Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania

The Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania (founded in 1850), later renamed as The Medical College of Pennsylvania (MCP) after opening its doors to men in 1970, was the second medical institution in the world established to train women in medicine and offer them the M.D. degree. (New England Female Medical College had been established two years earlier.) Originally called The Female Medical College of Pennsylvania, the college changed its name to Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania in 1867. The associated Woman's Hospital of Philadelphia was founded in 1861.

The college built a new campus in East Falls in the 1920s, which combined teaching and the clinical care of a hospital in one overall facility. It was the first purpose-built hospital in the nation. In 1993, the college and hospital merged with Hahnemann Medical School. In 2003, the two colleges were absorbed by the Drexel University College of Medicine.

Smedley's History of the Underground Railroad cites Dr. Bartholomew Fussell with proposing, in 1846, the idea for a college that would train female doctors. It was a tribute to his departed sister, who Bartholomew felt could have been a doctor if women had been given the opportunity at that time. Her daughter, Graceanna Lewis, was to become one of the first women scientists in the USA. At his house. The Pines, in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, he invited five doctors to carry out his idea. The doctors invited were: Edwin Fussell (Bartholomew's nephew) M.D., Franklin Taylor, M.D., Ellwood Harvey, M.D., Sylvester Birdsall, M.D., and Dr. Ezra Michener. Graceallen was also in attendance. Dr. Fussell would support the college, but had little to do with it after it started in 1850 in Philadelphia.

One doctor, Ellwood Harvey (who attended the 1846 meeting, but would not start teaching at the college until 1852), helped keep the school alive along with Edwin Fussell. Dr. Harvey not only taught a full course load, but took on a second load when another professor backed out. Dr. Harvey also took on patients for his practice, which included Philadelphia abolitionist and UGRR historian, William Still, and his family. It was most likely Still who told him about a slave hiding in Washington DC named Anne Maria Weems. Harvey took her, disguised as male buggy driver, from in front of the White House to Philadelphia and eventually New York City. She eventually made it to Canada. With the $300 reward, from Lewis Tappan, for rescuing Weems, Dr. Harvey bought a papier-mâché dissection manniquin for the college. Ann Preston was one of the first students to graduate from the Female Medical College of Pennsylvania.

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