San Francisco was a forgotten patch of land settled by a few Spanish missionaries until the Gold Rush blew up its population. Among the new entrants to the city were several doctors, including Hugh Toland, who after a few weeks of rather unsuccessful mining took upon himself to establish a viable medical school in the state. It was not the first med school in the state: The University of the Pacific already had a medical department already in place, but it fell into disarray after the death of its founder. When Toland and his partners began their medical school in earnest, their first students came from the defunct Cooper College medical department at The University of the Pacific.

On this day, February 20, in 1873, the Medical Department of the University of California opened, a merger between the Toland Medical College and the two year-old  University of California. Twenty-seven students were enrolled in the first class — including a few women.

The UC medical school stated it clearly in an early resolution: “young women offering themselves for admission and passing the required examination must be received to all the privileges of the Medical Department.” Just two  years later, the first woman to graduate from a West Coast medical institution received her diploma from the school. Following UC’s steps, the universities of Oregon, Stanford and Southern California began efforts to attract women to their own medical departments. Notably, these were all female-only programs; the University of Michigan was the first to offer a co-ed medical school curriculum.