BODLEY, Miss Rachel L.

Rachel L. Bodley.jpg
Rachel Bodley Commencement Speech as Dean 1881.jpg

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Dr. Rachel L. Bodley was born in Cincinnati, OH on December 7, 1831. She later lived in Philadelphia, PA. 

A graduate of Wesleyan Female College and Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania, Rachel became a scientist, doctor of medicine, and professor. 

By the late 1860s, she was Professor of Chemistry and Toxicology at the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania, and later she served as Dean. Her colleagues included Ann Preston, Mary J. Scarlett Dixon, Elizabeth Catharine Keller, and Grace Babb, "the first woman graduate of a college of pharmacy" (The Columbus Journal). Rachel also served as a member of a district school board in Philadelphia. 

Rachel belonged to many organizations, including the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, the Cincinnati Society of Natural History, the New York Academy of Sciences, the American Chemical Society of New York, the Franklin Institute of Philadelphia, PA, and the Educational Society of Philadelphia. 

She passed away on June 15, 1888.  In 1891, her friend and former student Emma H. Palmer proposed a Dean Bodley Memorial Fund for the Sharada Sadan school in India.  This fund was to honor Rachel for her work in support of the efforts by Ramabai Sarasvati, a "high-caste Hindu widow," to establish this school for Hindu widows in India (Emma H. Palmer to Eliza J. W. Armitage).

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Item: DIXON, Mrs. Mary J. Scarlett knows This Item