31st May 2004
Founded by a woman, Queen Elizabeth I of England in 1592, women were not admitted to Trinity College, Dublin until 1904. This year being the centenary of that momentous event there have been great celebrations in College especially by the women graduates and staff.
Foresight is needed when dealing with such events and a small committee set itself up in 1995 to ensure all would be a success. One of the most ambitious projects this committee decided on was to publish a book reflecting, as the foreword says, "on the struggles and the achievements that have marked women's involvement with the university".
Initially it was far more struggles than achievements for the women. When one considers that women were admitted to most universities long before 1904, Oxford and Cambridge were the notable exceptions with which Trinity allied itself, it is disappointing to see the opposition to improve the education of women in Ireland being so trenchant.
There was, of course, the usual old medical buffer declaring "I have seen girls, the daughters of well grown parents, who simply stopped growing too soon...this being caused as I believe, by the vital and serious force being appropriated by the mental part of the brain in learning...The increasing grind at book-knowledge, from thirteen to twenty, has actually warped the women's nature, and stunted some of her most characteristic qualities."
While I'm glad to say the old buffer was a Scot rather than an Irish man it makes one very alarmed about the powerful effect of public statements by important people. The above view was shared by many public figures and was used to discredit the women's education movement of the time. It is on a par to what was considered would happen women if they were to insist on cycling bicycles and both were very much designed to constrain the involvement of women in society. Perhaps I am being uncharitable but I do not think such warnings were solely for the protection of the fairer sex.
The book is entitled "A Danger to the Men?" a history of women in Trinity College Dublin 1904 - 2004 and when those with the power to admit women really got down to considering the petition signed by 10,000 men and women to allow women enter college this was the next argument produced - it would be dangerous for the men to have women about. There was a fear of scandal and the unsettling effect of women on college. Nowhere can I see any suggestion that the young gentlemen should behave themselves and concentrate on their books!
But while many were against them, the women had internal supporters as well. The Provost of the 1890s Provost Salmon said that women would enter college over his dead body was exactly what happened. He died early in 1904 and women entered a few months later. His daughter, Miss Salmon, was secretary to one of the committees promoting the admission of women, so home life in the Provost's House at that time must have been interesting.
Medicine as a profession for women was taken very seriously in Victorian time. Emily Davies, the founder of Girton College, Cambridge began a campaign on the subject in 1862 when she read a paper to the National Association for Social Sciences in London on the topic. Perhaps it was the Victorians' concerns about sex which lead to this subject being taken seriously. From the beginning of the entry of women to College they were allowed into the Medical School. There were stipulations such as separate dissecting rooms but I doubt if this troubled anyone too much.
Such rude comments were made by some men about the early graduates. "An ugly lot" was how the then Chief Justice had described women who graduated from the Royal University in 1884 and I'm sure he would have said the same about the early Trinity graduates. One thing was undeniable, however, their academic results were stunning. Large gold medals were frequently awarded with First Class degrees.
By the 1950s about one third of each medical class was made up of women. At that time so many of both sexes had to emigrate that many of their names are not commonly known in Ireland. There would not appear to have been any worry at that time about women making up less than half the class as there is at present when young men make up only one third of the class.
The Biological Association, the society for medical students, was one of the first in College to admit women. But even here there was trouble. One year the society organised a meeting in the Graduates Memorial Building, the GMB. This was all very well but women were not allowed into the building. These ridiculous exclusions continued into the 1960s. Women were not permitted to eat in the Dining Hall until 1965 even though I'm sure many of the young women had better table manners than the young men.
Dr. Blanche Weekes, Senior Lecturer in Anatomy, was the first woman tutor and the only one for many years. Having had the good fortune to be one of her students I can only be grateful that the college authorities had had the good sense to appoint a person so adept at the pastoral care of students to that position despite what some of them would have undoubtedly considered the disadvantage of her sex.
This is an important book about the higher education of women in Ireland. At times it made me laugh but frequently it made me furious. Furious not least for the petty humiliations so many clever women had to suffer but enraged, also, when I thought of the loss of so many talented people over decades to the country because of prejudice. Would we have our Celtic Tiger economy if we were determined to educate only one half of our most able students? No, we would not.
Senator Mary Henry, MD
