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The Legacy Center Blog

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Equity and DiversityBehind the ScenesHistory of MedicineHomeopathyLearning and TeachingWomen in Medicine
Letter from a patient to Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania Dean Dr. Rachel Bodley, 1886. (The Legacy Center Archives and Special Collections)

From the Collections: A Nymphomania Cure?

Dr. Rachel Bodley was a prolific chemist and botanist who served as Dean of the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania from 1874 to 1888. This blog post concerns a letter discovered in her collection written by an anonymous patient suffering from nymphomania. “The Patient” as she was known, was under the care of neurologist Dr. Charles K. Mills at the Women’s Nervous Wards at Philadelphia Hospital. As the blog explains, The Patient began a correspondence with Dr. Bodley and requested that upon her death, her body be dedicated to helping find a cure for nymphomania. The blog post covers the unusual archival item, and poses the questions of what became of The Patient after the letter was sent.

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Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania basketball team, 1912-1914. (The Legacy Center Archives and Special Collections)

From the Collections: The Sporting Life

The first sporting club at Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania was fencing, which was designated an official athletic club in 1898. However, basketball soon rose to the top as the sport of choice at the college. This blog post delves into some of the history of sports and athletic leisure enjoyed by students at Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania in the late 1800s and early 1900s, looking specifically at student publications and photographs

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Construction of new building on Drexel Queen Lane campus, 2009 - steel frame. (The Legacy Center Archives and Special Collections)

More Construction Photos

On December 4, 2009, the Drexel University College of Medicine Legacy Center Archives moved from Drexel University’s Hagerty Library to a new space at the Drexel University College of Medicine Queen Lane Campus. This blog post is a quick update about the earlier stages of construction for the new archive space, and provides photos of the construction progress.

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Construction of new building on Drexel Queen Lane campus, 2009 - basement excavation. (The Legacy Center Archives and Special Collections)

The Big Dig

On December 4, 2009, the Drexel University College of Medicine Legacy Center Archives moved from Drexel University’s Hagerty Library to a new space at the Drexel University College of Medicine Queen Lane Campus. This blog post is a quick update about the construction of the new archives space, specifically the construction of the buildings concrete foundation.

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Women medical students working in the lab. (The Legacy Center Archives and Special Collections)

Every Day is Ladies' Day with Me

Women’s History Month is celebrated in the United States during the month of March, and largely corresponds with International Women’s Day on March 8. This blog post is a short early March reflection on Women’s History Day and the renewed interest in women’s history, and makes the point that at the Legacy Center archives, every month is Women’s History Month because so much of the archival material is centered around the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania and the theme of women in medicine.

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Portrait of Anna M. Longshore Potts, MD. (The Legacy Center Archives and Special Collections)

From the Collections: Potts, Kettle, Quack?

Dr. Anna Longshore-Potts was a 19th century physician and a member of the first graduating class of Female Medical College of Pennsylvania (later Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania) in 1852. Dr. Longshore-Potts was a very prolific preventative health lecturer and public speaker who spoke all over the world. This blog post looks at Dr. Longshore-Potts' legacy and specifically about the challenges she encountered as an early woman in the medical field. While she was wildly popular she also faced huge backlash from many prominent male physicians, both in America and abroad, who strongly disregarded her as intellectually inferior because she was a woman.

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Legacy Center Archives and Special Collections logo

You Can't Always Get What You Want

On December 4, 2009, the Drexel University College of Medicine Legacy Center Archives moved from Drexel University’s Hagerty Library to a new space at the Drexel University College of Medicine Queen Lane Campus. This blog post is an update on a layout change that involved putting an electrical room within the space designated for the archive stacks. The post updates readers, goes over some of the challenges with the proposed update, and ends on a positive note looking forward to the new space.

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Correspondenzblatt der Homoeopathischen Aerzte, October 22, 1835. (The Legacy Center Archives and Special Collections)

From the Collections: Correspondenzblatt der Homoeopathischen Aerzte

The Correspondenzblatt der Homoeopathischen Aerzte was a shortlived publication put out in 1835 and 1836 by the North American Academy of the Homeopathic Healing Art (better known as the Allentown Academy). The Correspondenzblatt was the first homeopathic medical journal published in the United States, and was edited by one of the founding homeopathic physicians in America, Dr. Constantine Herring. This blog post discusses what the journal is, where it came from, and what it wrote about.

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Rebecca Cole's thesis, the Eye and Its Appendages. (The Legacy Center Archives and Special Collections)

From the collections: Dr. Rebecca Cole

Dr. Rebecca Cole was a 1867 graduate of Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania, and the second African American woman in the United States to recieve a medical degree. This blog post draws together disparate details on Dr. Cole and attempts to create a narrative of her 50 years of medical work that she undertook after her 1867 graduation and before her death in 1922.

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