biology

Mary Sturge

Mary Sturge is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Mary Sturge rather than just read about it. In short: Mary Darby Sturge (16 October 1862 – 14 March 1925) was a British medical doctor, known for her pioneering work with alcoholism and championing the importance of preventative medical care. She is credited as being the second woman doctor in Birmingham and was President of the Medical Women's Federation from 1920 to 1922.

Key takeaways

Mary Sturge belongs to biology; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Mary Sturge to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Mary Sturge from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Mary Darby Sturge (16 October 1862 – 14 March 1925) was a British medical doctor, known for her pioneering work with alcoholism and championing the importance of preventative medical care. She is credited as being the second woman doctor in Birmingham and was President of the Medical Women's Federation from 1920 to 1922.

Biography Sturge was born in Yardley, Birmingham, on 16 October 1862. Her parents were Sara and Wilson Sturge. She was known as Maida in her family where she was the eldest of ten children in prominent Quaker family in the city. Her grandfather, Charles Sturge, was mayor of Birmingham when she was born. In 1877, Sturge was in the opening class at Edgbaston High School for Girls, the first secondary school for girls in Birmingham. She was educated at the new Mason Science College, the forerunner of Birmingham University, when it opened in 1880, where she was one of the first four women students. She left to study medicine in 1886 at London University, which had opened to women in 1878. She qualified as a doctor at the London School of Medicine for Women in 1891. Sturge returned to Birmingham in 1895 to take up general practice. In 1896, she began work in anaesthetics at the Birmingham and Midland Hospital for Women. Established in 1871, the hospital was unusual in that constitutionally 50 per cent its committee of management was female. She cared for her aunt, women's rights activist Eliza Sturge, who died at her house in 1905. Sturge inherited her aunt's entire estate. Sturge became acting honorary surgeon in 1905. She worked at the hospital until 1924, when she retired but remained a consulting surgeon. In 1908, Sturge published, with Sir Victor Horsley and Sir Arthur Newsholme, Alcohol and the Human Body. The book became a popular reference book on alcoholism, selling 85,000 copies in Britain and the USA. Sturge was an active member of the Birmingham Society for Women's Suffrage. While president of the Medical Women's Federation from 1920 to 1922 she campaigned for equal pay and the removal of the marriage bar for women in medicine. She died in Birmingham on 14 March 1925, having suffered from Bell's palsy.

References

External links Alcohol and the human body (1908) at the Internet Archive

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Mary Sturge

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Mary Sturge claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Mary Sturge before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Mary Sturge ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Mary Sturge

In research: Mary Sturge appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Mary Sturge in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Mary Sturge is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1865 births, 1925 deaths, 19th-century British medical doctors, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Mary Sturge outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Mary Sturge in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Mary Sturge means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Mary Sturge out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Mary Sturge in simple terms?

Why does Mary Sturge matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Mary Sturge?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Mary Sturge.