{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,9,24]],"date-time":"2026-09-24T11:36:56Z","timestamp":1790249816273,"version":"4.1.0"},"reference-count":99,"publisher":"Cambridge University Press (CUP)","issue":"2","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2019,3,26]],"date-time":"2019-03-26T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1553558400000},"content-version":"unspecified","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/www.cambridge.org\/core\/terms"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["cambridge.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Med. Hist."],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2019,4]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>This paper explores the influence of English female doctors on the creation of the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) and the production and circulation of contraceptive knowledge in England and, to a lesser extent in France, between 1930 and 1970. By drawing on the writings of female doctors and proceedings of international conferences as well as the archives of the British Medical Women\u2019s Federation (MWF) and Family Planning Association (FPA), on the one hand, and<jats:italic>Mouvement Fran\u00e7ais pour le Planning Familial<\/jats:italic>(MFPF), on the other, this paper\u00a0explores the agency of English female doctors at the national and transnational level. I recover their pioneering work and argue that they were pivotal in legitimising family planning within medical circles. I then turn to their influence on French doctors after World War\u00a0II. Not only were English medical women active and experienced agents in the family planning movement in England; they also represented a conduit of information and training crucial for French doctors. Transfer of knowledge across the channel was thus a decisive tool for implementing family planning services in France.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1017\/mdh.2019.3","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2019,3,26]],"date-time":"2019-03-26T09:57:14Z","timestamp":1553594234000},"page":"153-172","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1017\/policypage","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":11,"title":["English Women Doctors, Contraception and Family Planning in Transnational Perspective (1930s\u201370s)"],"prefix":"10.1017","volume":"63","author":[{"given":"Caroline","family":"Rusterholz","sequence":"first","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"56","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2019,3,26]]},"reference":[{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r92.1","unstructured":"1. 'Letter from medical secretary Mears to Mr and Mrs Dalsace, 15 November 1963'"},{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r92.2","unstructured":"2. 'Letter from Mears to Raoul Palmer, 15 November 1963'"},{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r92.3","unstructured":"3. 'Letter from Mears to Weill-Hall??, 15 November 1963', in SA\/FPA\/A10\/8 1955-66 IPPF, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r91","unstructured":"\u2019The FPA Walworth Women\u2019s Welfare Centre, Annual Report 1960\u2019, in SA\/FPA\/A13\/85B, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r90","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from Mrs Wintersgill to Mrs Nelson-Barette, 13 December 1960\u2019, in SA\/FPA\/A10\/8 1955\u201366 IPPF, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r89","unstructured":"On training in England, see \u2018Report of the March 1957 International Planned Parenthood Federation\u2019, in\u00a0SA\/FPA\/A10\/8 1955\u201366 IPPF, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r88","unstructured":"\u2018Herewith the usual forms and literature for the four who will be attending the lectures and demonstration session in London on Tuesday 12 November: Dr Chatelin (male doctor) Dr Houdville (male doctor), Dr Jacqueline Cahen-Wolff, Dr Branle.\u2019: \u2018Letter to Joan Rettie, 8 November 1963\u2019, in SA\/FPA\/A10\/8 1955\u201366 IPPF, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r87","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from S. Le Sueur Cappel to Eleanor Mears, 11 November 1961\u2019: \u2018I came back to Versailles very happy from my too short sejour in England. I thank you very much for the charming welcome I have found wherever I have been received and all the centres I have seen, [they]were very interesting for me\u2019, in Revue trimestrielle du Mouvement fran\u00e7ais pour le planning familial, December 1962, 2."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r86","unstructured":"They were not alone. According to a report from the FPA, Dr Pierre Bertrand, Dr Genevi\u00e8ve Hall, Dr Mato Medeau, Dr Elizabeth Palmer, Mrs Pechabrier (Ministry of Health and Education), Dr Yves Peninou, Evelyn Sullerot and Dr and Mrs Weill-Hall\u00e9 were all trained in 1956: SA\/FPA\/A10\/8 1955\u201366 IPPF, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r85","unstructured":"\u2018Report of the March 1957 International Planned Parenthood Federation and accounts for the region for Europe\u2019, in SA\/FPA\/A10\/8 1955\u201366 IPPF, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r84","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from Arlette Fribourg to Eleanor Mears, 25 April 1961\u2019, in SA\/FPA\/A21\/8 France 1951\u201367, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r83","unstructured":"For exchange of information between England and France, see \u2018Letter from Vera Houghton, 15 December 1954\u2019, in Fonds Vellay 9.5 IPPF; BIUM, Paris."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r82","unstructured":"Dossier 11. 1, Fonds Vellay 9.5 IPPF, BIUM, Paris."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r79","unstructured":"See Teresa Ortiz-G\u00f3mez and Agata Ignaciuk, \u2018The Fight for Family Planning in Spain During Late Francoism and the Transition to Democracy (1965\u201379)\u2019, Journal of Women\u2019s History, 30, 2 (2018), 38\u201362."