Jennie Kidd Trout

What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make – Jane Goodall

Today would have been Jennie Trout’s 117th birthday.  I never heard of her until a few minutes ago when I saw an image of her on Google’s logo.  Of course, I had to find out who Jennie Trout was.  She was the first woman in Canada to become a licensed medical doctor in March 1875. Jennie was the only woman in Canada licensed to practice medicine until July 1880, when Emily Stowe completed the official qualifications.

Jennie Kidd Trout was born in Kelso, Scotland.  In 1847, she moved with her parents to Canada.  They settled in Stratford, Ontario.  After graduating, Jennie became a teacher after taking a teaching course and continued teaching until her marriage to Edward Trout in 1865.  The couple moved to Toronto where Edward ran a newspaper.

It was her own battle with “nervous disorders” shortly after her marriage, which made Jennie decide to practice medicine.  In 1871, she passed her matriculation exam and studied the University of Toronto.  Jennie Trout and Emily Jennings Stowe were the first women admitted to the Toronto School of Medicine, by special arrangement.  However, Emily refused to sit her exams in protest of the university’s demeaning treatment of the two women.  In the following video is the reenactment of how Jennie stood up to the prejudices of her male counterparts in the classroom.

Jennie ended up transferring to the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania, where she earned her M.D. on March 11, 1875 and became the first licensed female physician in Canada.

Jennie opened the Therapeutic and Electrical Institute in Toronto where there were specialized treatments for women involving “galvanic baths or electricity.” A galvanic bath uses the components of water and gentle electrical current. You lie in a 34 degree Celsius Bath, electricity is then passed through your body. Galvanic bath’s are mostly used in the treatment of degenerative diseases such as inflammatory arthritis and problems with the joints. The treatment lasts about 15 minutes (SMOKH)

For six years, she ran a free dispensary for the poor at the same location as the Institute which became so successful that branches in Brantford and Hamilton were later opened.

In 1882, due to poor health, Jennie moved to Palma Sola, Florida.  She was instrumental in the establishment of a medical school for women at Queen’s University in Kingston. Her family travelled extensively between Florida and Ontario and later moved to Los Angeles, California, where she died in 1921.

In 1991, Canada Post issued a postage stamp in her honour to commemorate her as the first woman licensed to practice medicine in Canada.

Notes to Women celebrates this phenomenal woman who made history and left an indelible mark in the medical profession.  She is an inspiration for us all.

Sources: Wikipedia; Susanna McLeod ; Goodreads

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Mary Seacole

I just finished reading a very long but interesting biography of Mary Seacole. When I mentioned her to my husband, he immediately knew who I was talking about. He’s from Jamaica where Mary was born. She was born on November 23, 1805 to a Scottish father and Jamaican mother. Her father was a soldier in the British Army and her mother was a free woman. Mrs. Seacole was a doctress, a healer who used traditional Caribbean and African herbal remedies. She ran Blundell Hall, a boarding house, considered one of the best hotels in Kingston. It was from watching and helping her mother, that Mary became interested in nursing.

Mary was proud of her Scottish ancestry and called herself a Creole. Legally, she was classified a mulatto, a multiracial person with limited political rights. She was also very proud of her black ancestry. “I have a few shades of deeper brown upon my skin which shows me related—and I am proud of the relationship—to those poor mortals whom you once held enslaved, and whose bodies America still owns.” Being the educated daughter of a Scottish officer and a free black woman with a respectable business would have afforded Mary a high position in Jamaican society.

Mary married Edwin Horatio Hamilton Seacole, rumored to have been the illegitimate son of Horatio Nelson and his mistress, Emma, Lady Hamilton. Edwin was a merchant. The newly married couple moved to Black River where they opened a provisions store which failed to succeed. In the early 1840s, they returned to Blundell Hall.

