Mary Jane Blair was born August 8, 1837 in Barker, Broome County, New York, the daughter of Asa Edson Blair and Caroline Pease. Her mother had enjoyed brief fame as a poet under the pen name Waif Woodland. She was one of seven children. She continued her studies while working as a teacher in the public schools. At one time she worked as a teacher for her uncle Lewis Pease. In 1860 Blair married Lucius Wilbur Moody, a school administrator. The couple moved to Buffalo where Lucius entered the insurance business, and eventually they had seven children. During her marriage she continued her studies, attending Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania but illness and the needs of her family prevented completion of her degree. In 1874 Moody became the first woman medical student at Buffalo Medical College. She encountered some resistance from the faculty, though generally they "treated her well". One faculty member told her, “No lady will wish to study medicine". Despite that, she received her MD in 1876 and graduated with honors. She was the first woman to receive a medical degree from that institution. A terrace at the Joseph P. Ellicott complex at the school is now named in her honor.
Career
Moody practiced medicine for about nine years in Buffalo, New York. While there she lectured at the Women's Gymnasium. In 1882 she founded the Women's and Children's Dispensary in Buffalo and served as its senior physician. She was also very interested in reviewing and editing. She wrote book reviews for Buffalo Medical and Surgical Journal and was editor of the Bulletin of the Buffalo Naturalist Field Club. in New Haven where Moody practiced medicine from 1890 through 1903 Moody and her family moved to New Haven, Connecticut in 1886 where her husband ran the state office for the Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company. Moody quickly established herself as one of just a few women physicians in the city. Moody was a member of the Connecticut Medical Society and the National Medical Association, and in 1894 she became the first woman member of the American Association of Anatomists. Moody's interest in science extended beyond medicine to fields such as botany. She maintained memberships in the American Microscopical Association and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She discovered a species of orchid in the U.S. called Epipactis latifolia previously only thought to be found in the United Kingdom. She was made a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science for her work.
After her husband's death in January 1903, Moody moved to Pasadena, California, to live near two of her sons, one of whom had married Agnes Claypole Moody. Another of Moody's sons, Arthur, was the father of journalist and United States Senator Blair Moody, and another Charles Amadon Moody was the editor of Out West. She later returned to New Haven to live with her daughter, Mary Grace Moody. Moody died in New Haven on August 18, 1919 at age 82 and was buried at Spring Forest Cemetery in Broome County, New York near where she was born. Her long-time home in New Haven has been preserved as the Dr. Mary B. Moody House and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2017.
