Florence R. Sabin
Florence R. Sabin was a trailblazer physician scientist, and the first woman in history to be inducted into the National Academy of Sciences. Born in 1871 to a middle-class family in Colorado, Sabin attended Smith College and developed a strong aptitude for science. When Johns Hopkins School of Medicine admitted its first female students, Sabin was hopeful that her dream of attaining a post-secondary education would come true. For two years, she taught math at a Denver secondary school, after which she taught zoology at Smith College for a year, to save up for medical school. There, she earned a reputation for being a gifted anatomist, and her model of the fetal brain stem was widely celebrated and used by many other medical schools. Following her graduation from Hopkins, she was unable to receive a faculty position due to her identity as a woman, but she joined a group that supported female researchers and continued her research efforts. She had a wide and diverse variety of research interests, and she studied everything from the fetal lymphatic system to the role of white blood cells during the progression of tuberculosis. Eventually, Sabin became the first female faculty member at the School of Medicine at Johns Hopkins, and eventually was promoted to full professor. She then joined the cellular immunology department at the Rockefeller Institute, from which she retired at age 67. After this, she became very interested in public health, and while retired, she successfully re-designed and lobbied to revamp the organization of Colorado's state health department, as well as promoted the passage of new public health laws, which became known as the Sabin Program.
-Anjali
