Dr. Rebecca J. Cole, born in 1846, was from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; she was a physician and public health advocate. She was the second African American woman in the United States to earn a medical degree, graduating from the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania in 1867.
According to this biography written by the National Library Of Medicine, She interned at the New York Infirmary for Women and Children, where she taught prenatal care and hygiene to women, and In 1873, she opened a Women’s Directory Center, which provided legal and medical assistance to disadvantaged women and children. In 1899, she was appointed as the superintendent of a home run by the National Association For The Relief of Destitute Colored Women and Children, where she would take care of orphaned children and colored women with nowhere else to go.
Cole’s groundbreaking accomplishment not only set the standard, but laid the foundation for many, many future generations of Black physicians.
“If you imagine a 2,000 piece jigsaw puzzle, this is just one piece in the middle of that puzzle.” – Rebecca J. Cole