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r78","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Bibia Pavard , \u2018Du Birth Control Au Planning Familial (1955\u201360): Un Transfert Militant\u2019 [From Birth Control to Family Planning, An Activist Transfer], Histoire@ Politique, III (2012), 162\u201378.","DOI":"10.3917\/hp.018.0162"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r76","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from Eleanor Mears to all medical officers conducting contraceptive trials, 13 January 1965\u2019, in\u00a0SA\/FPA\/A5\/158B."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r74","first-page":"4","article-title":"Oral Contraception: The Results","volume":"10","author":"Mears","year":"1962","journal-title":"Family Planning"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r73","first-page":"1179","article-title":"Clinical Trials of Oral Contraceptives","volume":"5261","author":"Mears","year":"4\u00a0November\u00a01961","journal-title":"British Medical Journal"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r70","first-page":"587","article-title":"Contraception and Sterility","volume":"4322","author":"Malleson","year":"6\u00a0November\u00a01943","journal-title":"British Medical Journal"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r69","first-page":"539","article-title":"Contraceptives and Fertility","volume":"4026","author":"Jackson","year":"5\u00a0March\u00a01938","journal-title":"British Medical Journal"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r67","first-page":"484","article-title":"Contraceptives and Fertility","volume":"4025","author":"Malleson","year":"26\u00a0February\u00a01938","journal-title":"British Medical Journal"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r72","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from the General Secretary of the FPA to Greta Graff, 6 April 1954\u2019, in SA\/FPA\/A14\/188, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r48","first-page":"65","article-title":"Joan Malleson, The Principles of Contraception","author":"Murphy","year":"1935\u201336","journal-title":"Medical Women\u2019s Federation Quarterly"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r50","unstructured":"There was a long tradition of women who had achieved medical qualifications writing handbooks of health guidance for laywomen, who might not be in a position to afford to see a doctor, or who might be shy about discussing womanly ailments with a male medic."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r81","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from La maternit\u00e9 Heureuse, MFPF, 31 October 1961 to Mrs Pyke\u2019, in SA\/FPA\/A21\/8 France 1951\u201367, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r27.1","unstructured":"20. 'Letter from Elstone Secretary of the IPPF to Helena Wright, 8 November 1963', in SA\/FPA\/A\/10\/8, Wellcome Library"},{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r27.2","unstructured":"21. 'Letter from Elstone Secretary of the IPPF to Mary Pollock, 20 April 1966', in SA\/FPA\/A10\/8, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r26","unstructured":"\u2018International Planned Parenthood Federation Region for Europe, Near East and Africa Minutes of the Fifth Meeting of the Regional Council, November 1960\u2019, in SA\/FPA\/A10\/8, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r56","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1093\/jhmas\/jrx044"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r28","unstructured":"\u2018Proceedings of the International Congress on Population and World Resources in Relation to the Family, August 1948, Cheltenham, England\u2019, op. cit. (note\u00a018): 210."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r75","article-title":"Problem Families","author":"Peberdy","year":"April\u00a01965","journal-title":"Medical Women\u2019s Federation Quarterly"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r71","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1093\/shm\/14.2.247"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r22","first-page":"141","article-title":"Report of Meeting of International Committee on Planned Parenthood","volume":"43","author":"Houghton","year":"1951","journal-title":"Eugenics Review"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r46","volume-title":"Family Planning: A Handbook for the Doctor","author":"Pollock","year":"1966"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r57","unstructured":"Information collected in MS.9178\/3\/1 Walworth 70th anniversary historical material, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r16","unstructured":"Kling, op. cit. (note\u00a02)."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r62","first-page":"10","volume-title":"Clinical Contraception","author":"Cox","year":"1933"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r33","first-page":"127","article-title":"A Suitable Job for a Woman: Women Doctors and Birth Control to the Inception of the NHS","volume":"61","author":"Hall","year":"2001","journal-title":"Clio Medica"},{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r77.1","unstructured":"26. Bibia Pavard, Si Je Veux, Quand Je Veux: Contraception et Avortement Dans La Soci??t?? Fran??aise (1956-79) [If I Want, When I Want: Contraception and Abortion in France (1956-79)] (Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2012)"},{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r77.2","unstructured":"27. Christine Bard and Janine Mossuz-Lavau, Le Planning Familial: Histoire et M??moire, 1956-2006 [Family Planning: History and Memory, 1956-2006] (Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2007)."