In the male-dominated world of medicine, she dared to step forward and fight for fairness-graduating from Johns Hopkins Medical School with honors in the year 1900. But for physician Dorothy Reed Mendenhall, MD, the battle for equality was just beginning.

In the name of improving the standards of care for women and infants, she faced the scorn of prejudiced doctors in an establishment marked by its unwillingness to change. Still, through the Gilded Age, two World Wars, and beyond, she kept up her fight-in the process, discovering new breakthroughs and saving lives, all while...