An Interactive Annotated World Bibliography of Printed and Digital Works in the History of Medicine and the Life Sciences from Circa 2000 BCE to 2022 by Fielding H. Garrison (1870-1935), Leslie T. Morton (1907-2004), and Jeremy M. Norman (1945- ) Traditionally Known as “Garrison-Morton”

15961 entries, 13944 authors and 1935 subjects. Updated: March 22, 2024

GRIFFITH, Mary

3 entries
  • 11415

Observations on the May-Bug, and its ravages on plum and other trees, and also on the means of preventing the mischief.

J. Franklin Inst., 1, 364-366, 1826.

Griffth was probably the first American woman to publish in the sciences outside of materia medica and childcare. This article was probably her earliest non-geological publication. See Robt S. Cox, "A spontaneous flow: The geological contributions of Mary Griffith, 1772-1846," Earth Sciences History, 12, 187-195.



Subjects: Agriculture / Horticulture, COUNTRIES, CONTINENTS AND REGIONS › United States , NATURAL HISTORY, WOMEN, Publications by › Years 1800 - 1899
  • 11430

Discoveries in light and vision; with a short memoir containing discoveries in the mental faculties.

New York: G. & C. Carvill & Co., 1836.

The first work on vision written by a woman and published in the United States. Griffith published the work anonymously. 

"Griffith’s work had its start in print in 1834, when she published two articles on vision in David Brewster’s prestigious Philosophical Magazine: “Observations of the Vision of the Retina” (4: 43–46) and “Observations on the Spectra of the Eye and the Seat of Vision” (5:192–196). Both contributions appeared under her own name. Brewster, certainly a leading authority in the field of optics at the time, appended an editorial comment to the first article stating that some of the conclusions reached by Griffith were incorrect, but nonetheless he felt that her observations were interesting enough to be printed. Not one to take criticism well, Griffith led off her second article with an attack on Brewster, objecting that he had provided no evidence to back up his claim, and she, for one, continued to believe that she was correct in all particulars. In both the dedication and the preface of Discoveries in Light and Vision, Griffith acknowledges that her conclusions are often diametrically opposed to those held by the leading scientific men of the day, but she is convinced that their soundness will one day be acknowledged even by her harshest critics" (Joseph J. Felcone, private communication).

Digital facsimile from the U.S. National Library of Medicine at this link.



Subjects: COUNTRIES, CONTINENTS AND REGIONS › United States , OPHTHALMOLOGY , WOMEN, Publications by › Years 1800 - 1899
  • 11431

Barn-Yard rhymes; showing what opinions the turkey, the cock, the goose, and the duck, enterain of allopathia, homopathia, electro-galvanism and the animalcule doctrines.

New York: G. & C. Carvill & Co., 1838.

A critique of medical practice and procedures in 80 pages of rhymed couplets voiced by farmyard animals. Mary Griffith, who published these satirical poems anonymously, dedicated the work to the Philadelphia physician Nathanial Chapman, who she considered "one of the 'three good doctors.' "

Digital facsimile from the U.S. National Library of Medicine at this link.



Subjects: ALTERNATIVE, Complimentary & Pseudomedicine, Satire / Caricature & Medicine , WOMEN, Publications by › Years 1800 - 1899