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r23","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from Helena Wright to medical members of the IPPF\u2019s governing body, 3 March 1955\u2019: \u2018I proposed the setting-up of a medical sub-committee of doctors only, for the purposes outlined in IPPF 35(L). The governing body gave its sanction and at the second meeting of the Medical Sub-Committee I was appointed Chairman\u2019, in\u00a0SA\/FPA\/A10\/8, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r80","unstructured":"\u2018News of Population and Birth Control\u2019, 34 (1955), in Vellay 9.5 IPPF, BIUM."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r42","first-page":"9","volume-title":"The Principles of Contraception: A Handbook for General Practitioners","author":"Malleson","year":"1935"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r14","unstructured":"On the subject of population explosion and its connected fears, see Bashford, op. cit. (note\u00a06); Matthew James Connelly, Fatal Misconception: The Struggle to Control World Population (Harvard: Harvard University Press, 2008)."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r58","unstructured":"SA\/FPA\/A13\/85B, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r68","unstructured":"Ibid."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r55","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from Blacker to Wright, 14 April 1932\u2019, in PP\/CPB\/C\/1\/16, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r34","unstructured":"Debenham, op. cit. (note\u00a02); Leathard, op. cit. (note\u00a02)."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r43","unstructured":"Ibid., 10."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r53","unstructured":"Malleson, op. cit. (note\u00a042)."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r40","unstructured":"Hall, op. cit. (note\u00a033), 109."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r63","first-page":"5","volume-title":"Contraceptive Technique: A Handbook of Practical Instruction","author":"Wright","year":"1968"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Caroline Rusterholz , \u2018English and French Women Doctors in International Debates on Contraception (1920\u201335)\u2019, Social History of Medicine, 31, 2 (2018), 328\u201347. On women being assigned to precarious positions, see Mary Ann\u00a0C. Elston, Women Doctors in the British Health Services: A Sociological Study of their Careers and Opportunities (Diss. University of Leeds, 1986).","DOI":"10.1093\/shm\/hkx027"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r32","unstructured":"Bashford, op. cit. (note\u00a06), 330."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r17","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from Elise Ottesen-Jensen to Joan Malleson, 10 July 1946\u2019, in SA\/FPA\/A10\/10, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r47","unstructured":"The women doctors contributing to the book were Sylvia Dawkins (medical officer at the Islington Family Planning Centre), Rosalie Taylor, Eleanor Mears, Josephine Barnes, Margaret Moore White, Margaret Neal-Edwards, Mary Egerton, Margaret Blair, Jean Passmore, Elizabeth Draper, Alison Giles, Margaret Pyke and Wright."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1093\/shm\/hkq045"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r3","unstructured":"Medicalisation means \u2018defining a problem in medical terms, using medical language to describe a problem, adopting a medical framework to understand a problem or using a medical intervention to treat it\u2019: Peter Conrad, \u2018Medicalization and Social Control\u2019, Annual Review of Sociology18, 1 (1992), 211."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r5","volume-title":"Beyond the Natural Body: An Archaeology of Sex Hormones","author":"Oudshoorn","year":"1994"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r6","volume-title":"Global Population: History, Geopolitics, and Life on Earth","author":"Bashford","year":"2014"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r25","unstructured":"\u2018First Annual Report, 29 November 1952\/31 August 1953, IPPF\u2019, in Fonds Dalsace-Vellay, Vellay 9.5 IPPF, BIUM, Paris."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r7","unstructured":"For the medicalisation of birth control at the transnational level, see Rusterholz, op. cit. (note\u00a04)."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r8","unstructured":"\u2018Birth Control International Information Centre\u2019, in PP\/CPB\/C.2, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r9","unstructured":"Ibid."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r24","unstructured":"\u2018The IPPF Medical Committee\u2019 in News of Population and Birth Control, CXVII (1963), in Vellay 9.5 IPPF, BIUM, Paris."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r10","unstructured":"Ibid."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r11","unstructured":"Ibid."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r61","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1017\/CBO9780511778353"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r12","unstructured":"Ibid."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r18","unstructured":"\u2018Proceedings of the International Congress on Population and World Resources in Relation to the Family, August 1948, Cheltenham England\u2019, in PP\/EFG\/A.46, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r13","first-page":"21","volume-title":"Sexual Chemistry: A History of the Contraceptive Pill","author":"Marks","year":"2010"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r15","unstructured":"Recently, scholars have begun to incorporate a transnational perspective into these issues, pinpointing the permanency of arguments and actors before and after World War\u00a0II. See references in note\u00a014."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r19","unstructured":"The London eugenics leader, Carlos Paton Blacker, and the president of the British FPA, Thomas Jeeves Horder, who presided over the Asian conference in 1933, were also both present."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r20","unstructured":"\u2018Proceedings of the International Congress on Population and World Resources in Relation to the Family, August 1948, Cheltenham England\u2019, op. cit. (note\u00a018)."