| By Gale Staff |
Representation is a powerful tool for your elementary students’ social and emotional development. But all too often, students lack real-world role models who look like them or relate to their experiences. By highlighting individuals who broke through social, racial, or gender barriers, you can inspire young thinkers to push back on unfair societal norms—and to break barriers of their own.
Using Gale In Context: Elementary, discover curated portals featuring the world’s great pioneers across art, music, science, mathematics, and more. From biographies and historical images to magazine articles and quick facts, you will have everything you need to develop an effective and fascinating lesson plan.
Today, in honor of her birthday on February 3, let’s discuss Elizabeth Blackwell, the first female doctor in the United States. Meet her parents, who believed in education for everyone regardless of sex. Learn how Blackwell overcame early hardship and gender bias to pursue her dream of becoming a doctor. And read how she built a legacy that would inspire women in science well beyond her death.
Meet Elizabeth Blackwell’s Family
Often, the best way to begin learning someone’s story is through their family background and upbringing. Gale In Context: Elementary houses helpful biographical information on Blackwell’s early years and related content to provide historical context.
Her parents, Samuel and Hannah Blackwell, had nine children. They were Quakers, a religious group that believes in peace and equality. As such, the Blackwells were anti-slavery activists and very progressive regarding women’s rights. They thought all of their children, regardless of gender, deserved a good education. In addition to her supportive parents, young Elizabeth had several role models within her extended family, including Lucy Stone and Antoinette Brown Blackwell, both groundbreakers in their own rights.
When Elizabeth was born in 1821, the family lived in England. Her father, Samuel, ran a sugar refinery, but the operation burned down in 1832. The fire prompted the Blackwells to seek a future in the United States. Sadly, following an economic downturn known as the Panic of 1837, Samuel died suddenly of fever, leaving the Blackwells in financial crisis. To support the family, the Blackwell women turned to teaching, one of the few occupations available to women at that time.
The Journey to the Top of the Class
While working as a teacher and with little extra money, Elizabeth Blackwell boarded with other families. One was the family of a physician, who allowed Blackwell access to his collection of medical books. Thus began her interest in the inner workings of the human body.
However, a second event likely sparked Blackwell’s determination to become a physician.
When a close friend, Mary Donaldson, was dying of uterine cancer, she told Blackwell that she believed she would have received better care and avoided some of her suffering if she had access to a female doctor. Before Donaldson died, she encouraged Blackwell to consider becoming a doctor herself.
With her friend’s final wish as motivation, Blackwell began applying to medical school. However, because she was a woman, no one would accept her. Finally, in 1847, the small Geneva Medical College in New York sent her an acceptance letter. Historians believe the college’s dean extended the offer as a joke since he did not believe a young woman would actually succeed within the all-male student body. Despite facing harassment and exclusion from academic opportunities, the persistent Blackwell graduated top of her class just two years later.
Study Blackwell’s Remarkable Accomplishments
Receiving a degree as a woman in the 19th century was an impressive feat on its own—but Blackwell’s accomplishments extend far beyond her graduation from medical school. Following graduation, she traveled to Europe to gain first-hand experience with the top surgeons in Paris. Despite her credentials, the doctors did not accept her, so she instead worked in the maternity ward delivering babies.
During this time, Blackwell developed an infection that caused her to lose sight in one eye, making her dreams of becoming a surgeon impossible. She returned to the United States to continue her work. The daring young doctor landed back in New York, though none of the prestigious hospitals were interested in hiring a woman. Undeterred, she opened her own clinic in 1851, serving low-income patients (mostly women and children) in the slums of New York City.
Shortly thereafter, Blackwell wrote The Laws of Life with Special Reference to the Physical Education of Girls, which specifically addressed information about the physical health of young women. In 1857, she founded the New York Infirmary for Women and Children, an institution run exclusively by female staff.
Analyze Her Legacy
As a doctor, Blackwell helped pioneer research in preventive medicine and hygiene. She believed education was essential to public health and openly shared her knowledge. In 1869, she traveled to England to open another medical college for women. There, she helped found Great Britain’s National Health Society and became the first female to serve on the British medical register (the country’s official list of practitioners). She even helped support her friend Florence Nightingale’s mission to establish the world’s first nursing school.
Blackwell paved the way for other women to pursue medicine. Her two sisters, Emily and Marie, both became physicians and worked at the female-run hospital that Elizabeth had opened in New York. In 1870, just 20 years after her graduation, 137 women were actively enrolled in medical schools nationwide. Blackwell would continue to write and teach well into her 90s, doing everything in her power to mentor and encourage more women to become medical professionals and learn about their bodies.
Celebrate Women in STEM with Gale
As you prepare for Women’s History Month in March, Blackwell’s birthday presents a timely opportunity to highlight more female leaders in STEM. Gale makes lesson planning a breeze. In addition to Gale In Context: Elementary’s well-organized, meaningful content, educators can explore related activities, curious facts, and built-in vocabulary guidance.
With Gale In Context: Elementary, you can trust in the accuracy and age-appropriateness of content. With a traditional search engine, elementary students might stumble across distracting, biased, or unsuitable information. Gale mimics the user-friendly flow and customizations of popular search engines, but our database guides students through the research process and delivers relevant educational results. Plus, Gale’s elementary platform is colorful and organized, ideal for welcoming young students and developing early reading comprehension skills.
Whatever the topic, you can lean on Gale collections for more curriculum-aligned ideas highlighting other significant and inspirational figures throughout history. If your school doesn’t subscribe to Gale In Context databases, you can contact your local rep today to learn more about our products.