Born Susan Maria Smith in Brooklyn's Weeksville community, the seventh of ten children of prosperous, multi-racial parents, she paid her way through medical school with wages earned as a teacher. In 1870, just five years after the Thirteenth Amendment, she graduated valedictorian from the New York Medical College for Women — becoming the first African American woman physician in New York State and only the third in the entire country.
McKinney Steward ran a thriving Brooklyn practice from 1870 to 1895, specialising in homeopathic treatment for women and children, and co-founded what became the Memorial Hospital for Women and Children. She remained active in medical societies, suffrage and abolitionist circles throughout her career, later serving as resident physician at Wilberforce University in Ohio. W. E. B. Du Bois delivered her eulogy at her funeral in 1918.
She acted upon her own judgment, and when she had made up her mind that a thing was right and ought to be done, she did it.
A Brooklyn junior high school was renamed in her honour in 1975 at her grandson's urging, and the Susan Smith McKinney Steward Medical Society continues to support Black women physicians across New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.
- 1847Born Susan Maria Smith in Brooklyn's Weeksville community.
- 1867Enters the New York Medical College for Women.
- 1870Graduates valedictorian — first Black woman physician in New York State.
- 1870–1895Runs a private practice in Brooklyn and Manhattan.
- 1898Joins Wilberforce University, Ohio, as resident physician and faculty member.
- 1918Dies in Wilberforce, Ohio; eulogised by W. E. B. Du Bois.
- ★ First African American woman physician in New York State
- ★ Third African American woman physician in the United States
- ★ Co-founder of the Women's Hospital and Dispensary, Brooklyn
- ★ Faculty member and resident physician, Wilberforce University