[112]. Dr. McNutt.
[113]. Drs. Peckham, Cushier.
[114]. Dr. Cushier.
[115]. In 1876, the Boylston Prize, conferred every two years by Harvard University for a medical essay, was won by Dr. Mary Putnam Jacobi. The prizes were awarded in ignorance of the names of the writers, and consequently of their sex; but this was the first occasion on which a woman had competed. The subject was, “The Question of Rest for Women during Menstruation.”
Dr. Boylston, the founder of the prize, had been the first colonial physician to practice inoculation, after this had been suggested by Cotton Mather.
[116]. The committee consisted of Prof. Alexander Agassiz chairman, Dr. Morrill Wyman, President Eliot, Mr. J. Elliott Cabot, Dr. Le Baron Russell.
[117]. Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, May 22, 1879. The editor expresses surprise at “so frank a confession of inferiority.” Although it was only a few years since women physicians were ostracised on the ostensible ground of the necessary inferiority of their means of education, the Boston editor now, in order to confute the claim of necessity for the Harvard education, passes in most flattering review the existing schools for women at New York, Philadelphia, and Chicago, and insists that these offer all the advantages any reasonable woman can want. Thus (this in 1879):
Philadelphia, 29th year, class 90 students.
New York, 10th year, class 47 students.
Chicago, 9th year, class 32 students.