LIBRARY BLOG
Photo from: National Women’s History Alliance
Elizabeth Magnus Cohen: First Female Physician in Louisiana
Photo from The National Women’s History Alliance
Every March marks the observance of Women’s History Month—the acknowledgement and celebration of women’s contributions to history, culture, and society. The month-long observation used to only be a week. Back in 1978, the Sonoma, California school district put together a weeklong celebration to honor the work women had done to advance the world. Dozens of schools held commemorative presentations, students competed in an essay contest about what it meant to be a woman, and a parade was held in Santa Rosa. In the coming years, other school districts across the US began holding similar festivities. They became so popular that President Jimmy Carter declared the week of March 8th (with the 8th being International Women’s Day, established in 1911) as National Women’s History Week in 1980, which was backed by Congress a year later. The National Women’s History Project triumphantly petitioned to expand the celebration to the entire month of March in 1986, making the celebration of Women’s History Month as we know it (History).
The National Women’s History Alliance, an expansion of the National Women’s History Project, chooses a new theme every year. This year’s is “Women Providing Healing, Promoting Hope,” to honor the work of women in the medical field throughout the pandemic and to recognize how women throughout history have striven for hope and care in their communities (National Women’s History Alliance).
Women as healers can be traced back to the earliest civilizations. Despite the commonality of women in such positions, it was quite a while before they were able to serve in the medical field in an official capacity. We’re all familiar with Elizabeth Blackwell, the first female student be accepted into Geneva Medical College in 1847 and, subsequently, the first female physician. She was rejected from several colleges on the basis of her gender, and only gained acceptance into Geneva Medical College because of a perceived prank. The school, thinking it would be outright and unanimously disagreed with, surveyed the all-male student body asking if they thought a woman could be enrolled. The men thought it was a joke, and voted that Blackwell should join the student body. Misinterpretation or not, she took part in paving the way for women being able to become medical professionals (The Medicine Book). One of these women is Elizabeth Magnus Cohen, the first female practitioner in Louisiana.
Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell
Photo from: Women’sHistory.org
Dr. Elizabeth Magnus Cohen
Photo from The Rudolph Matas History of Medicine in Louisiana
Elizabeth Magnus Cohen was born in 1820 in New York. She and her husband, Dr. Aaron Cohen, had five children together. Only one child lived to be an adult. When her youngest son died from measles, she decided to dedicate her life to helping other mothers care for their children. She enrolled in Philadelphia College of Medicine—the first medical school for women in the US—in 1853 and graduated in 1857 (Jewish Women’s Archive). Dr. Aaron Cohen had both gone to school and found work in New Orleans, so Elizabeth joined her husband in the city upon her graduation where she served during recurring yellow fever, typhoid, and smallpox outbreaks as well as during times of standard health care.
Her time in practice wasn’t easy. The Rudolph Matas History of Medicine in Louisiana says that she faced “little opposition” when working in New Orleans, “possibly because she was the wife of a physician” (p 102), however Cohen spoke about the struggles she faced for recognition. One example is her fight to be listed as more than a midwife in the New Orleans city directories, which she mentioned in interviews for the New Orleans Times-Picayune. The directory listed her as a “doctress” in 1869, perhaps as a compromise. It wasn’t until 1876 that she was finally listed as a physician (Jewish Women’s Archive). She was an outspoken feminist, and went on record to say that male medical professionals did not encounter as much opposition as she and her fellow female counterparts did. In an 1853 New Orleans Bee editorial, someone wrote that the prospect of a female physician (especially one who would tend to male patients) was improper. This was a steadfast idea among the masses. Years down the line, in 1893, another editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association blamed female doctors for salary decreases. These were widely-held beliefs, and medical colleges started to refuse woman as students once again (Changing the Face of Medicine). Despite the odds, she became successful and popularly sought-out in her career.
Dr. Cohen’s services were in high demand as time went on. An article on NOLA.com titled “How a Single Case of Measles Made New Orleans Healthier” briefly commemorates the iconic woman, citing that she was just the fourteenth doctor licensed to practice in the city. As one of the few practicing New Orleans doctors in her 30-year-long career, she was called upon at all hours of the day and night and became one of the most talented surgeons in New Orleans. Other doctors began calling her a “lucky hand” to have around in trying cases because of her success rates. Though Dr. Cohen retired from active practice in 1887 at age 68, she volunteered at the Touro Infirmary in New Orleans, which she also lived in. Touro was the first private hospital in the south, and it later became an assisted living facility. She resided there until her death in 1921, having lived to be 101 years old (Changing the Face of Medicine).
Dr. Elizabeth Magnus Cohen
Photo from Changing the Face of Medicine
Recommended Books
Recommended Documentaries
Sources
“2022 Theme.” National Women’s History Alliance, 9 Feb. 2022, https://nationalwomenshistoryalliance.org/.
“Changing the Face of Medicine | Elizabeth D. A. Magnus Cohen.” U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, 3 June 2015, https://cfmedicine.nlm.nih.gov/physicians/biography_348.html.
History.com Editors. “Women’s History Month 2022.” History.com, 23 Feb. 2022, https://www.history.com/topics/holidays/womens-history-month.
“‘New Orleans Times-Picayune’ Celebrates 100th Birthday of Elizabeth D.A. Cohen, Louisiana’s First Practicing Female Physician.” Jewish Women’s Archive, https://jwa.org/thisweek/feb/22/1920/elizabeth-da-cohen.
Parker, Steve, et al. The Medicine Book. DK Publishing, 2021
The Rudolph Matas History of Medicine in Louisiana. Vol. 2, Edited by John Duffy, Louisiana State University Press for the Rudolph Matas Trust Fund, 1962.
Scott, Mike. “How a Single Case of Measles Made New Orleans Healthier.” NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune, 18 Sept. 2018, https://www.nola.com/300/article_30b1e6b3-4f2a-558e-8dce-87d7f619a340.html.
-Lillian LeCompte, Reference Department