Ever since the men physicians began to organize themselves into a compact body or guild, their endeavor has been not to educate the women whom they everywhere found called to be the natural obstetricians, but to drive them entirely out of such practice and to monopolize it for themselves. This struggle continues everywhere, all over the world. And it is a struggle which will continue until both men and women are educated equally well, so that the individual patient may exercise her choice of the “trained doctor” of either sex.
A public agitation begun in Boston in the summer of 1847 culminated in 1848 in a revulsion of feeling among the laity against this attempt of the male physicians to monopolize the practice of obstetrics, and in favor of the restoration of at least a part of such practice to the hands of women. And this revolt was countenanced by a large number of the leading citizens of Boston as well as of the rest of New England.
As a result of this agitation, the Boston Female Medical School was opened on November 1, 1848, with twelve pupils. And to aid this School, the Female Medical Education Society was organized on November 23, 1848, with six members. This membership increased to a thousand or more during the following year, its larger part consisting of men of prominence in all walks of life. And in the following year, 1850, this society was incorporated “for the purpose of providing for the education of Midwives, Nurses, and Female Physicians.”
In the earliest printed report of the Boston Female Medical School (1851), most stress is laid upon the course of study for Midwives, which is as follows:
Candidates for Diplomas as Practitioners in Midwifery, must be at least twenty years of age, and must present testimonials of good moral character; they must have studied at least one year, including the Lecture terms; must have attended two full courses of Lectures, one of which must have been in this institution: and must pass a satisfactory examination before the Board of Examiners, in Anatomy and Physiology, in Obstetrics and the diseases peculiar to Women.
Nurses are referred to in the statement that:
Courses of Lectures and Instruction will be given to Nurses in reference to their important and responsible vocation of attending the sick.
And Female Physicians are considered in the paragraph:
The candidates for full Medical Diplomas must have pursued a course of Education equivalent to that required in other medical institutions; and at least two terms of their instruction must have been in this School.
While all groups are urged to seek to prepare themselves, “Persons intending to become members of the School will do well to study, in advance, some elementary work on Anatomy and Physiology—Cutter, Jarvis, etc.,” closing with the naïve statement whose wisdom cannot be gainsaid, “And any other preparatory knowledge will be useful.”