Emily Blackwell

About

Emily Blackwell (October 8, 1826 – September 7, 1910) was an American physician and women’s rights activist. She was the second woman to earn a medical degree at what is now Case Western Reserve University, after Nancy Talbot Clark. She made major advancements in the medical scene, assisting in the start of the New York Infirmary for Indigent Women and Children and creating the Women’s Central Association of Relief. Blackwell, along with her sister Elizabeth, established the Women’s Medical College in New York City. Shortly after, she helped form the London School of Medicine for Women. In 1993, she was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame.

Blackwell was born on October 8, 1826, in Bristol, England. She was the sixth of nine surviving children of Samuel and Hannah Lane Blackwell. The Blackwell family had been very prosperous for the time, educating Emily with private tutors. The Blackwell household was said to be very intelligent and stimulating. Especially because her father Samuel was many things including a dissident, reformer, and a lay preacher. At a young age Emily was shy but extremely intelligent, she would perform different experiments…