How To Defy The Odds – Three Denton Women That Wouldn’t Be Held Back

 

March is Women’s History Month, making it a perfect time to talk about some of the incredible ladies who have made strides in local, state, or national history.

Denton County has a large list of ladies who have made great bounds in education, medicine, the arts, journalism and much more. Maybe it’s due to having some great universities in the area, or maybe it’s just because we somehow attract the best, the brightest, and the boundary-pushers. From the mid-1800’s to present day, women in the area have defied odds, not letting dissenting views keep them from pursuing something monumental. Let’s discuss a few of these awesome ladies.

Louisa Owsley:

We’ll start off with Louisa Owsley (originally named Louisiana), who was the first woman to practice medicine in Denton. Louisa was a self-taught homeopathic doctor who lived off of Hickory Street with her husband Henry, a fellow physician. Homeopathy, a medical philosophy spearheaded in Germany in the 1700s, is based on the idea that the body has the ability to heal itself and remedies illnesses with small doses of natural ingredients.

Owsley and her husband generally clashed on their views of medicine. Henry was a conventional doctor who had gone to school for his practice. He based his remedies on sciences, whereas Louisa used her own self-taught findings. Despite their disagreements, she persisted with her own practices.

Louisa generally worked with women and children and delivered more babies in Denton than any of her male counterparts. Because of their different views, it is said she only allowed Henry to do one task for her, which was harnessing her horse and buggy for her daily rounds.

 

Millie Hughes-Fulford:

Did you know that the first female scientist in space studied in Denton? Millie Hughes-Fulford started college at 16 at Tarleton University, eventually attending Texas Woman’s University for her master’s degree. The reason why she picked the Denton institution? Many other schools considered her a “high risk” student because she was a new mother. TWU didn’t see this as an issue and readily accepted her to study biomedical sciences.

After graduating, it was her work as a faculty member at Southwestern Medical School that got her a spot on NASA’s STS-40, a space laboratory dedicated to studying the effects of space on biomedical systems. This solidified her place in history as the first woman working as a scientist to be sent to space. After seven years of training, Fulford made her nine day journey in 1991, flying over 3.8 million miles and performing 18 experiments with her crew while aboard.

Upon her team’s return, they had brought “back more medical data than any previous NASA flight.” Her work generated new innovations in maintaining the health of astronauts in space and even gave insight to medical issues on Earth.

After her flight she became a professor at the California Medical Center at San Francisco. To this day she is still directing studies at the Hughes-Fulford Laboratory in the San Francisco VA Medical Center. Her current investigations involve studies of cancer and the regulation of bone growth.

 

Caro Crawford Brown:

Caro Crawford Brown was once a student at the College of Industrial Arts (now Texas Woman’s University) in Denton. In 1926 she was suspended from the school for “riding in an automobile with a man without proper written permission.. to a Fort Worth night club.. out of uniform.” Despite this collegiate setback, she became an editor of CIA’s school newspaper, graduated in 1928, and went on to make some great strides in her journalism career.

In the 1950’s Brown went to work for the Alice Daily Echo in Duvall County, Texas.Starting as a proof reader, she eventually worked her way up to a reporting position, uncovering great political scandal in the area.

She was investigating the Parr family, who had the Duval County political machine in its clutches. It was a dangerous job to take, as one of the last reporters investigating them was mysteriously killed. When the Texas Rangers told her she was putting herself in a bad position, she made the decision to always carry a pistol in her glove compartment. Brown’s dedication to the case often found her paying for her own hotel and travel expenses during her reporting and caused bitter opposition from local politicians. All the while, she balanced this life with taking care of her family at home.

Her investigation uncovered and dismantled the work of political boss George B. Parr. Parr had rigged elections, the most notorious being for Lyndon B. Johnson. She also wrote a series of articles that uncovered the murders of Mexican-American World War II veterans who had assembled to protest the work of the Parr family.

Brown’s journalism on the case led her to win a Pulitzer Prize for local reporting, making her the first woman to ever receive this distinguished honor. She was also awarded a citation from the trustees of Colombia University for her in-depth series.

Though Brown’s career in journalism only spanned a short five years, she accomplished what many in the field aspire to do in a lifetime.

 

The takeaway? Despite obstacles, you can do whatever you hope to achieve. Are you a Louisa, who has peers that disapprove of your thinking? A Millie, who is told you may not do well because of life’s circumstances? Or maybe you’re a Caro, who has run into some trouble along your journey? Whoever you are, don’t stress. Keep persisting. And when a roadblock pops up, know that it isn’t the end of the pursuit, but a mere detour.

 

Written by Marissa Hunt