement, which was a European humanitarian effort to provide neutral aid to those injured in combat. Inspired by this, she volunteered with the International Committee of the Red Cross, providing civilian relief during the Franco-Prussian War. Then, on May 21, 1881, at the age of 59, Barton founded the American Red Cross in an effort to help injured American civilians. She served as the Red Cross President for 23 years before retiring in 1904.
Women have made countless contributions to the nation's medical history and history as a whole. So don't limit your appreciation for these amazing female trailblazers to just the month of March. Look to your mothers, sisters, aunts, nieces, friends, neighbors and coworkers and let them know they, too, can make history.