Doctor Wore Petticoats, Chris Enss
Doctor Wore Petticoats, Chris Enss
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Doctor Wore Petticoats
Women Physicians of the Old West

Author: Chris Enss

Narrator: Janet Metzger

Unabridged: 3 hr 32 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 07/27/2021


Synopsis

"NO WOMEN NEED APPLY."

These four discouraging words of admonition often greeted female physicians looking for jobs in the frontier-era West. Despite the dire need for medical help, it seemed most trappers, miners, and emigrants would rather suffer and die than be treated by a female doctor. Nevertheless dozens of highly trained women headed West, where they endured hardship and prejudice as they set broken limbs, performed operations, delivered generations of babies—and solidified a place for women in the medical field.

Susan La Flesche, the youngest daughter of an Omaha Indian Chief, felt called to medicine when at the age of twelve she saw a woman die because a government-paid doctor was too busy hunting prairie chickens to help. Destitute divorcee Bethenia Owens Adair traded in laundry work for a successful medical practice. Flora Hayward Stanford, the first female doctor in Deadwood, was known to patch up gunfight victims and to treat the likes of Buffalo Bill Cody and Calamity Jane. With a determination and strength of spirit that resonates even today, these incredible women and seven others profiled in The Doctor Wore Petticoats are sure to inspire.

About Chris Enss

Chris Enss is a New York Times bestselling author who has been writing about the women of the Old West for more than a dozen years. She has penned more than thirty published books on the subject, including Object: Matrimony, the winner of the Elmer Kelton Award for best nonfiction book of 2013. Chris also has received the Spirit of the West Alive Award, cosponsored by the Wild West Gazette, celebrating her efforts to keep the spirit of the Old West alive for future generations. She lives in Grass Valley, California.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Becky

First sentence: The frontier of the wild West resisted attempts to tame it by adventurous pioneers who were hell-bent on making a life for themselves and their families on the open range. The terrain was rough and unyielding, not unlike its new inhabitants. Most of these inhabitants were as stubborn......more

Goodreads review by Donna

The book opens with the story of Bethenia Owens-Adair, a northwest physician in 1872. To say that women were not well received in the medical profession at that time would be a gross understatement. Bethenia proved stronger than the resistance to her by male physicians. A good example is of the time......more

Goodreads review by Jeannie

As I lover of Pioneer history, especially in terms of the women of the times, I found The Doctor Wore Petticoats a nice introductory to not only early medicine on the frontier, but to the bravery and fortitude a certain group of tenacious women showed in order to make their way in a man's world. Chr......more

Goodreads review by Teri

The content of this book was excellent, but the writing was a little dry. Still a fascinating book about the lives of some women who were pioneers in the West while also being pioneers in their fields of medicine and dentistry. We like to think that we are the first at everything, but these women we......more