Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-09-07
THREE PIONEER WOMEN.
Sisters Who Entered Professions When
to Do So Was Unpopular.
From the Philadelphia Press.

From the Philadelphia Press.
1t has been so long since women kept 81
lence in the churches-three of them re-
Gently speaking in as many different puipits
in Chicago on one Sunday without the fact
attracting much attention-that we forget
that. paradoxically. it has been in another
sense so short time. Still living today is
the first woman clergyman to be formally
ordained in this country. and her ordina-
ton only dates back hal century. Mrs.
Antoinette L. Brown Blackwell belongs.
~ marriage, to a family whose name is as
ISOLATED with every reform movement which
aims to give to woman the large initial.
1t was Rev. Antoinette Brown, how
ever. she first became known to fame for
her brilliant oratorical powers. AS child
of less than sixteen years Miss Brown be
gan teaching in the public schools to obtain
the coveted and then terribly discussed
higher education Before her graduation
from Oberlin College she had gained a rep
utation as a speaker on anti-slavery tenn
perance, woman suffrage and other sub
jects equally startling to the conservative
minds of the middle of the last century.
But her heart turned toward the pulpit
from which men who had passed theological
examinations less creditably than she thun-f
dered ST. Paul at her. Despite them and
st. Paul she continued to preach, as well s
to lecture, for four years. until in 1852
she found council brave enough to ordain
her-that called by the First Congrega-
tional Church at South Butler, n. Y.
A Methodist clergyman preached the Or
dination sermon beginning with the solemn
statement that the setting apart of fe-
male to the work of the Christian ministry
is, to say the least, a novel transaction in
this land and age.
She had already been preaching in the
South Butler church a year before receiv-
ing her license. Her pastorate there lasted
but a few years, however, i'll health.
change in religious faith and marriage to
Samuel c. Blackwell of New York, all con-
tributing to sever the connection. Though p
of late years she has taken charge of no
specific church, Mrs. Blackwell has often
appeared in Unitarian pulpitS (She having
transferred her adherence to that church,
and was among those who read a paper at
the Chicago parliament of religions ten
years ago. When 1t is added that in addi-
ton to participating actively in the woman
suffrage and other social movements Mrs.
Blackwell has written five books and
brought up an exactly corresponding num-
Der of children 1t may be seen that in
signing pastoral duties she by no means
gave up trying to make the world better.
Born in 1925, Rev. Mrs. Blackwell Is one
Of the three living grand old women of
that name who are identified with women's.
progress. The two others, her SiSterS-in-
law, Elizabeth Blackwell. born 1921, and
Emily Blackwell, born 1896, were pioneer
women physicians. Together, under diff
cuIties impossible for the twentieth century
mind to guess at, they established the New
York Infirmary for Women and Children
the first woman's hospital in the country
to which later they attached medical col
1ege for what were still termed females"
DR.. Elizabeth Blackwell. the elder, then
crossed the ocean to England cher native
country and founded the London School q
Medicine for Women. She now resides
permanently in England. having lived to
see the once execrated woman doctor, at
first regarded as something of a cross be-
tween a witch and infidel become the
commonplace angel in the household" II
angels ever can become commonplace
About ten years ago she published an ex-,
tremely interesting book on Pioneer Work
in Opening the Medical Profession to Wo--
men,
DR.. Emily Blackwell resides in New York
and Is still the dean of the New York In
Urinary. 1t was the brother of these two
remarkable sisters. Henry B. Blackwell,
who, in marrying the famous woman suf-
Eag1st. the late Lucy Stone. allowed her
to retain her maiden name to her dying