Intrepid Women: Elizabeth Blackwell, M.D.

Loretta reports:

Some years ago I wrote a novella (being reissued this May in an anthology) set in England in the late 1820s.  The heroine of “The Mad Earl’s Bride” wanted to be a doctor.  That was not going to happen.  The medical profession was closed to women.  Men had even moved into midwifery, traditionally a feminine occupation, and pushed women out.  It would be a long time before women obstetricians/gynecologists (re-)appeared on the scene.   There was a time not at all long ago when it was hard to find a woman doctor of any kind, even in a large city.

Which makes Elizabeth Blackwell’s achievement all the more impressive.  She had tried teaching and it didn’t agree with her (oh, I can relate!).  Then a dying friend inspired her to become a doctor.  Unthinkable!  Even her strongest supporters told her the only way she could get into medical school was to disguise herself as a man.  I don’t doubt that this is a route a few other women took—we do know of women who got into the military that way.  But imagine the complications.  You have to stay in disguise all through school, and then you get a diploma in someone else’s name, which means you’re not legally a doctor???  So you pretend to be a man for the rest of your life??????

Not Elizabeth.  She stuck to her guns, eventually got accepted into a small medical school, and in 1849 became the first woman to complete a course of study at a medical college and receive the M.D. degree.  It wasn’t exactly smooth sailing after that.  But hers is an amazing story of a dauntless woman.  You can read all about it at the U.S. National Library of Medicine.  The presentation, “That Girl There Is a Doctor of Medicine,”
includes pictures of many original documents.

Her story appears on Harvard University’s Women Working 1800-1930 as well.  I’d also recommend a very interesting, late 19th century book, Our famous women: An authorized and complete record of the lives and deeds of eminent women of our times. Giving for the first time the life history of women who have won their way from poverty and obscurity to fame and glory...Superbly illustrated —and it is, actually.  Dr. Blackwell’s story includes the dramatic illustration at right of an incident at medical school.

1920s: The boyish look

Loretta reports:

Among ourselves as well as with you, Susan & I have talked about which fashion eras seem to be more flattering to one time of life than another.  We’ve agreed that the fashions of the Regency era were more flattering to slender, youthful figures than to more…er…mature, curvaceous ones.  Bosoms were in fashion, though, and generously displayed in the evening.

In the 1920s, too, a youthful look ruled.  But it was a boyish look.  I didn’t fully realize how boyish, however, until the latest posts arrived from one of my new favorite blogs, the FIDM Museums & Galleries.  The dress on display, Rachel points out, has no darts!  That’s when it really sank in.

Today, while the “ideal” is tall & skinny, women are also supposed to have cleavage.  You know: the Barbie look.  It’s so important that some of us who don’t own that sort of real estate go out and buy it.

But not back in Clara Bow’s day.  Interesting that the It Girl (at left above) offers us a very sexy display of back instead.  I’ve put Greta Garbo up as well (at right below) because hers was that ideal figure.

But few of us possess the ideal figure, for then or now.  I will never be as tall as Frances Stuart or the Countess of Castlemaine, let alone a runway model, and it’s a good bet that my skinny days are behind me.  While I can appreciate beautiful clothes on the right body, I do fantasize about a greater variety of “right body” in designers’ repertoires.  And so I couldn’t help cheering when I followed Rachel’s suggestion and took a look at Prada’s fashions for fall. 

Check it out, and check out the FIDM Museum & Galleries blog.  You'll find there as well a whole fresh post devoted to the beautiful cloche hat.

Both photos courtesy Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA. (1) Undated photo of Clara Bow.  (2) Greta Garbo and Mauritz Stiller, 8/17/25.

Men Behaving Badly: King Charles II, the Duke of Richmond, & Frances Stewart

Susan reports:

King Charles II (1630-1685), left, of England loved women, and women in turn loved him. From high-born peeresses to humble orange-girls, literally hundreds of women enjoyed the royal person during his lifetime. Only one lady of his court is known to have refused him: a beautiful nineteen-year-old Maid of Honor named Frances Stewart (1647-1702), lower right. Although Charles pursued her for months, Frances clearly had other interests. This is an excerpt from the Memoirs of Philibert, Comte de Gramont, one of the greatest gossips of the 17th century.

