Doctor Wore Petticoats: Women Physicians of the Old West

Today it is easy to take for granted a woman's freedom to choose a career. In this book, however, Enss brings to our attention the struggle of women doctors to gain the acceptance of prospective patients as well as that of their male colleagues.For all of the women profiled in this book, medicine is not merely a job,but a vocation they embrace with tenacity and passion. The personal and professional challenges they face seem to make them stronger. Some have to leave there homes and families in order to find a location where male doctors were few or simply not available. Others married, only to loose there spouses because of the time and dedication the practice of medicine required, especially in the expanding West.I would recommend this book to all readers, but especially to young women contemplating the a future in medicine. The book will inspire not only those desiring to be doctors, but any profession that requires a life of dedication and service to others.

This book is a good start if you are researching the way women lived during pioneer days. But the author doesn't give you much personal detail about these women. Enss just documents who they were and where they practiced. I really wish they had gone further and dug up some journals or family stories about these heroic women who went against the grain. A lot of them were women who had not planned to travel West, but once they completed medical school, they could not practice in Eastern cities and towns. So they had to go to a more dangerous and less conventional place where miners, cowboys, outlaws, soldiers, and other adventurous types had no other recourse if they wanted to get bandaged up.

The book had interesting history of a variety of women doctors of the west. It was interesting to see that the women did gain acceptance from the communities that they chose to practice in. Doctors were scarce in the west. The women doctors weren't prefered. As with any time a woman breaks into a mostly male field, they had to work harder to prove themselves to both the patients and other doctors that might be in the community. The research was well done. It would have been a little more interesting if there were more firsthand personal accounts. That would have made the book considerably more expensive. There is enough information on each of the doctors mentioned in the book that follow up research on a particular person would be realatively easy to do.

The book was ok. I just wish there was more context. The book gives a short biography of each woman and a very brief synopsis of the challenges face by women entering into and practicing medicine. It talks about the attitude of the professors and male students towards women but does not really explain how women were able to get into the college's. At one point it is mentioned that a student had to apprentice for two years and be over thirty. Is that all that was required to get into med school? But what about the women who were younger when they went into medicine? Did they wait until they were 30? It also mentioned that Mormons were much more accepting of women Dr's. Why was that? Is it part of their faith or was it that there were more women then men? There were also times were I found the wording of certain things confusing. Enss mentioned that one of the women had 5 children and goes on to mention that 3 children died young, 2 before their 1st birthday and one at 5. In the next paragraph Enss discusses the challenges the Dr faced with a busy practice and raising her 5 children to adulthood. Wait...what?!!? So she actually had 8 children and 5 survived until adulthood. All and all I just wanted so much more from this book and it just didn't deliver. What was included was very interesting which is why I did not rate it lower.

Brief bios of eleven of the first women doctors who dared to hang out their shingles as physicians on the rough edges of the American frontier. Enss wants her readers to sympathize with these women, and does a good job pulling readers into their lives. 19th century women doctors have often gotten short shrift from historians such as David Dary in Frontier Medicine. This book fills in some of the gaps with a clear message that these women should be taken seriously, not only as path breakers, but as compassionate, dedicated healers.The stories are arranged in no particular order, either chronologically or geographically, which unfortunately hides the significant progress that women actually made during the 19th century in medicine, but never mind. It’s not meant to be a scholarly analysis.Each mini-biography kicks off with a dramatized anecdote that adds emotion and action to the narratives. Dr. Georgia Arbuckle Fix beats off a drunken robber with her medical bag while riding to see a patient in western Nebraska. Dr. Bethenia Owens arrives in Roseburg Oregon to set up her new practice and is invited by the snarky local doctors to attend the autopsy of a dead man’s genitals. Dr. Mary Canoga Rowland watches a gunfight erupt on the main street in front of her office in Herndon Kansas and gets out her medical bag to be ready to work on the losers. These lady physicians were a colorful and strong-willed bunch.

Chris Enss matches her research skills with her writing skills. She has done very extensive work into the background of the first female doctors of the Old West.Getting accepted by a medical school was only the first hurdle. Time after time these ladies were challenged. Then after they were able to start their careers to any success they were often left by lonely husbands. Having a successful career AND a successful family life was nearly impossible for the first women physicians. Thankfully they perservered and we benefit today. My own family physician is a woman and my husband and I are both quite happy about it.Get this book on Kindle then buy a couple of paperback copies for your young daughters.

disappointed, i expected a lot more for my money. Interesting subject but not enough detail for me.

What an interesting read this book was! I love reading history through the personal accounts of individuals. This book gives real insight into the lives and challenges of early female doctors in American. A good read!

A very interesting read shedding light on a topic that I had long wondered about after watching that TV program some years ago about a female Doctor named Doctor Quinn

des histoires vraies et pour une fois des femmes de l'ouest