Carolina Beatriz Ângelo: Google Doodle celebrates Portuguese first surgeon woman and the first female to vote in Portugal

Google Doodle celebrates a Portuguese physician and women’s activist Carolina Beatriz Ângelo, the first surgeon woman and the first female to vote in Portugal, on May 28, 2021.

Who was Carolina Beatriz Ângelo?

Carolina Beatriz Angelo was born on 6 April 1878 in São Vicente, Guarda, Kingdom of Portugal. She was a doctor and women’s activist Portuguese. It was the first surgeon female and the first woman to vote in Portugal, during the elections of the Constituent Assembly in 1911.

During her childhood, Beatriz, as she was called by loved ones, experienced childhood in a liberal family environment. Her father and maternal grandfather supported the Progressive Party and were connected to the journalistic activity of the region, permitting her to study and enter the Liceu da Guarda in 1891, where she finished her primary and secondary studies.

Settling with her family in Lisbon in the last decade of the eighties, Carolina Beatriz Ângelo proceeded with her academic career and entered the Polytechnic School and the Medical-Surgical School of Lisbon, where she finished her medical course in 1902.

In Carolina Beatriz Ângelo’s medical career, the fact that in 1903 she introduced her debut thesis ” Prolapsos Genitaes (Apontamentos) ” stands out, starting her training as the first Portuguese surgeon, a notable feat that negated the strongly sexist tendency of the operating rooms of the time. She would then become the first Portuguese woman to work at Hospital de São José, under the direction of Sabino Maria Teixeira Coelho.

Shortly afterward, Carolina Beatriz Ângelo began working at the Psychiatric Hospital of Rilhafoles, under the guidance of Miguel Bombarda, and dedicated herself to the specialty of Gynecology, with a private practice in downtown Lisbon, in particular at Rua Nova do Almada.

In 1906, Carolina Beatriz Ângelo worked close by the Portuguese Committee of the French Association, the first of numerous groups Ângelo teamed up with to help build a better Portugal. The next year, Ângelo united with the Portuguese Group of Feminist Studies, where she worked intimately with famous figures of the country’s thriving movement for gender equality.

In 1909, Carolina Beatriz Ângelo was part of the group of women who established the Portuguese Republican League of Women (LRMP), defender of republican goals, of female suffrage, of the right to divorce, of the education of children, and equal rights and duties for men and women.

Carolina Beatriz Ângelo’s efforts to improve society topped in 1911 when she established the Portuguese Association of Feminist Propaganda (Associação de Propaganda Feminista), a key force in the battle for the rights of Portuguese women and children.

On May 28, 1911, Carolina Beatriz Angelo cast her vote in favor of deputies of the Constitutional Assembly in the first elections after the fall of the government. Since she was both a widow and a mother of a daughter, she was viewed as head-of-household. Ângelo became the first woman to vote in the Portuguese parliamentary election. Even though women’s suffrage wasn’t allowed in Portugal until decades later, Ângelo’s formidable legacy of advocating for equality is felt at Portuguese voting booths right up ’til the present time.

Carolina Beatriz Ângelo died of cardiac syncope because of myocarditis on 3 October 1911 at just 33 years old in her home at São Jorge de Arroios, Lisbon, Portugal.

On May 28th, 2021, Google showed up Doodle for Celebrating Carolina Beatriz Ângelo. Google Doodle is represented by Belgium-based guest artist Fatinha Ramos.