Franziska Tiburtius

Franziska Tiburtius was a German physician and advocate for women's education, born in 1843 on the island of Rügen in Pomerania and dying in Berlin in 1927. She was one of the first two women to qualify as a doctor in imperial Germany. Refused entry to German medical programs, she studied medicine in Zurich and passed her examinations with distinction in 1876, then completed an internship in internal medicine in Dresden. In 1877 she and her fellow student Emilie Lehmus opened a women's clinic in Berlin, which drew a large clientele despite court injunctions and slander. In 1908 she opened a surgery clinic for women doctors that accepted patients without health insurance and gave medicine free to the needy. She supported the German women's movement and the repeal of bans on women's continued study, and wrote an autobiography, Memories of an Octogenarian.