Anna Breslaw
Most of us remember Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman to receive a medical degree in the U.S. I named my first fish after her when I was in the fifth grade! No joke. Blackwell had to put aside her dreams of being a surgeon and stay with her regular practice after catching a baby patient's eye infection and going half blind. (Doesn't that feel like a really on-the-nose metaphor? LADIES? WE CAN'T HAVE IT ALL, LADIES.)

Anyway, so yeah, Elizabeth Blackwell! But have you heard of Mary Walker? The Atlantic has an extensive article on Walker's quest to become an official female physician for the Civil War's wounded Union soldiers. An ardent abolitionist and firm believer in women's rights, Walker stated her case in a letter to President Lincoln in 1864.

His response: "The Medical Department of the army is an organized system in the hands of men supposed to be learned in that profession and I am sure it would injure the service for me, with strong had, to thrust among them anyone, male or female, against their consent." In other words, a 19th century version of Talk to the hand, you crazy bat.

However, Walker wrote in a letter to a friend that she "was confident that the God of justice would not allow the war to end without its developing into a war of liberation." After being turned down in an official capacity by the Secretary of War, Walker found an Indiana hospital that oh-so-graciously allowed her to work, pro bono and sans title. Full disclosure: She was offered the title of nurse, but she turned it down. The head of the hospital offered to share his salary, but she turned it down. The latter is particularly noble/stubborn, since she was cash-poor thanks to " a long divorce with a philandering husband who impregnated at least two patients."