Mary Halton

Mary Gertrude Halton (1878–1948) was an American pathologist, gynecologist, obstetrician, women's health activist, and suffragist. She fought to publish research on early intrauterine device (IUD) technology, in order to further the legalization of birth control in the United States. She was the first women appointed to the Harvard Medical School faculty.

Early life and education Mary G. Halton was born in 1878 in San Francisco, California, she was the daughter of Mary Gunn Halton and Dr. Richard J. Halton.

Career After graduation she worked as a pathologist at Saint Francis Memorial Hospital, St. Luke's Hospital, and Southern Pacific Hospital in San Francisco. She also worked at the Gouverneur Hospital as a surgeon in the outpatient maternity ward. Halton became famous in 1923, when she was able to use an X-ray machine in order to shrink an enlarged gland on a three-day-old baby, and as a result she saved the baby's life. A similar process was being done in Germany at the time. The research article was published with warning one year later, in 1948 in the Human Fertility journal by Margaret Sanger. In 1915, Halton wrote a letter to the editor of The New York Times, in support of the suffragist movement. She founded the Halton Endowment for Girls, Inc, which helped place low income "working girls" into beds in New York City for when they couldn't afford medical treatment. By the time of her death, fourteen states had changed their laws around birth certificates and parents names, in order to protect babies born out of wedlock.

Death Halton died after a long illness on January 25, 1948, at Doctor's Hospital in Staten Island in New York City, she was 69 years old. After her death, the Equal Rights For Babies fund was diverted into the Dr. Mary Halton Student Loan Fund at NYU–Bellevue Medical Center to help more women study medicine.