During the years 1843 and 1844, disasters struck Mary and her family. They lost much of the boarding house in a fire on Kingston. Blundell Hall burned down and was replaced by the New Blundell Hall which was deemed “better than before.” She lost her husband and then her mother. Overcome with grief, Mary didn’t move for days. Then she composed herself and assumed the role of manager of her mother’s hotel and plunged herself into work, turning down many offers of marriage. She became a widely respected among the European military visitors to Jamaica who frequently stayed at Blundell Hall.

During the cholera epidemic of 1850 which killed 32,000 Jamaicans, she treated patients and blamed the outbreak to infection brought on a steamer from New Orleans, Louisiana. Shortly after she arrived in Cruces, Panama where her half-brother moved, cholera struck. Familiar with the disease and having treated those who had the infection, Mary moved into action, treating the first victim who survived. This did wonders for her reputation and many patients were brought to her as the infection spread. The epidemic raged, causing many casualties which filled Mary with exasperation with the victims, claiming that they “bowed down before the plague in slavish despair.” Towards the end, she too became sick but managed to pull through.

During the Crimean War, disease broke out and hundreds perished, mostly from cholera. Hundreds more died while waiting to be shipped out or on the voyage. It was during this time that Florence Nightingale was charged with the responsibility of forming a detachment of nurses to be sent to the hospital to save lives. After suitable candidates were selected following interviews, Florence left for Turkey. Mary tried to join the second group of nurses to the Crimea. She applied to the War Office and other government offices but arrangements for departure were already underway. She applied to the Crimean Fund, a fund raised by the public to support the wounded in Crimea for sponsorship to travel there but again, she was refused. Resolute, she decided to travel to Crimea using her own resources and to open a British Hotel.

On the ship Malta, Mary met a doctor who recently left Scutari, where Florence Nightingale was. He wrote Mary a letter of recommendation to Florence. Mary visited Florence at the Barrack Hospital in Scutari, asking for a bed for the night as she planned to travel to Balaclava the following day to join Thomas Day, her Caribbean acquaintance. In her memoirs, Mary mentioned that Florence was very friendly. They found a bed for her and breakfast was sent to her in the morning.

As she had planned, Mary opened the British Hotel near Balaclava. Meals were served there and there was outside catering. It prospered. Meals and supplies were provided for the soldiers. One frequent visitor was Alexis Soyer, a French chef who advised her to concentrate on food and beverage service and not to have beds for visitors as the few either slept on board the ships in the harbor or in tents in the camps.

The Special Correspondent of The Times newspaper highly commended Mary’s work, citing, “Mrs. Seacole…doctors and cures all manner of men with extraordinary success. She is always in attendance near the battle-field to aid the wounded, and has earned many a poor fellow’s blessings.”

Florence Nightingale acknowledged favorable views of Mary to Soyer and Mary had told him how kindly Florence had given her board and lodging. When Soyer mentioned Mary’s inquiries of her, Florence responded pleasantly and with a smile that , “I should like to see her before she leaves, as I hear she has done a great deal of good for the poor soldiers.” Yet, Florence didn’t want her nurses to associate with Mary and in a letter to her brother-in-law, Sir Harry Verney, she insinuated that Mary had kept a “bad house” in Crimea and was responsible for “much drunkenness and improper conduct”. This letter came at the time when Mary approached Sir Harry for the opportunity to assist in the Franco-Prussian War because of his involvement in the British National Society for the Relief of the Sick and Wounded.

In spite of this, Mary moved in royal circles. Prince Victor of Hohenlohe-Langenburg, a nephew of Queen Victoria was one of Mary’s customers in Crimea when he was a young Lieutenant. Perhaps as a token of gratitude and appreciation, he carved a marble bust of her in 1871 which was exhibited in the Royal Academy summer exhibition a year later. Mary also became the personal masseuse to the Prince of Wales who suffered from white leg rheumatism.

Sadly, while she was well-known at the end of her life, Mary quickly faded from public memory and her work in Crimea was overshadowed by Florence Nightingale’s for many years. And there were controversies surrounding Mary. It has been argued that she is being promoted at the expense of Florence Nightingale. According to Professor Lynn McDonald, “…support for Seacole has been used to attack Nightingale’s reputation as a pioneer in public health and nursing.”

