The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-06-12

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st~ was ihn daughter n Urufsn Palmer
pirtam ,ls Vsw work publisher and 4
hrt het ~ ueussr Havsn Putnam pf"anhi
lrad ~ h. hour Sl~ vac bonn Nv london
August N. isl2. hr elIes ~ ten children
sIr lived In m gland With her IA let and
nn, her until IN. was Z years old whom tho
r,rnams fr,utned - Amrrica and ~eht
10 Staten Island 10 I'VE MARY Putnam
~as rduoa,ed u, home Nv her mot l"r and
tutors, except for one Vraf sh" -p"nt ~ flh
old Twelfth street school
She WIS a child ~ unusual strength ~
mind and maturity ~ thought Before abe
VII. IL years Old sho made up her mind that
she wanted Us lr n doctor, telling her father
ihst she ~ " no reason why n woman should
no, he ahlp 10 attain the slns degree 81 sue
cess ~ u man and Va obtain high RAM IN
tho profession of medicine A. that time
Elizabeth and Emily Blackwell were practiH-
ing medicine IA New York and had founded
the New York lntlrmary for Women
and Children Mr.. Putnam respected his
daughters Judgment and furthered her am
bitlon with all the means In his power. In
later years, when she attended lectures IN
Philadelphia. her father escorted her 10 ana
from class rooms.
IL was in 1882 that she entered the Women's
Medical College in Philadelphia While
attending lectures there she was Temples
TO abandon the profession Of medicine to
become d writer. She had shown unusual
talent az a little girl, writing IA poem az the
age Of 0. Her pen vas always busy
with essays. poems. r~hapsodies and articles
on serious subjects. While at the college
she wrote u short story, Hair Chains"
and sent IL to the Atlantic monthly. IL was
accepted Immediately and she was asked 10
come to the office Of the publication, where
sixteen half ia giles were paid to her, and
the little pile of gold came very near
turning her from medicine. She talked the
matter over with her father and decided
10 continue her studies.
In 1888. while at college still, word came
TO her that her brother, George Haven
Putnam, who had enlisted in the l'6th
New York, was very ill at New Orleans:
She packed a few belongings and travelled
South, no small undertaking for a young
Ngirl in the middle Of the war, even with the
courtesy and assistance she met from both
Federal and Confederate officers. At New
Orleans she found that the story OF her
brothers. illness was a mistake and she re-
turned Immediately to Philadelphia.
After her two year course at the Phlia-
delphia Medical College she went To the New
England Hospital for a year as an inferno.
Boston and Philadelphia in those lays
were considerably ahead OF New YORK IN
the opportunities they gave TO professional
! women. She remained in Boston hve years.
from 1895 until 1871, when she wentto Paris
and spent some months studying in the
hospitals. Then she applied to the Minister
Of Public Instruction for permission 10 enter
the Ecole de Medicine. There was some
had ever gone through the great Paris
school of medicine as "A woman, although
there was a story OF a brilliant Russian
woman who had taken courses there con
cealing her sex by mans dress.
The permission was obtained, and Mary
Putnam took her degree in 1871 with honors,
receiving the second prize for her thesis,
the first woman ever TO take the full course
but the second to receive q degree. Dr.
Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, a famous
English physician, had passed the m
ton in 1870 and received the degree OF MD:
The Franco-Prussian war broke out ana
Mary Putnam gave her services TO the
Paris hospitals. The Commune interrupted
her work in the hospitals and she returned
to America and began practising in this city
at once, about the same time entering upon
the duties of lecturer upon therapeutics in
the Woman's Medical College, which DR..
Elizabeth Blackwell had estabiis ed IN
1857.
admitted TO the New York medical societies
and to the American Medical Association.
She was also the first woman to be sent az
a delegate from the New York Academy OF
Medicine to the state medical Associatoh'
She was married to DR.. Abraham jacob
in 1873. Each was an eminent physician
by then and each continued practice OF the
profession, one frequently consulting the
other in difficult cases. DR.. Jacob, with
his male colleagues in the profession. had
the utmost respect for the skill and learn
ing of DR.. Mary Putnam jacob, and it was
His custom TO call her in consultation in
preference to physicians OF his own sex
They we're closely associated in the work
Of Mount Sinai, Hospital, where Or; Jacob
was visiting physician and his wife was
| connected with the dispensary work. for
twelve wears. For ten years she was a
lecturer to the Woman's Medical College;
When the New York Post-Graduate Hospital
was founded in 1881, she became clinical
professor OF diseases Of children. In 1874
she organized and became president Of the
Association for the Advancement OF the
Medical Education Of Women. For a num-
! Der of years she was a visiting physician
! at st. Marks Hospital. In 1875 she won the
Boylston prize Of Harvard University. She
did not particularly approve OF specializa-
| ton in the practice OF medicine, She be-
lieved that an all around medical training
was more valuable.
Although she had not been especially in
| terested in woman suffrage, she became in
1894 an active advocate, and in 1894 before
| the convention for amending the State Con-
| stitution, held in Albany, she delivered an
address pleading for the recognition Of
women az voters. She published many
medical books and ESSAYS, and in answer
to Mallock's is Life Worth Living2' she
wrote in 1879 The Value Of Life" Among
her other publications were Common
Sense Applied to Woman's Suffrage Qso4l
and From Massachusetts, to Turkey
pritten in 1853 after a tour Of Greece and
Turkey. In 1891 she contributed a paper
on the history Of women physicians in this
country to the volume -Women's Work in
America, in which, amid the photography
OF writings by American women physicians.
she mentions over forty productions of her