Lydia Sesemann’s family came from Germany when her great-grandfather moved from Lubeck to Vyborg and established himself as a merchant. He rose quickly to be the jury man of the city. Sesemann family continued as dealers or wholesalers and married into other German-born and German-speaking merchant families of the city. Lydias father Michael Sesemann Sesemann Carl was a merchant, who was a shareholder in the wood shop Rosenius & Sesemann, and also acted as the Danish Consul. His first marriage to Maria Charlotta Jænisch brought three daughters and three sons. After her death, he married Antonie Williams. Her parents were German-born Karl Williams (1777-1847), who was at that time Director of Rokkalan glassworks director, and Christine Holtz. Four daughters and three sons were born and Lydia, who was born in 1845, was the second oldest of these children.

Lydia probably studied in German private schools and may also have received home schooling like children of other wealthy families of that time. After her father’s death, her mother moved to his daughters, Lydia and Mary Helene Christina to Stuttgart, Germany. While living in Germany, she tried to continue with her studies at university and took private lessons in mathematics and Latin. The University of Zurich began to accept women as students in the 1860s. Women students in particular, came from Russia. Lydia was one of the female students who applied and studied chemistry at the Faculty of Philosophy. When she started her studies, there were fourteen women enrolled at the University, nine of whom came from Russia. Later when Russia insisted that only those studying in Russia could work in government posts, many Russian women students moved to Russia and only Lydia and five others remained in Zurich.

In the spring of 1874 Lydia defended organic chemistry thesis and received her Ph.D. Lydia Sesemann was the first Finnish woman to complete a doctorate, but as this took place in a university abroad, little attention was given to the fact at the time. The newspaper Finlands Allmänna Tidning mentioned it briefly and Suomenlehti in Viipuri wrote: "Miss Sesemann from our town has taken the doctoral degree in the natural and mathematical sciences at the University of Zürich in the land of Switzerland."

Apart from medical career, scientifically educated women did not have many opportunities except to work as a researcher. Of Lydia Sesemann´s later life, not much is known, except that she moved to Switzerland and resided Zurich with her mother and then Munich, where her mother died in 1896. Lydia later lived with her sister Helene in Munich and then with her other brothers and sisters in Lausanne. Though she wanted to travel to Finland and Helene to Holland, it is however know that both traveled to Munich, where they lived at the end of their lives. Lydia Sesemann died in Munichin 1925 when she was 80 years and Helene Sesemann died when 67 years old in 1928.

Author: SABINA TAGORE IMMANUEL