Born: 1 December 1813, United States
Died: 18 April 1872
Country most active: United States
Also known as: NA
The following bio was written by Emma Rosen, author of On This Day She Made History: 366 Days With Women Who Shaped the World and This Day In Human Ingenuity & Discovery: 366 Days of Scientific Milestones with Women in the Spotlight, and has been republished with permission.
Ann Preston, an American physician, activist, and educator, became the first female dean of the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania. As head of the Woman’s Medical College of Pennsylvania, Preston was the first female dean of a medical school in the U.S.
During her career, she campaigned for her female students to be admitted to clinical lectures at the Blockley Philadelphia Hospital and the Pennsylvania Hospital, despite the open hostility of some male medical students and faculty. She died in 1872.
From Famous Women: An Outline of Feminine Achievement Through the Ages With Life Stories of Five Hundred Noted Women. Written by Joseph Adelman, published 1926 by Ellis M Lonow Company:
Ann Preston, an American physician and educator, daughter of Amos Preston, a Quaker. She entered the Women’s Medical College of Philadelphia in 1850, when the institution was opened, graduated two years later, and was professor of physiology and hygiene from 1854 and dean from 1866.
Her address to the Philadelphia County Medical Society, which had decided to ignore women physicians, finally gained a victory for her sex.