Desmond Thomas Doss

Clay and 7th Streets

The childhood home of Rosalie S. Morton, surgeon and public health advocate, stood on the present site of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church. Morton graduated from the Women’s Medical College of Pennsylvania in 1897 and trained in Europe and Asia. She led a nationwide public-health initiative for the American Medical Association beginning in 1909. During World War I, Morton worked in field hospitals on the Salonika Front and was a founder of the American Women’s Hospitals service, which opened its first hospital in 1918 in France. She established the International Serbian Educational Committee in 1919. Morton received decorations for distinguished service from the governments of France and Serbia. Q-6-50

50 Elizabeth Langhorne Lewis (1851–1946)

609 Court St. The home of Elizabeth Lewis, one of the most influential women’s suffrage activists in Virginia, stood here. As a vice president of the Equal Suffrage League (ESL) of Virginia, she organized local leagues, gave speeches, and lobbied elected officials. In 1910 she founded the ESL of Lynchburg, the second-oldest local chapter in the state, and she was its president until 1920. Like many suffrage groups organized by white women, the ESL failed to include African Americans in its work. After the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guaranteed women’s voting rights in 1920, Lewis became a leader of the state and Lynchburg chapters of the League of Women Voters. Q-6-56