A law of 1891 enabled women to be appointed deputies in county offices.
Dr. Adele S. Hutchison is a member of the State Medical Board which examines physicians for license to practice. She was appointed by Gov. John Lind and is the first woman to hold such a position. Women can not sit on any other State boards.
There is no law requiring police matrons but they are employed in Minneapolis and St. Paul by the city charters.
The State hospitals for the insane are required by law to have women physicians. The steward's clerk in the State Institute for Defectives is a woman. The State Public School for Dependent and Neglected Children has a matron, a woman agent and a woman clerk. The State Training School, once called the Reform School, has women for agent and secretary.
The State Prison has a matron for the eight women prisoners. There are about 500 men prisoners (1900).
The Bethany Home at Minneapolis was established by women in 1875, and is entirely officered by them. In 1900 it cared for 126 mothers and 226 infants, and had a kindergarten and a training school for nurses. The city hospitals send all their charity obstetrical cases here, and about half of its support comes from the city.
The Northwestern Hospital for, Women and Children was founded by women in 1882, and until 1899 was entirely officered and managed by them.
The Maternity Hospital for unfortunate women was founded by Dr. Martha G. Ripley in 1888. In 1899 it cared for 103 mothers and 99 infants.
Occupations: No profession or occupation is forbidden to women by law. Women were admitted to the bar in 1877 by act of the Legislature. There are sixty-eight women doctors registered as in actual practice in the State. In Minneapolis there is an active Medical Women's Club of physicians of both schools. Women ministers are filling pulpits of Congregational, Universalist, Christian and Wesleyan Methodist churches, and the superintendent of the State Epworth League is a woman.
