Finding Fame among the Lincoln Cousins - Dr. Julia Minerva Green
In the list of ancestral women last month, I included a distant relation because her story jumped out at me as I’ve been working on the Lincoln lineage book (yes, I’m still in the second revision!). She’s among a group of cousins who have such interesting stories that my husband got tired of me shouting across the house whenever I discovered new highlights. Today, I want to tell you about Dr. Julia Minerva Green.
Dr. Green is actually really well known. She was at the time she lived, as well.
She was one of only a few female physicians, having been only 1 of 15 in her class at Boston University. She was known for making house calls on her bicycle around Washington, DC - all five feet of her - with fishing weights in her skirt to prevent loss of modesty.
She’s cited as being one of the first homeopathists - though its relationship to medicine has changed since her time - and founded the American Foundation for Homeopathy. She wrote about numerous cases for better understanding among doctors and the journal was edited by her brother even after her death. She never retired - she was seeing patients up to the week she died.
Julia was born in Massachusetts in 1871 to Julia E. Lincoln (d. 1935) and Bernard Richardson Green (1843-1914). The family moved to DC when her father, a civil engineer, was working on the Washington Monument. She never married and died in 1963.
As you can guess, her mother is the link to my Lincoln line.
Julia E. Lincoln was born in 1843 in Connecticut to Marvin Lincoln (1813-1909) and Asenath Brooks (1817-1898).
Marvin was one of the North Windham Lincolns. His parents were James Lincoln (1784-1857) and Asenath Flint (1784-1869).
James’ parents were Jonah Lincoln (b. 1760) and Lucy Webb, my 5th-great-grandparents.
Children of Jonah Lincoln (d. 1845) and Lucy Webb (d. 1846)
Jonah Lincoln was born November 15, 1760, in Windham, Connecticut, to John Lincoln and Anna (Martin) Stowell. He married Lucy Webb May 1, 1783,…
It's interesting what connects a reader to a story. You'd think the connection would be that she was a woman. Or perhaps that she lived in Boston for a time. But no, it was the fishing weights in her skirt. I lived in the Netherlands for about a year and rode a bicycle in a skirt. I used weights and I used a clothespin tied to the frame. I wonder if Dr. Green used saddlebags to carry her medical bag or was it strapped on a carrying rack on the back or put it in a basket on the front?