Esther Park (physician)

Esther Park (Hangul: 에스더 박, born Kim Jeom-dong Hangul: 김점동; Hanja: 金點童; March 16, 1876/7 — c. 1910) was a Korean physician; she was the first woman to practice Western medicine in the country.[1]

Early life

Kim Jeon-dong was born on March 16, 1877 (or, according to other sources - March 16, 1876 or 1879) in the Seoul district of Jeong-dong, she was the youngest in a family of four daughters. Kim's father worked with American missionaries for a while, his boss was Henry Appenzeller; this influenced him and in 1886 he sent his daughter to study at the Ewha Girls' High School.[2] Kim was one of the first female students of this school, but her parents allowed her to study having set two conditions: she was forbidden to go to the US and to leave school prior to marriage.[3]

Kim was a good student, being particularly good at English, and when American schoolteacher Rosetta Sherwood Hall visited the school, Kim was asked to work as her interpreter.[2] Seeing how Sherwood Hall operated a girl with a hare lip, considered an incurable disease in Korea at that time, Kim began to dream of a medical career. In addition, Sherwood Hall convinced Kim that Koreans were very afflicted by Confucian prohibitions that did not allow them to be properly treated: strict separation of the sexes in society prevented a woman from being examined by a man.[4] Sherwood Hall herself taught her the basics of caring for patients.

Study and career

Sherwood Hall introduced Kim to Park Yusan (박유산), who worked with her husband, and on May 24, 1893, Kim Jeon-dong married him at the first Western-style wedding ceremony in Korea.[2] After the wedding, she took the name of Esther Park, adding her husband's name to the name under which she was baptized. In 1894, Sherwood Hall returned to New York, taking Esther and Yusan with her.

Esther Park graduated from a one-year school in New York where she studied Latin, physics and mathematics, and then went to the Baltimore Women's Medical School .[5] In 1900, Park perfectly passed all the exams and became a doctor. Her husband supported Park's desire to make medicine his profession, but he died in New York from tuberculosis, half a year before her graduation. In the US, he worked on a farm, earning his wife for education.[2]

After obtaining the degree, Park returned to Korea and settled in the first female hospital in the country, Bogu-yogwan (Hangul: 보구 여관; Hanja: 普救女館), in Seoul, near Dongdaemun. For 10 months of work there, Dr. Park helped more than 3,000 patients, and then in 1901 moved to Pyongyang, where Sherwood Hall established a new hospital.[2] Park traveled all around Korea, including during the cholera epidemic, helping patients free of charge. In addition to the main work, she also conducted educational and teaching activities, teaching the first generation of Korean female doctors. Park read public lectures in which she emphasized the importance of health education and education for women, and promoted Christianity .[4]

Esther Park died of tuberculosis in April 1910, at the age of 33 or 34 years.[4]

Honors

On April 28, 1909, Esther Park and two other Korean women pioneers were celebrated with a ceremony: Ha Ran-sa, the first woman bachelor in Literature from an American university, and Yun Jeong-won, the first Korean graduate of the Japanese Meiji University (Music); it was attended by 7800 people.[4] Emperor Gojong presented Park with a silver medal.[2]

In 2006, the Korean Academy of Sciences introduced Esther Park to the Korean Science and Technology Hall of Fame.[2]

In 2008, the Ewha University Alumni Committee established the Esther Park Medal, which recognizes the merit of women who graduated from the university and became doctors.[1]

References

  1. 1 2 "이화보이스". evoice.ewha.ac.kr (in Korean). Retrieved 2018-03-16.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "KBS WORLD Radio". world.kbs.co.kr. Retrieved 2018-03-16.
  3. ↑ 이화역사관 (2005). EWHA Old and New: 110 Years of History (1886-1996). Ewha Womans University Press. ISBN 9788973006557.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Yi, Pae-yong (2008). Women in Korean History 한국 역사 속의 여성들. Ewha Womans University Press. ISBN 9788973007721.
  5. ↑ 이화역사관 (2005). EWHA Old and New: 110 Years of History (1886-1996). Ewha Womans University Press. ISBN 9788973006557.
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