386-761-1821
Dr. Mary Josie Rogers, M.D. was born in 1876 to David Dunham Rogers and Julia Davis Rogers. David Rogers was one of the earliest settlers and one of the founders of Daytona Beach in 1878. He was a member of the first city council. He was a civil engineer and worked on surveying Florida and worked to map the land for over 40 years. He also built the first paved road to cross the Halifax River in 1884, and designed the Main Street Bridge in 1888.
Dr. Mary Josie Rogers, more commonly Doctor Josie, lived in Daytona her entire life, except for her time in Chicago getting her medical degree in 1907. She practiced medicine for 50 years. As a child, she went to a private school in Daytona from 1889-1891, and in 1893, she attended Ocala High School where there was only one other student. She graduated from Alfred University in New York in 1899, and attained her medical degree from Hahnemann Medical School in Chicago. She practiced in her house in Daytona, and had a separate waiting room built on the back of her house for Black patients.
Dr. Rogers was very instrumental in either fostering or actually starting many civic and fraternal organizations in Daytona, including The Palmetto Club, which grew out of a book club she and other women belonged to. Statewide, in 1912, she was the first woman to be named chairperson of the Florida Department of Health. Dr. Rogers was a suffragette working for women’s rights, and also started health exams for Volusia County children in schools in 1919. Finally, she spearheaded the effort to place nurses in all schools throughout the county. In 1921, Rogers started the first Negro Welfare Association, which later became the Daytona Beach Board of Public Welfare. In 1922, after only two years that women were allowed to vote, she was elected mayor of Daytona Beach.
By all accounts, she was the first woman to be elected mayor of a city in Florida. In 1923, she organized the first Recreation Board in Daytona.
In 1925, Rogers took a trip around the world, stopping in Geneva, Switzerland where she attended the first International Conference on Child Welfare. She also helped organize the Daytona’s YMCA, and Daytona’s League of Women Voters. Throughout the years of her civic service, she was a Daytona Beach commissioner, director of the Halifax Historical Society and Chief of Staff at Halifax Hospital.
Roger’s siblings also were successful. Her sister, Mabel, was a college professor. A brother, Clarence, was also an engineer; and another brother, Walter, was a land developer.
Dr. Rogers never married. If she was asked about marriage, her comment was often, “I haven’t; so far I’ve escaped!”
Dr. Josie Rogers lived to the age of 98 years old and died in the year 1975, passing away in 1975.
