Gladys Smithwick
Yearbook photo of a young white woman with dark hair and glasses
Gladys Smithwick, from a 1924 yearbook
Born
Laura Gladys Smithwick

May 28, 1898
Warren County, North Carolina
DiedDecember 28, 1964
Charlotte, North Carolina
Occupation(s)Physician, Christian missionary

Laura Gladys Smithwick (May 28, 1898 – December 28, 1964) was an American physician. She served as a Presbyterian medical missionary in China and the Belgian Congo.

Early life

Smithwick was born in Warren County, North Carolina, one of the eight children of James Walter Smithwick and Laura S. Fort Smithwick. She completed a bachelor's degree at Oxford College in North Carolina in 1919.[1] She earned a medical degree the Medical College of Virginia in 1925, where she was a member of the Alpha Epsilon Iota professional society.[2] She later earned a master's degree in public health at Tulane University,[3] and studied anesthesiology at Massachusetts Memorial Hospital in Boston.[4]

Career

After medical school, Smithwick worked at the Catawba Sanatorium in Virginia,[5] and the Rhode Island State Sanatorium.[6] She spent much of her career as a medical missionary with the American Southern Presbyterian Mission. She was posted in China from 1929 to 1935, where she was co-director of a women's hospital at Suzhou.[7][4] She was an anesthesiologist[4][8] and an active clubwoman in Lexington, Kentucky, in the 1930s and 1940s.[9][10][11]

Smithwick hoped to return to China after World War II;[8][12] instead, she studied French in Belgium, and worked at a leprosarium[13] in the Kasai Province of the Belgian Congo, from 1949 to 1963.[14][15]

On furloughs in the United States, she spoke about her work at Presbyterian churches.[16][17][18]

Personal life

Smithwick died in 1964, aged 66 years, at a hospital in Charlotte, North Carolina.[13][14][19] There is a file of her letters in the Presbyterian Historical Society archives.[20]

References

  1. ↑ "Commencement Exercises of Oxford College". Oxford Public Ledger. 1919-06-06. p. 5. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  2. ↑ Medical College of Virginia (1924). X-ray. Virginia Commonwealth University Libraries. Medical College of Virginia.
  3. ↑ "Missionary to Speak". The Greenville News. 1955-06-10. p. 13. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  4. 1 2 3 Hoagland, Marjorie (1941-08-30). "Former Missionary Says China, With U.S. Aid, Will Beat Japs". The Lexington Herald. p. 2. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  5. ↑ Health, Virginia Dept of (1925). Biennial Report. Center for Health Statistics, Virginia Department of Health.
  6. ↑ Rhode Island State Sanatorium (1930). Annual Report. p. 6.
  7. ↑ "Americans Fight Oriental Fever Scourge in China". Suffolk News-Herald. March 7, 1935. p. 1. Retrieved March 26, 2021 – via Virginia Chronicle.
  8. 1 2 "Dr. Smithwick Takes Medical Post in China". The Lexington Herald. 1948-04-21. p. 1. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  9. ↑ "Dr. Smithwick Will Entertain at Tea Today". The Lexington Herald. 1939-03-05. p. 19. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  10. ↑ "Dr. Smithwick Gives Tea for Committee". The Lexington Herald. 1941-09-13. p. 5. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  11. ↑ "Dr. Smithwick, Mrs. Cantrill to Give Book Reviews". The Lexington Herald. 1945-03-18. p. 17. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  12. ↑ "Dr. Gladys Smithwick's Assignment is Delayed". The Lexington Herald. 1948-05-06. p. 22. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  13. 1 2 "Dr. Gladys Smithwick, Former Missionary, Dies". The Charlotte Observer. 1964-12-29. p. 4. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  14. 1 2 "Dr. Gladys Smithwick Dies at Charlotte". Warren Record. p. 1. Retrieved March 26, 2021 – via DigitalNC.
  15. ↑ Staff, United States Department of State Cultural Planning and Coordination (1959). International Educational Exchange and Related Exchange-of-persons Activities: British Cameroons, Cameroun, French Equatorial Africa, Belgian Congo, and Angola. p. 44.
  16. ↑ "Shiloh, Mebane Presb". The Daily Times-News. 1960-01-29. p. 12. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  17. ↑ Rice, Teek (1964-10-18). "Medical Missionary Tells of Her Experiences in the Congo". Beckley Post-Herald The Raleigh Register. p. 12. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  18. ↑ "Dr. Smithwick Here". The Advocate-Messenger. 1953-02-04. p. 3. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  19. ↑ "Dr. Laura Smithwick's Will Probated in County Court". The Lexington Herald. 1965-02-06. p. 11. Retrieved 2021-03-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  20. ↑ "Guide to the Missionary Correspondence Department Letters". Presbyterian Historical Society. Retrieved 2021-03-26.
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