Obituary of Eleanor A. Woodbury

Eleanor A. Woodbury, MD, well-known physician and longtime Rochester resident, passed away peacefully on July 19, 2015, at the age of 95. Dr. Woodbury came to upstate New York in 1942, to attend medical school at the University of Rochester, and lived in the Rochester area for the remainder of her life. She practiced medicine from 1946 to 1985, first as a Resident and Sr. Attending Physician at Strong Memorial Hospital, then in private practice. Since 2011 she was cared for at The Friendly Home. Dr. Woodbury is survived by her son Jonathan, and was preceded in death by two other sons, Alden (dec. 1955) and Douglas (dec. 1968). Her husband, William Woodbury, a physicist associated with the Research Lab at Kodak, died in 1968; he was a decorated veteran of World War Two who served as an officer with the United States Army in Europe. Dr. Woodbury was born Eleanor May Atkinson, at Tilton, New Hampshire in 1920, the fourth child of Bert and Mary Atkinson. Eleanor attended Tilton School, and graduated from Laconia High School in 1938; from 1938 to 1942 she was a student at the University of New Hampshire, at Durham, where she met her future husband. Upon graduation she moved to Rochester to attend medical school, one of only two women in her class. During these years Eleanor also worked at Kodak's Hawkeye division, performing metallurgical analysis of battleship steel and chemical analysis of the cutting oils and grinding compounds used for manufacturing lenses. Always an adventurer, she also volunteered as a subject in military research on hypothermia, which required her to stand atop a building on some of the coldest days of the Rochester winter, wearing only light clothing, as body temperature measurements were taken. In December, 1944, during her third year of medical school, Eleanor married William Woodbury at Boston, Massachusetts, following Lt. Woodbury's discharge from the Army. They resided near the University of Rochester campus until the late 1940s, when they moved to Irondequoit. During the years that followed, Dr. Woodbury built her medical practice, with offices on St. Paul Circle and then on Titus Avenue in Irondequoit. To a considerable degree her life story exemplified the rise of women in American society, and in medicine. Born into a rural home that lacked even a radio, she became the first female Chief Resident in Medicine at Strong Memorial Hospital, and was later board certified in Internal Medicine. She served as head of the pharmacy committee at Rochester General Hospital; she was also a member of the American Medical Association and the Monroe County Medical Society. Dr. Woodbury attended the United Church of Christ, in Irondequoit. She was also an avid gardener, a tennis player and cross-country skiing enthusiast, a world traveler, and a dedicated genealogist. She descended from a family that had emigrated from England to the American Colonies in the 1660s, and she devoted significant time and energy to uncovering and documenting the history of the Atkinson and Woodbury families. Throughout her life she visited and communicated with a vast network of family, friends, and professional associates. Eleanor A. Woodbury, MD will be interred at Webster Union Cemetery, in Webster, New York. Memorial contributions may be made to The Atkinson-Woodbury Scholarship Fund, c/o the University of New Hampshire Foundation, Elliott Alumni Center, 9 Edgewood Rd, Durham, NH 03824-1934.