It was near midnight: the king met [Frances's] chambermaids [at her bedchamber door], who respectfully opposed his entrance, and, in a very low voice, whispered to His Majesty that Miss Stewart had been very ill; but that, having gone to bed, she was God be thanked, in a very fine sleep.

"That I must see," said the king, pushing her back...He found Miss Stewart in bed, indeed, but far from being asleep: the Duke of Richmond was seated at her pillow, and in all probability was less inclined to sleep than herself. The perplexity of the one party, and the rage of the other, were such as may easily be imagined upon such a surprise. The king, who, of all men was one of the most mild and gentle, testified his resentment to the Duke of Richmond in such terms as he had never before used. The duke was speechless, and almost petrified...Miss Stewart's window was very convenient for a sudden revenge, the Thames flowing close beneath it..and seeing the king more incensed...than he thought his nature capable of, [the duke] made a profound bow, and retired, without a single word to the vast torrent of threats and menaces that were poured upon him.

Miss Stewart, having a little recovered from her first surprise, instead of justifying herself...said everything that was most capable to inflame the king's...resentment; that, if she were not allowed to receive visits from a man of the Duke of Richmond's rank, who came with honourable intentions, she was a slave in a free country;...if this was not permitted her...she did not believe that there was any power on earth that could hinder her from going over to France, and throwing herself into a convent, to enjoy there that tranquillity which was denied her in this court. The king, sometimes furious with anger, sometimes relenting at her tears...nearly was induced to throw himself upon his knees, and entreat pardon for the injury he had done her...when instead she desired him to retire, and leave her in repose, at least for the remainder of that night....This impertinent request provoked and irritated the king to the highest degree: he went out abruptly, vowing never to see her more.

Ladies who refuse kings, let alone berate them in their bedchambers, seldom fare well in history. But Frances won. Soon after this night in 1667, she eloped with her duke, and the pair were married – much to the displeasure and disappointment of the King.

Above: Charles II, King of England, Scotland, and Ireland, by James Michael Wright

Below: Frances Teresa Stewart, by Sir Peter Lely

Department of Shameless Self-Promotion

Loretta & Susan reporting:

Our readers may have noticed the two new book covers at right. Yes, we are the Two Nerdy History Girls, but when we're not writing blogs, we're writing novels, and these are our newest, scheduled to appear in your look bookstore around summer's end. Loretta's Last Night's Scandal arrives in August, and Susan's The Countess & the King: A Novel of the Countess of Dorchester & King James II in September. We'll have more to say about them over the next few months, but we couldn't resist showing off our covers now.

As for both covers having a purple-theme...we have no idea how that happened. Completely different genres, stories, and publishers. Must have been something in the air or the stars. Or maybe purple is this year's Gemini color.

Left: Detail from Southwark Fair by William Hogarth, 1733

Spring bonnets at Old Sturbridge Village

Loretta reports:

There was a time, not so very long ago, when a woman (or man) wouldn’t think of leaving the house without a hat. Some of us may remember the collection of hatboxes in our mothers’ or grandmothers’ closets—or the thrill of going out to buy a new outfit for Easter, complete with hat. But nowadays even the Easter bonnet has become an endangered species.

Old Sturbridge Village, a living history museum dealing with life in a New England village of the 1830s, wants us to know that it didn’t matter whether one lived out in the sticks in a community that didn’t really celebrate Easter. The ladies still cared about what went on their heads, they were far from immune to fashion, and with spring’s arrival, they burst out in new or at least spruced-up bonnets. You can read the story here.

According to the newspaper article that caught my attention, “Mid 19th century women typically owned four types of bonnets: a decorated silk or straw one for spring, a folding cotton calash* for rain or travel, a winter velvet-lined bonnet or quilted hood, and a cotton or linen bonnet for outdoor work.” This took me completely by surprise. I’d no idea they went in for ribbons and feathers. Just goes to show the assumptions one makes about New England country folk.

For a short time—because the items are so fragile—some of the museum’s collection of bonnets will be on display. On Easter weekend, costumed interpreters will hold bonnet-making demonstrations. You can take an online tour of their bonnets here on the website.

Above left is a Straw bonnet with silk pleated lining, circa 1830, from the Old Sturbridge Village collection.

*collapsible bonnet, illustrated at right.