Dora Chatterjee was the third Indian woman to graduate from the

Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania The Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania (WMCP) was founded in 1850, and was the second medical institution in the world established to train women in medicine to earn the M.D. degree. The New England Female Medical College had been established ...

and the first woman from

Punjab Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising ...

to earn a medical degree. She founded Denny Hospital for Women and Children in

Hoshiarpur Hoshiarpur () is a city and a municipal corporation in Hoshiarpur district in the Doaba region of the Indian state of Punjab. It was founded, according to tradition, during the early part of the fourteenth century. In 1809, it was occupied ...

Biography

Chatterjee, who has been described as a "Hindu Prince’s Daughter", was in fact daughter of a prominent Bengali Christian Missionary family born in

Punjab, India Punjab (; ) is a States and union territories of India, state in northern India. Forming part of the larger Punjab region of the Indian subcontinent, the state is bordered by the States and union territories of India, Indian states of Himachal ...

. Her father was

Kali Charan Chatterjee Kali Charan Chatterjee Doctor of Divinity, D. D. (1839–1916), also spelt as Kali Charan Chatterji or K.C. Chatterjea, was a Bengali people, Bengali Christian missionary who worked with the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America, A ...

, a Christian convert and noted Presbyterian missionary; Her mother Mary Chatterjee and her maternal grandfather the Rev. Golaknath was also active in Christian mission work. As a child, she traveled with her parents to an international missions meeting in New York in 1887. Youngest of the five siblings, Dora Chatterjee returned to the US to study medicine at the end of the 19th century. In 1901, she graduated from

in Philadelphia, now

Drexel University College of Medicine Drexel University College of Medicine is the medical school of Drexel University, a private research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The medical school represents the consolidation of two medical schools: the first U.S. medical schoo ...

, making her the third Indian woman to graduate from the school and the first woman from Punjab to earn a medical degree. The school's first Indian graduate was

Anandibai Joshi Dr. Anandibai Gopalrao Joshi (31 March 1865 – 26 February 1887) was the first Indian female doctor of western medicine. She was the first woman from the erstwhile Bombay presidency of India to study and graduate with a two-year degree in west ...

, who was also the first Indian woman to attend an American medical school. The second was Gurubai Karmarkar. Chatterjee was described as "the chief interest of the graduating class" in newspapers across the US, sometimes sharing that distinction with a Russian graduate, Olga Povitzky. Chatterjee returned to India and established the Denny Hospital for Women and Children in

. She married Rai Sahib Manghat Rai, a civil servant based in the

North-West Frontier Province The North-West Frontier Province (NWFP; ps, شمال لویدیځ سرحدي ولایت, ) was a Chief Commissioner's Province of British India, established on 9 November 1901 from the north-western districts of the Punjab Province. Followin ...

References

External links

Newspaper clipping, Dora Chatterjee's graduation from the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania Public Relations office records

Letter sent from India to Woman's Medical College reporting Chatterjee's change of address from Legacy Center Archives, Drexel University College of Medicine, Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania Collection via the South Asian American Digital Archive (SAADA)
{{Authority control Indian women medical doctors 20th-century Indian women medical doctors 20th-century Indian medical doctors Drexel University alumni