There are claims that her achievements have been exaggerated for political reasons and a plan to erect a statue of her at St. Thomas’ Hospital in London, describing her as “pioneer nurse” has sparked some outrage. According to those who oppose, Mary has no connection with the institution whereas Florence Nightingale did. In Dr. Lang’s opinion, she “does not qualify as a mainstream figure in the history of nursing.”

Mary’s name appears in an appendix to the Key Stage 2 National Curriculum, as an example of a significant Victorian historical figure but teachers are not required to include her in their lessons. At the end of 2012, it was reported that she would be removed from the National Curriculum. This was opposed by Greg Jenner, the historical consultant to Horrible Histories. He believes that removing Mary from the curriculum would be a mistake in spite of the fact that her medical achievements have been exaggerated.

In January 2013, Operation Black Vote launched a petition to request that Education Secretary Michael Gove not drop Mary Seacole or Oloudah Equiano from the National Curriculum. Reverend Jesse Jackson and others wrote a letter to The Times, protesting the proposed removal of Mary Seacole from the National Curriculum. The campaign was a success as Michael Gove was forced to concede after receiving approximately 35,000 signatures.

Today, Mary Seacole is remembered in the Caribbean. She was posthumously awarded the Jamaican Order of Merit in 1991. In 1954, the headquarters of the Jamaican General Trained Nurses’ Association was christened “Mary Seacole House”. This was quickly followed by the naming of the University of the West Indies in Mona, Jamaica. A ward at the Kingston Public Hospital is named in her memory. In Britain, buildings and organization now commemorate her by name and near the bottom of Fleet Street in London a Seacole Lane existed until it was redeveloped in the 1980s.

Notes to Women celebrate this pioneer in healing and helping those who were sick. She may not have been a registered nurse and her achievements may have been exaggerated but what matters is that she had the heart for nursing. There are some in the nursing profession who not in it because it is their passion. Mary Seacole had the heart and the passion for nursing and she was a blessing to many of those whom she treated. We think that this phenomenal woman should be recognized for what she has done.

She is a role model for all of us.  She was proud of her heritage.  She defied racism and bigotry and she embarked on her calling to help others, not allowing rejection or any other obstacles to get in her way.  If you have a goal in life, make it happen.  Don’t dream.  Act.  Florence Nightingale was not the only light.  Like Mary Seacole, you can be light too wherever you are.

I must say that I don’t appreciate your friend’s kind wishes with respect to my complexion. If it had been as dark as a nigger’s, I should have been just as happy and useful, and as much respected by those whose respect I value: and as to his offer of bleaching me, I should, even if it were practicable, decline it without any thanks.

I have a few shades of deeper brown upon my skin which shows me related to those poor mortals you once held enslaved, and whose bodies America still owns. Having this bond, and knowing what slavery is, having seen with my eyes and heard with my ears proof positive enough of its horrors, is it surprising that I should be somewhat impatient of the airs of superiority which many Americans have endeavoured to assume over me.

I have always noticed what actors children are……….whatever disease was most prevalent in Kingston, be sure my poor doll soon contracted it…….before long it was very natural that I should seek to extend my practice, and so I found other patients in the cats and dogs around me.

Doubts and suspicions rose in my heart for the first and last time, thank Heaven. Was it possible that American prejudices against colour had some root here? Did these ladies shrink from accepting my aid because my blood flowed beneath a somewhat duskier skin than theirs?

 

 

Sources:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Seacole; http://www.biographyonline.net/humanitarian/quotes/mary-seacole.html

Mary Ann Shadd Cary

Mary Ann Shadd Cary was the eldest of thirteen children.  She was born on October 9, 1823 in Wilmington, Delaware.  Her great-grandfather was Hans Schad, alias John Shadd, who served as Hessian soldier with the British army during the French and Indian War.  Her father, Abraham Doras Shadd was trained as a shoemaker and owned a shop in Wilmington and later in the nearby town of West Chester, Pennsylavania.  In these two places, he was a conductor on the Underground Railroad and involved in other civil rights activities.  He was an active member of the American Anti-Slavery Society and in 1833 he was named President of the National Convention for the Improvement of Free People of Colour.

