WORCESTER MEDICINE
Medicine in Worcester
Homer Gage, MD: Envisioning the Mass Med Society with a Journal Continued
bibliography:
1. Gage, Homer. “Some Abuses in Surgical Practice.” The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal 169, no. 1 (1913): 1-7.
Rebecca Barnard, MD and Mary Vincent O’Callaghan, MD: Worcester’s Answer to the ‘Woman Question’: The First Female Members of the WDMS Madeline Ryan, PhD
2. Bergin, Paul. “Some Worcester Doctors at the Turn of the Century.” In A History of the Worcester District Medical Society and the Worcester Medical Society 1794-1954. Worcester, Massachusetts: Worcester District Medical Society; 1994; 86. 3. Bergin, Paul. “Some Worcester Doctors at the Turn of the Century.” In A History of the Worcester District Medical Society and the Worcester Medical Society 1794-1954. Worcester, Massachusetts: Worcester District Medical Society; 1994. 4. Cheever, David. “HOMER GAGE.” Annals of Surgery 113, vol. 2 (1941):315-7. 5. Gage, Homer. “Some Abuses in Surgical Practice.” The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal 169, no. 1 (1913): 1-7. 6. Fitzharris, Lindsey. The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister’s Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine. New York: Scientific American, 2017. 7. Reis, Jacqueline. “Memorial shows Gages’ love of son.” Worcester Telegram and Gazette. August 29, 2010. https://www. telegram.com/article/20100829/ news/8290384 8. Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society Volume 48, Part 2 (1938): 170-174.
T
hroughout
the
latter
half
of
the
top:
Portrait of Dr.
19th century, the entry of women O’Cahhaghan; bottom: into medicine was hotly debated in Office of Dr. Barnard medical societies across the United States. The Massachusetts State Medical Society first confronted the debate in 1850, when Nancy Talbot Clark, a graduate of the Western Reserve Medical College of Cleveland, requested admission. Dr. Clark’s application was declined, and the MMS effectively tabled the question until 1873, when it sent notices to local medical societies throughout the state asking them to weigh in on the issue. In response, Oramel Martin of the Worcester District Medical Society proposed a resolution that “the wish of [the WDMS] is that women be admitted to all the rights and privileges of the Massachusetts Medical Society upon the same conditions as men.” (1) While the other members did not reject the resolution outright, Dr. Francis proposed an amendment that effectively neutered it, stating “that the present exigency demands no action on our part in regard to the admission of females into the Massachusetts Medical Society.” Dr. Woodward concurred, arguing that “this was only an attempt to drag the Woman Question into the [MMS] and so add another bone of contention for the medical profession.” The debate was finally resolved with a compromise, changing the words of the original resolution to state that the society “has no objection to” the admission of women – a less enthusiastic statement that reflected the contentiousness of the issue. The ambivalence and inertia surrounding the “Woman Question” persisted until 1884, by which time the United States was witnessing a “national trend toward the acceptance of women” in medicine. (2) That year, the By-Laws of the MMS were finally changed to allow female members. A little under a year later, on May 13, 1885, the WDMS
JULY / AUGUST 2021
9
