Women on Walls at RCSI in partnership with Accenture Open Call 1 March to 25 April 2018 SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION You can find the below supplementary information for your entry below: About the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland Biographies and Images of Graduates of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland RCSI President Portraits Commissioned About the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland The RCSI building was created on the model of an Italian palazzo with a grand piano nobile. The Board Room) is located on the upper floor over-looking St Stephens Green. The Board Room, which survives largely intact, derives from the tradition of grand first floor saloons so well represented in eighteenth century Dublin houses. Inspiration for this room lies in grand Dublin Neo-Classical interiors. The ceiling of the Board Room is decorated in the neoclassical style with some unusual motifs, like the bands of circles and part-circles of which is reflected in design and colour on a specially-woven carpet. The twin chimney pieces give a hint of an austere Grecian style and are made of Kilkenny limestone, designed with minimal decoration and a linear simplicity. The Board Room gave the college an ample space for important occasions on which the President, Vice-President, censors and members convened to deal with College business. Examinations and conferrals were held there, the bestowal of the honorary fellowship being a particularly impressive ceremony. Evening converzasiones were fashionable, well attended events, likely to attract the Lord Lieutenant. It is here that in 1885 it was agreed to open the medical school to women. During the late 19th Century, College dinners were held in the Albert Theatre. This changed when what was the Anatomical Museum was converted in 1903 to an Examination and Banqueting Hall. Its proximity to the Board Room has made the latter very suitable for pre-dinner receptions. Easter 1916: On Easter Monday 1916, Countess Markievicz and two citizen Army men entered the College at gunpoint. Over the following week, over a hundred men and boys occupied the College and barricaded the Front Hall with books from the Library, slept in the College Hall. Shooting from outside was concentrated on the Board Room overlooking St Stephen’s Green, with the Tuscan columns of the façade, the Colles portrait and the copper finger plate of the door leading to the stairs all receiving bullet damage. Following Pearse’s order to lay down arms on Saturday, the College garrison surrendered on Sunday, 30 April. References: Lee, Clive (Ed.), Surgeons’ Halls; Building the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland 1810-2010. Dublin, A. &A. Farmar, 2011 Lyons, J.B., The Board Room, RCSI, Journal of the Irish Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons, January 1995 Biographies and Images of Graduates of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland Name Accomplishments Image 1. Dr. Victoria One of the earliest to investigate Sudden Coffey (1911 – Infant Death Syndrome. One of first 1999) female Paediatricians in Ireland who did considerable work in the area of congenital abnormalities. First female recipient of the RCSI’s Distinguished Graduate Medal, first woman President of the Irish Paediatric Association and the Paediatric Section of the Academy of Medicine in Ireland, and, was the first woman President of the RCSI Post Graduates' Association. Also of note, she was President of the Irish-American Paediatric Society. LRCPI & LM, LRCSI &LM 1936, PhD, MA Dub. 1965, FRCPI 1979, MFCM 1974, LM Coombe 1944, DCH RCPSI. (RCSI). 2. Mary Frances Founder member and first Dean of the Crowley (1906 – Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery in the 1990) Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. She started the Medical Missionaries Midwifery Training School at the International Hospital, Drogheda in 1942. RGN, RM, RNT, OND, FFFNRCSI. 3. Dr. (Emily) 1st female fellow Winifred Dickson M.D.R.U.I. 1896, M.B., B.Ch., B.A.O. (1866 – 1944) 1893, M.A.O. 1896; F.R.C.S.I. 1893, L.R.C.P.I and L.M. 1891 2 4. Dr. Pearl Dunlevy Graduate & lynchpin of Dublin's (1909 – 2002) immunisation programme. Dublin was the first local authority in Britain and Ireland to introduce BCG vaccine which prevented TB. L.R.C.P.I & L.M., L.R.C.S.I. & L.M. 1932; D.P.M. R.C.S.I. 1938. 5. Dr. Mary First woman to both train and qualify at None at present Josephine RCSI. Hannan (1865 – L.R.CP.I. and L.M. L.R.C.S.I and L.M. 1935) 1890; L.M. Rot. Hosp. Dub. 1890; (R.C.S.I.) 6. Sr. & Dr. Maura After 17 years in Uganda and Angola as Lynch (1938 – MMM, she returned to Ireland in 1948 2017) and, at the age of 46, began training as a surgeon at the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin. Extensive work in missionary hospitals in Africa. MB, BCh BAO NUI 1964; DObst RCOG 1967; DTM Lisbon 19667; (Univ Coll. Dub; FRCSI 1985. 