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The precursor to Drexels medical school was the worlds first place women could earn MDs.

A lot took place between 1850, when Womans Medical College of Pennsylvania was chartered on Arch Street, and 2002, when it became part of the Drexel University College of Medicine.

Over that time, the institution had a continuous stream of women deans, moved its campus to a larger location, experienced a dramatic spat with male students at Pennsylvania Hospital and was pivotal in the establishment of the Womans Hospital of Philadelphia.

At the early epicenter was Ann Preston, a Quaker dynamo who served on the board of the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Sociery, wrote a childrens book, and helped launch that womens hospital in North Philly.

Heres how it all went down.

Phillys medical school for women opened at the location that eventually became 627 Arch St. Today, you can spot a plaque dedicated to its establishment on the 7th Street wall of the William J. Green Federal Building, which now stands in its place.

Originally called the Female Medical School of Pennsylvania, the college received its charter from the state legislature in May 1850, making it the worlds first to award women medical degrees. (A womens school in Boston opened two years before the Philly school, but didnt give out degrees.)

As it happens, the Womans Medical College of Pennsylvania was founded by Quaker men, including a businessman philanthropist and abolitionists William J. Mullen, Dr. Joseph S. Longshore and Dr. Bartholomew Fussell.

The colleges first announcement publicizing the program, made in a July 1850 edition of the Public Ledger, listed a few admission and graduation qualifications:

About that tuition: Students owed $10 for each professor, a one-time matriculation fee of $5 and a $15 graduation fee. With six professors, the women paid a grand total of about $80 for their medical degree. Adjusted for inflation, thats about $2,600 in todays money.

Instruction included four months of lectures beginning in October that covered topics like anatomy, obstetrics, chemistry and clinical practice.

Ann Preston, born in 1813, was part of the inaugural eight-person graduating class of 1851 at the Womans Medical College.

A Chester County native born into a Quaker family, she accomplished a lot before enrolling, and shed go on to do much more before her death in 1872.

Preston was involved in anti-slavery efforts as early as 1837. In 1849, a 36-year-old Preston published an abolitionist childrens book called Cousin Anns Stories. The Freeman paper lauded the project and recommended it for parents who wish to instill in the minds of their children a sentiment of opposition to slavery, war, intemperence, the use of tobacco and other evils.

It was around that time Preston sought to establish her medical career. She tried to gain admission into four traditional medical schools in Philadelphia, to no avail. When the womens college was open, she jumped at the chance.

After graduating in 1851, Preston became the schools first woman professor. In 1866 she rose to become the schools first dean, starting a tradition of all woman-deans for nearly the entire next century.

Preston also headed the effort to open the Womans Hospital of Philadelphia in 1861.

Anti-woman discrimination during this time was ever-present.

Despite Prestons accomplishments in the medical field in Philadelphia, in 1869 she and her students were verbally and physically attacked when they traveled to Pennsylvania Hospital for clinical hours.

When the women arrived at the surgical amphitheater for class on Nov. 6, what they encountered was a mob hurling spitballs, cat-calls and tobacco juice at the She Doctors, as they were bitterly referred to.

The much-publicized incident became known as the jeering episode.

One edition of the Pennsylvania Evening Bulletin referred to it as an outrage, saying that the police should arrest as many as possible of the offenders for insulting women in the street, and subject them to the penalties of the law.

Preston and the Womans Medical College secretary, Dr. Emeline H. Cleveland, wrote a letter to the editor defending the woman students after the event.

If they have been forced into unwelcome notoriety, they wrote, it has not been of their own seeking.

The first womens college in the world pushed on, accomplishing several more firsts through its graduates.

Graduate Catherine Macfarlane conducted the first pelvic cancer prevention study. Graduate Anna Broomall created some of the first prenatal medical programs. Graduates Rebecca Cole and Eliza Grier were some of the first Black woman doctors. And the first ever Native American doctor, named Susan LaFlesche Picotte, was also a graduate.

In 1862, the college moved into the Womans Hospital of Philadelphia on 22nd Street and North College Avenue.

In 1970, the first four male students were admitted, ending the colleges 120-year all-woman reign. It was renamed the Medical College of Pennsylvania.

In 1995, the college merged with the Hahnemann University Medical School. In 2002, it was acquired by Drexel to create the universitys med school program that still continues today. Tuition is close to $60,000 per year.

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