Emily Stowe by Elizabeth Meshcheryakova

Emily Howard Jennings Stowe has contradicted numerous stereotypes in medicine. She has become an example for other girls and women passionate about this career. Not only has she built a successful medical career, she also has proven herself as the first female school principal in an Ontario public school and she even founded an association aiming to equalize genders.

Born in Norwich, Ontario, on May 1st, 1831, Emily’s passion for deeper studies, especially medicine, were already showing from a young age. In her teen years she volunteered for a family friend who worked as a homeopathic physician this way, starting to discover the medical world. Later, she worked as a teacher and also helped her family at the farm. When the time came, she applied to college and was rejected simply because of her gender. After the first rejection, she applied to the only women accepting, advanced school in Canada and graduated with honours. She then went back to work at a school, but now as a principal; she is considered to be the first female principal of a Canadian public school. This was her first step to breaking gender inequalities.

When her husband fell ill with tuberculosis in 1863, this became a turning point and resumed her passion for medicine. Once more she was rejected because she was a female when applying to the Toronto School of medicine in 1865. In order to study medicine, she moved to New York and obtained her degree in 1867. She then came back to Canada and opened her clinic, now working to treat diseases in women and children.

The battles never stopped. She was refused entry into the University of Toronto to licence her practice in Canada and therefore had to choose a different school- the Toronto School of Medicine and was admitted only 4 years after. There, Emily, accompanied by Jannie Trout, became one of the first women admitted into the school.

When finally settled as a doctor, Mrs. Jennings was still perturbed with the double standards for women. Quickly, her beliefs for equal rights turned into action and in 1876 she helped start the Toronto Women’s Literary Club (TWLC) which focused on giving women access to better education as well as raising work conditions and rights of women. (The TWLC afterwards changed its name to the Canadian Women's Suffrage Association or CWSA). With the CWSA making change in the lives of millions of girls and women, she founded and became president of another organization for women called the Dominion Women’s Enfranchisement Association (DWEA).

Emily has achieved much more wonders and made the medical career a choice for girls rather than a restriction. She has made history with her actions and is a huge motivation to me. On April 30, 1903, she passed away but has left a powerful trail behind, for which she will forever be remembered.