Metta Lou Henderson: I have always, of course, had a very special interest in women in pharmacy and especially in trying to answer questions that people had about them. Over time I had done some research and written several articles and, after my retirement, was approached by the editors of Pharmaceutical Heritage Pharmaceutical Care through History Series. They wanted a book on women pharmacists and they believed I should be the one to write it. It was a lot of work, but I had a lot of fun learning even more about women in the history of pharmacy and what they had done. It was a nice crowning end to what has been my professional career.

If you had to choose one particular contribution women pharmacists have made to the profession, is there something that you could pick out as the greatest?

I think it is the fact that they have cared about patients and wanted to help patients and wanted to do their best for the patients. That was the first priority for them. That goes back to the 1800s and even earlier, as well as the 1900s and now the 21^st century.

What about women pharmacists appeals to you personally? Is it that you are a woman pharmacist or does it go beyond that?

It starts with the fact that I am a woman pharmacist. Further, I believe the time has come for everybody in pharmacy and even outside of pharmacy to know the wonderful contributions made by women to the profession and to health care.

In 1975, you published "Expectations of Female Pharmacy Students." What were those expectations in 1975 and how have they changed over the last 27 years?

I recently reread the article, which I hadn’t looked at in a long time. Basically, we were trying to find out at that time why women were beginning to enter pharmacy school in greater numbers. What we found out was that primarily they did it because they wanted to be involved in a health-related profession. They also saw the ability to work full-time or part-time, raise a family, combine marriage and family with their professional career, and have a good salary. If we look back to the 1970s, certainly pharmacy was one of the few professions in which women did extremely well from a financial standpoint. Has it changed? I am not really sure. I think it would be interesting if somebody would repeat the study. What I continue to pick up from women pharmacists today are again those same reasons: health-related profession and the ability to be able to manage marriage, family and career. The whole balance issue.

What attracted you to academia and do you have any advice for the pharmacists who may be considering this career path?

I really got into academia because I began teaching nursing students at the hospital, and then began to work with pharmacy students. Then Dick Ohvall, who was dean at Ferris State College at that time, said I should try academia, so I did. Because I had a master’s degree but not a PhD at that time, he encouraged me to go back. So I went back and got my PhD and then spent the rest of my career, from 1978 until I retired, at Ohio Northern.

Do you think it is important for women to pursue academia, particularly in pharmacy?

I think it is a good practice site for women. At this particular time, based on what I am hearing, we need both males and females in pharmacy education. You need to be able to work with the students and with the whole issue of influencing the profession. Influencing how pharmacy will be practiced is probably the prime reason you select academia.

Do you see any major advantages to pursuing an academic career?

You have been very involved in mentoring throughout your career. Do you have any advice for the young pharmacy professional who would like to find a mentor but doesn’t know about how to go about doing that?

I think, to a certain point, you try. It is almost a hunt system to try to find someone who will help you as you move through your career. You need different mentors at different times, different backgrounds of mentors. Pharmacy is such a small world; as you find that first mentor, pretty soon they introduce you to other people and your horizons begin to grow and expand.

What do you feel passionate about?

I think it varies from time to time, as I get involved in new things. I got very passionate about the book while I was writing it, then it was the conference in Tucson (The Emerging Majority: Contributions of Women Pharmacists Past, Present, and Future.) Now, I am ready to move on to other things.

Who has been the most influential person in your career?

Outside the profession of pharmacy, it is my father. I was part of a second family, so he was much older and yet was a man far beyond his time in terms of what society felt women should do. He encouraged me to spread my wings, to go into pharmacy when it wasn’t a profession with too many women in it. He was always encouraging me to do my best; there was only one way to do things and that was to do it right. Also, within pharmacy, I think I would have to say Gloria Niemeyer Francke has been a strong influence. I was fortunate to meet her many years ago and I was also fortunate that she took an interest in me. She has done so many tremendous things for pharmacy.

Can you tell us a little bit about who Gloria Francke is and why she was so significant to profession?

Gloria graduated from Purdue University in 1942 and became very involved in hospital pharmacy and soon became a staff member at the APHA headquarters. Later, she was the executive secretary of ASHP, which at that time was called the American Society of Hospital Pharmacists. Her husband was Don Francke, who was another very important person in hospital pharmacy. Gloria always has spoken well for pharmacy and for women in pharmacy. You can go just about anywhere in the world and, if you talk to somebody in pharmacy, they will ask you if you know Gloria. She has just spread her wings that wide. She has written extensively and has been such an influence on the profession. It is hard to summarize everything she has done.

What is the best advice you have ever received?

It would go back to when my dad told me, early on, that when you are going to undertake something, you do it and you do it well or you don’t do it at all. For the most part, that advice has worked well for me.

What has been the biggest challenge in your career and how did you get to the other side of it?

The biggest challenges would have been earlier on in my career when I was one of few women pharmacists around. I just had to blaze a trail and do it. I was very fortunate because many of the men I worked with were willing to go along with it and not say I couldn’t do it because I was a woman. But, at that time, women also had to do everything they did better. You had to prove that a woman could do it.

Would you say you experienced some stereotyping when you were a younger pharmacist?

I don’t know if it was exactly stereotyping as much as that there just weren’t many of us around. Many times when I was working, I probably was the first woman pharmacist many people had ever met. I got very good at saying, "Yes, I am the pharmacist."

Going back to your book, if you were to pick just one woman of interest who stands out, who is it and why?

There would be several, but if I had to pick only one, I would pick Zada Mary Cooper. She became a pharmacist in 1897 and immediately joined the faculty at the University of Iowa, where she remained a faculty member until 1942 when she retired. She was involved in the American Pharmaceutical Association, the American Conference of Pharmaceutical Faculty and the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy. She was responsible for founding the Kappa Epsilon Fraternity and she is one of the founders of The Rho Chi Society, the honor society. She was very influential in AACP, including serving as secretary from 1922 to 1942. She was a wonderful faculty member. She mentored many, many, many pharmacists and educators. When she retired, AACP created a category of honorary membership to give to her. She retired in 1942, which is when Gloria Francke graduated. If you put the two of them together, they’ve covered women in pharmacy since before 1900.

What else can you tell us about Zada Cooper?

She just did everything. She was the first one to begin to gather statistics on Colleges of Pharmacy. She wrote well over 40 articles in a time when women certainly didn’t publish and they are delightful to read. She very much believed that women should be pharmacists and she really pushed for that. She was an organist. She had some other interests. She never married, but they said that up until the time she died, she remembered every name of every student she had ever taught.

Do you have any parting insights to share with our readers?

A person who is a pharmacist is in a wonderful profession. There is no limit to what you can do; you just have to say this is what I am going to do and go do it.