It’s not surprising that the Shadd family moved to Pennyslavania when it became illegal to educate African American children in the the state of Delaware.  In Pennyslavania, Mary attended a Quaker school.  In 1840 Mary Ann returned to West Chester where she established a school for black children.  She taught in Norristown, Pennsylvania and New York City.  Three years later, Abraham was forced to move his family to Canada, settling in North Buxton, Ontario.  The reason of this move was the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850.  The law threatened to return free northern blacks and escaped slaves into bondage.   In 1858, Abraham D. Shadd became the first black man to be elected to political office in Canada.

Mary Ann founded a racially integrated school in Windsor with the support of the American Missionary Association.  She ran The Provincial Freeman, an anti-slavery newspaper which made her the first female editor in North America.  Her brother, Isaac managed the business affairs of the newspaper and at his home he hosted meetings to plan the raid on Harper’s Ferry.

Mary Ann traveled around Canada and the United States, an advocate for full racial integration though education and self-reliance.  She promoted emigration to Canada amongst freemen.  In 1855 when she attempted to participate in the Philadelphia Colored Convention, the assembly debated whether or not to even allow her to sit as a delegate.  She was viewed as a controversial figure becuase of her advocacy for emigration.  By 15 votes she was admitted and according to Frederick Douglass’ Paper, although she gave a speech advocating for emigration, she was so well received that the delegates voted that she be given ten more minutes to speak.  Unfortunately, her presence at the Convention was omitted from the minutes most likely because she was a woman.  How sad.  Here we have blacks who know what it’s like to be discriminated because of color and yet they were discriminating against Mary Ann because she was a woman.  How difficult it was to be a black woman in those days.  She faced prejudice because of her color and prejudice because of her gender.

In 1856 Mary Ann married a Toronto barber named Thomas F. Cary who was involved with the Provincial Freeman.  They had a daughter and a son.  After Thomas died in 1860, Mary Ann and their children returned to the United States.

During the Civil War, at the request of abolitionist, Martin Delany, she served as a recruiting officer to enlist black volunteers for the Union Army in the state of Indiana.  After the Civil War, she went back to teaching.  She taught in the black schools in Wilmington before she moved to Washington, D.C. where she taught in public schools and attended Howard University School of Law.  In 1883, at the age of 60, she graducated as a lawyer, becoming the second black woman in the United States to earn a law degree.  Age didn’t slow this remarkable woman down.  Not only was she writing for newspapers such as National Era and The People’s Advocate but she organized the Colored Women’s Progressive Franchise.  She joined the National Woman Suffrage Association where she worked alongside Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton for women’s suffrage.  They testified before the Judiciary Committee of the House of the Representatives.

Mary Ann Shadd died in Washington, D.C. on June 5, 1893.  She was interred at Columbian Harmony Cemetery.  She left behind her a great legacy.  Her former residence in the U Street Corridor was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1976.  In 1987 the National Women’s History Project designated her a Women’s History Month Honoree and Canada honored her by designating her a Person of National Historic Significance.

Like her father, Mary Ann was an advocate for civil rights –the right to freedom and education among blacks.  She was an anti-slavery activist, journalist, teacher and lawyer.  She was a wife and mother.  She was a wonderful example to her children.  She taught them that everyone is entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  No one should have their freedom and right to education taken away from them.

Notes to Women salute this amazing woman who showed us that the things we sometimes take for granted are to be cherished.  Freedom and education are two things we should fiercely guard.  There are some countries in the world where human rights are violated.  Women are treated as second class citizens or worse, girls are denied education and Christians are denied the freedom to worship.  Be thankful for the freedoms you currently have.

“Self-reliance Is the Fine Road to Independence.”

 

 

Sources:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Ann_Shadd;

http://www.womeninhistoryohio.com/mary-ann-shadd-cary.html