Justina was born in Knoxville, Illinois. Her interest in medicine began at a young age playing “hospital,” dissecting frogs, inventing disease names, and accompanying her mother, who was a nurse, to see patients. After high school, she began to study medicine at Hering Medical School in Chicago. There, she met John Ford, a Baptist minister, and the couple got married in 1892. At 28, after graduating from medical school, she went to pay for the license, but the examiner denied her application for being a woman and African-American. Ford worked in a hospital in Alabama for two years before they relocated to Denver, Colorado, where she was finally given a medical license – and became the first licensed African American female doctor in the city. Because of her race, she was not allowed to work in hospitals or join the state’s medical association, so she opened a private practice in her home and made house visits to see patients, practicing mainly gynecology, obstetrics, and pediatrics. Ford treated anyone in need, regardless of race, gender, or citizenship. The majority of her patients were African-Americans, poor whites, and immigrants who did not speak English or could not afford to go to the hospital. With no money to pay for her services, her patients often exchanged produce, household items, and maintenance work. In 1950, at the age of 79, Ford was permitted to join the Colorado Medical Association as well as the American Medical Associations and became a member of the Denver Medical Society. After 48 years of running her practice, she began to work at the Denver General Hospital, still the only female African American doctor in Denver. She continued to practice medicine until two weeks before she died, at the age of 81.   Read more...