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r21","first-page":"175","volume-title":"Crusader do Sex Education, Elise Ottensen-Jensen (1886\u20131973) in Scandinavia and on the International Scene","author":"Linder","year":"1996"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r29","unstructured":"\u2018First Annual Report, 29 November 1952\/31 August 1953, IPPF\u2019, in Fonds Dalsace-Vellay, Vellay 9.5 BIUM, Paris."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r1","unstructured":"I use the term \u2018English\u2019, although some of these women were British, to emphasise the fact that they were practising in England during the period under study."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r30","unstructured":"Ibid."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r31","unstructured":"\u2018Report on the 11th Congress Vienna, 24\u201325 June 1968\u2019, Medical Women\u2019s International Journal, (1968), 66, in SA\/MWF\/K.8\/12, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r35.1","unstructured":"59. Leathard, op. cit. (note??2). Richard??A. Soloway, Demography and Degeneration: Eugenics and the Declining Birthrate in Twentieth-Century Britain (Chapel Hill: UNC Press Books, 2014)"},{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r35.2","unstructured":"60. Lesley??A. Hall, Sex, Gender and Social Change in Britain since 1880 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012)"},{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r35.3","unstructured":"61. Lesley??A. Hall, The Life and Times of Stella Browne: Feminist and Free Spirit (London: IB Tauris, 2011)"},{"key":"#cr-split#-S0025727319000036_r35.4","unstructured":"62. Lucy Bland and Lesley Hall, 'Eugenics in Britain: the view from the metropole', in A.??Bashford and P.??Levine (eds). The Oxford Handbook of the History of Eugenics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 213-27."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r36","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1093\/acprof:oso\/9780199267361.001.0001"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r37","unstructured":"Hall, op. cit. (note\u00a033)."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r38","unstructured":"\u2018Minutes of the meetings of the Council of the Medical Women\u2019s Federation, 8 May 1931\u2019, in CMAL SA\/MWF\/A 11\/4, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r39","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"\u2018Birth Control in Modern Life\u2019, British Medical Journal, 3910 (1935), 1182.","DOI":"10.1136\/bmj.2.3910.1182-a"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r51","first-page":"3","volume-title":"Birth Control: Advice on Family Spacing and Healthy Sex Life","author":"Wright","year":"1935"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r41","volume-title":"Clinical Contraception","author":"Cox","year":"1933"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r44","unstructured":"Ibid., 25."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r45","first-page":"5","volume-title":"Contraceptive Techniques: A Handbook for Medical Practitioners and Senior Students","author":"Wright","year":"1951"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r49","first-page":"37","article-title":"Margaret Moore White, Womanhood","year":"1952","journal-title":"Medical Women\u2019s Federation Quarterly"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r52","first-page":"4","volume-title":"Womanhood","author":"White","year":"1947"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r54","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from Wright to Blacker, 18 March 1932\u2019, in PP\/CPB\/C\/1\/16, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r64","first-page":"1022","article-title":"Birth Control and the Medical Profession","volume":"3621","author":"Jackson","year":"31\u00a0May\u00a01930","journal-title":"British Medical Journal"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r59","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"\u2018Letter from the Secretary of the Clinics Medical Sub-Committee to Dr Evelyn Roberts, 26 January 1956\u2019, in\u00a0SA\/FPA\/A14\/196, Wellcome Library.","DOI":"10.1086\/618321"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r60","unstructured":"\u2018Demonstration model of the teaching of contraceptive techniques. Designed to the specification of Dr Helena Wright, approved by the FPA. Produced exclusively by Pytram LTD\u2019, in SA\/FPA\/A19\/9, Wellcome Library."},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r65","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/S0140-6736(00)93345-2"},{"key":"S0025727319000036_r66","first-page":"419","article-title":"Contraceptives and Fertility","volume":"4024","author":"Alabaster","year":"19\u00a0February\u00a01938","journal-title":"British Medical Journal"}],"container-title":["Medical History"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.cambridge.org\/core\/services\/aop-cambridge-core\/content\/view\/S0025727319000036","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2022,9,14]],"date-time":"2022-09-14T11:08:40Z","timestamp":1663153720000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.cambridge.org\/core\/product\/identifier\/S0025727319000036\/type\/journal_article"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2019,3,26]]},"references-count":99,"journal-issue":{"issue":"2","published-print":{"date-parts":[[2019,4]]}},"alternative-id":["S0025727319000036"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1017\/mdh.2019.3","relation":{},"ISSN":["0025-7273","2048-8343"],"issn-type":[{"value":"0025-7273","type":"print"},{"value":"2048-8343","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2019,3,26]]},"assertion":[{"value":"\u00a9 The Author 2019. Published by Cambridge University Press.\u00a0","name":"copyright","label":"Copyright","group":{"name":"copyright_and_licensing","label":"Copyright and Licensing"}}]}}