A Respectable Occupation: - University of Hertfordshire Research ...

Women Pharmacists. It is reported that she advised girls who had passed
the apothecaries‘ assistant‘s examination not to stop there, but to continue
to study for the Pharmaceutical Society‘s qualification. The training was
shorter and less expensive than that for medicine; nonetheless, a good
education including Latin was still required.
Other early Pharmaceutical Society registrants included Edith
Rayner who was the dispenser at the Mildmay Mission Hospital in Bethnel
Green in 1900 and Georgina Barltrop who was in charge of the dispensary
at the North Eastern Hospital for Children in Hackney. Clara Fox, another
assistant turned pharmacist, was the dispenser at the St Pancras Infirmary
and Margaret Warren held the same post in the Royal Eye Hospital,
Southwark. 197 Elizabeth Garrett was the first woman to become a doctor by
qualifying as a licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries in 1865. She opened
the St Mary‘s Dispensary for Women and Children in Marylebone a year
later and offered work, as dispensers, to some of the apothecaries‘
assistants. 198 Alice Marion Hart applied, at the same time as Rose
Minshull, to be registered as a student member of the Pharmaceutical
Society and had her Apothecaries‘ Assistant‘s Certificate accepted as
equivalent to the ‗preliminary‘ examination. Considering the dispute that
was to arise after 1911 in respect of apothecaries‘ assistants registering as
chemists and druggists, this was an interesting development. 199
The world of work was at last opening up to young middle class
women and the apothecaries‘ assistant‘s qualification was at the forefront of
197 „Women in Pharmacy‟, Pharmaceutical Journal, 76, 22, (6 Jan. 1906) 15.
198 Jordan, „Suitable and Remunerative Employment‟, 436.
199 Holloway, Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, p. 263.
210