Interesting Facts about Esther Chapa Tijerina, a Mexican medical surgeon and women’s rights activist

Google Doodle celebrates the 118th birthday of Esther Chapa Tijerina, a Mexican medical surgeon, educator, writer, feminist, suffragist, trade unionist, and women’s and children’s rights activist, on October 22, 2022. Here are some interesting and fun facts about Esther Chapa Tijerina.

Here is a look at the life and work of Esther Chapa Tijerina.

Who was Esther Chapa Tijerina?

Personal

• Birth date: 22 October 1904
• Birthplace: Tamaulipas, Mexico
• Died on: 14 December 1970 (aged 66)
• Death place: Mexico City, Mexico
• Nationality: Mexican
• Famous as: Physician, Writer, Educator

Interesting and fun facts about Esther Chapa Tijerina

1. Esther Chapa was born on October 22, 1904, in Tamaulipas to Virginia Tijerina and Quirino Chapa.
2. She went on to study medicine at one of Latin America’s leading institutions — the National Autonomous University of Mexico. Chapa educated microbiology.
3. In her medical practice, Esther Chapa Tijerina specialized in clinical analysis and microbiology, and she taught microbiology at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
4. In the wake of graduating from medical school, she became one of the country’s few female surgeons and went on to teach microbiology at her alma mater.
5. Esther Chapa Tijerina later became Director of the National School of Nursing and Obstetrics and president of the National School of Nursing. She also co-founded the surgeon’s union and union of service workers.
6. Tijerina galvanized Mexico’s women’s activist movement when she co-founded the Single Front Pro-Women’s Rights group in 1935 with Mexico’s first female psychiatrist, Dr. Matilde Rodríguez Cabo.
7. Chapa was a member of the Single Front Pro-Women’s Rights (FUPDM) together with Dr. Matilde Rodriguez Cabo.
8. Also known as Frente Unico Pro-Derechos de la Mujer (FUPDM), the group advocated for lower taxes, electricity bills, and rent costs for working-class women. It became Mexico’s biggest women’s rights organization at the time.
9. Drs. Chapa and Cabo got to know each other while in medical school and made changes to aid prisons, prostitution, and welfare for women and children.
10. Cabo and Chapa together made the Frente Unico (Single Front in Mexico) in 1935. To research the issues mentioned, Chapa and a few other women made the “Leona Vicarío” for the study of the specific issues of Mexican families and the “status of a woman as mother and wife”.

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11. At a June 1934 meeting, Marxist dissidents, for example, Esther Chapa Tijerina, contended that poverty was a large reason for the prevalence of prostitution in the area.
12. Esther Chapa Tijerina pushed for a Marxist revolution to stop the guideline of prostitution and use government funds for education and social reforms instead.
13. She was additionally active on behalf of abortion rights, equality, and the right to vote and be an active political member of society.
14. In 1936, Esther Chapa Tijerina published a notable book, El derecho al voto para la Mujer, which played a significant role in mobilizing Mexican women to join the suffrage movement.
15. Esther Chapa Tijerina’s 1936 book El derecho al voto para la Mujer compared women to detainees and patients in insane asylums, as they also were not permitted to vote and were confined in the activities they could do.
16. Chapa attempted to make a Women’s Prison through Social Prevention in the Federal Penitentiary.
17. Esther Chapa Tijerina was also director of the Help Committee for the Children of the Spanish People (for refugees of the Spanish Civil War).
18. After the Frente Unico acquired its triumph in giving women equal rights in 1958, Chapa became an international consultant and made frequent trips to China to foster relations between the countries of China and Mexico.
19. Esther Chapa Tijerina died of cancer in December 1970.
20. On October 22, 2022, Google featured a Google Doodle on its homepage for celebrating Esther Chapa Tijerina’s 118th Birthday. Google Doodle celebrates the birthday of Esther Chapa Tijerina, a recognized Mexican surgeon, professor, and feminist who played a pivotal role in advancing women’s voting rights in Mexico.