Wilkerson, Artishia Garcia Gilbert

Artishia Garcia Gilbert was the first African American woman to pass the medical boards and become a doctor in Kentucky. She was an 1889 graduate of State University [later Simmons College, KY] and also taught at the school. She was an 1893 graduate of the Louisville National Medical College and an 1897 graduate of Howard University Medical School. She returned to Kentucky and taught obstetrics at the Louisville National Medical College and was superintendent of the Red Cross Sanitarium in Louisville. She was a member of the Green Street Baptist Church and of the board of directors of the Colored Orphan Home in Louisville. She was also an active member of the Baptist Women's Educational Convention. She was president of the Baptist Women's Missionary Convention when she died. Artishia Wilkerson was also a club woman who belonged to several organizations including the Woman's Industrial Club, Woman's Improvement Club, and Sons and Daughters of the Morning. She was born in Manchester, KY, the daughter of William and Amanda Gilbert. She was the wife of attorney B. O. Wilkerson, whom she married in 1896; the couple had three children: B. O. Jr., Artishia Garcia, and a baby boy. An incorrect death date for Artishia Wilkerson is given as December 31, 1929 in the Directory of Deceased American Physicians, 1804-1929, edited by A. W. Hafner, et al. Wilkerson died in 1904. For more see Black Women in America, 2nd ed., vol. 2; Women Doctors in Gilded-Age Washington: race, gender, and professionalization, by G. Moldow; the Artishia Garcia Gilbert entry in A Historical, Biographical and Statistical Souvenir by Howard University Medical Department [available full view at Google Book Search]; and "In Memoriam: Mrs. Artishia Gilbert Wilkerson, A.B., A.M., M.D.," American Baptist, 04/08/1904, p. 3.