7. Dr. Barbara Paediatrician and disability campaigner. Maive Stokes MB, BCh, TCD, DCH RCSI 1946 (1922 – 2009) 3 8. Dr. Mary Suffragette and advocate of women’s Somerville and public health services and became Parker the first female elected town councillor Strangman of Waterford in 1912. (1872 – 1943) F.R.C.S.I. 1902, L and L.M 1896; L.R.C.P.I. and L.M. 1896. 4 1. Dr. Victoria Coffey (1911 – 1999) Coffey, Victoria (1911–99), one of the first female paediatricians in Ireland, was born 16 September 1911 at 108 Brunswick Street, Dublin, the daughter of John Coffey, a weigh-master, and Ellie Coffey (née McCaul). Her paternal grandfather, William Coffey, had been lord mayor of Dublin in 1909–10. Educated at the RCSI, she graduated with the licentiate degree and the degree in midwifery of the conjoint board of the royal colleges in 1936. She later took the diploma in children's health of the RCSI (1943). Coffey's first house officer position was as a surgeon at the Meath Hospital, working alongside Tom Lane (qv), Oliver St John Gogarty (qv), Henry Stokes (qv), and a young Robert Collis (qv). She also served as clinical clerk at the Coombe Hospital for women before being appointed medical officer in charge of children at St Kevin's Hospital in 1943. St Kevin's was previously the South Dublin Union or poorhouse hospital. Although it was the largest hospital in Dublin, with over 1,500 beds, it had a comparatively small medical staff because most of the patients there were regarded as terminally ill. This meant that Coffey worked long hours and became well known for her capacity for hard work. At one point she was in charge of a maternity ward, a sick infants’ ward, and the children's hospital – 136 beds in all. Her working conditions did not improve until the 1950s, when more nursing and medical staff were appointed; however, she was the sole paediatric consultant for a long period. It was during this time that Coffey became interested in the area of congenital abnormalities in infants, an unglamorous and understudied area of paediatrics, and in 1954 she gave a paper at the Royal Academy of Medicine in Ireland on the subject. With the encouragement and support of W. J. E. Jessop (qv), she pioneered the first scientific studies of congenital birth defects in Ireland, publishing her findings in the Irish Journal of Medical Science between 1955 and 1959. In recognition of her work in the area, she was appointed lecturer in teratology at TCD in 1961, gaining a Ph.D. from the university in 1965 for a thesis on the incidence and aetiology of congenital defects in Ireland. She published internationally and maintained her research output for several years after her retirement. Coffey is chiefly remembered for this work on congenital abnormalities, which forms much of the baseline research on this subject in Ireland. As a research fellow of the Medical Research Council of Ireland, she also carried out one of the first studies of the effects of thalidomide on birth defects recorded in the country. Together with Patrick Moore, she pioneered the study of metabolic disorders in the newborn and performed one of the early studies of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) in Ireland. Having gained fellowship of the RCPI in 1979, she was a founder member of the Faculty of Paediatrics in the college two years later. She maintained a close association with her alma mater, and was president both of the RCSI Graduates' Association (1968–9) and of its Biological Association (1955–7), serving an unprecedented two terms in the latter position before she was succeeded by David Mitchell (qv). She was a member of the Irish Paediatric Association and the first female president of that group. A founder member of the Irish and American Paediatric Society in 1968, she was later its president (1974). She was also an honorary fellow of the American College of Physicians. After her retirement she continued to do private research, and worked as the director of research for the Foundation for the Prevention of Childhood Handicap until shortly before her death. Known as Vicki to her friends, Coffey was a redoubtable character. As evidenced by her service on many committees, she had natural leadership qualities and a no-nonsense manner, and was both able and assertive. Although she was widely known among members of her profession, mention of her in medical histories is sparse. Outside of her medical work she did much fund-raising for the Dominican mission, with which one of her two brothers was associated.