Marie Louise Lefort (September 1874 – August 7, 1951) was an American physician who directed a medical unit in France during World War I.[1] From 1898 to 1902, Marie Louise Lefort was the first female district physician in Newark, New Jersey.[2]
Lefort was born in September 1874. In her twenties, she lived with her mother, Adeline Lefort, and a servant, Edward Muster.[3] She conducted her medical practice in New Jersey until 1918, when she aided World War I efforts by medically assisting soldiers in Reims, France. In 1919, she became Director of the American Memorial Hospital for the American Fund for the French Wounded.[4] Speaking both English and French fluently allowed her to communicate easily with the Americans and the French while working abroad.[5] Under the direction of Lefort, a medical gas unit reformed a damaged girls' boarding school into Jeanne d'Arc Hospital.[6]