In Pursuit of a Grand Cause

Galter Health Sciences Library & Learning Center has created a six-banner exhibit in celebration of the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Northwestern University Woman's Medical School (formerly Woman's Hospital Medical College of Chicago). This exhibit presents a brief history of the school and focuses on the lives of four women who were either graduates of the school, faculty, or both. The title of the exhibit, In Pursuit of a Grand Cause, pays homage to Marie Mergler, MD's recollection of the pursuit of equal opportunities for women in medical education and training:

No woman studying medicine to-day will ever know how much it has cost the individuals who were personally concerned in bringing about these changes; how eagerly they have watched the new developments and mourned over each defeat and rejoiced with each success, for with them it meant much more than success or failure for the individual, it meant the failure of success of a grand cause.

- Marie J. Mergler, "History of Competitive Examinations," in Woman's Medical School, Northwestern University: (Woman's Medical College of Chicago): the Institution and its Founders, Class Histories, 1870-1896 (Chicago: H.G. Cutler, 1896), 84-92.

For more resources on the history and women of the Woman's Medical School, check out this GalterGuide.

In Pursuit of a Grand Cause was developed by library staff at Galter Health Sciences Library & Learning Center. This exhibit is part of Feinberg School of Medicine’s Women in Medicine initiative for the 2019-2020 academic year. 

View the exhibit virtually