Resolved, That editors of the religious and secular press will contribute important aid to an effort they must all approve by inserting these resolutions in their columns.
Among the influences that brought new thought to the question of woman suffrage was the establishment of The Revolution in 1868. Radical and defiant in tone, it awoke friends and foes alike to action. Some denounced it, some ridiculed it, but all read it. It needed just such clarion notes sounded forth long and loud each week to rouse the friends of the movement from the apathy into which they had fallen after the war. One cannot read its glowing pages to-day without appreciating the power it was just at that crisis.[1]
Miss Lucy B. Hobbs of New York was the first woman that ever graduated in the profession of dentistry. She matriculated in the Cincinnati Dental College in the fall of 1864—passing through a full course of study, missing but two lectures, and those at the request of the professor of anatomy. She graduated from that institution in February, 1866. A letter from the dean of the college testifies to her worth as follows:
She was a woman of great energy and perseverance. Studious in her habits, modest and unassuming, she had the respect and kind regard of every member of the class and faculty. As an operator she was not surpassed by her associates. Her opinion was asked and her assistance sought in difficult cases almost daily by her fellow-students. And though the class of which she was a member was one of the largest ever in attendance, it excelled all previous ones in good order and decorum—a condition largely due to the presence of a lady. In the final examination she was second to none.
Having received her diploma, she opened an office in Iowa; from thence she removed to Chicago, and practiced successfully. The following letter from Mrs. Taylor (formerly Miss Hobbs) gives further interesting details. Writing to Matilda Joslyn Gage, she says:
I am grateful to you for giving me the opportunity to place in history the fact of my study of dentistry. I was born in Franklin county, New York, in 1833. You ask my reason for entering the profession. It was to be independent. I first studied medicine, but did not like the practice. My preceptor, Professor Cleveland, advised me to try dentistry, and I commenced with Dr. Samuel Warde of Cincinnati, finishing my studies in March, 1861. At that time the faculty of the Ohio Dental College would not permit me to attend, and there was not a college in the United States that would admit me, and no amount of persuasion could change their
- ↑ See Volume II., page 264.
