After a family conflict Edith and Katharine were permitted to engage in higher education and both applied to Bryn Mawr College.

During the first half of the 20th century social issues involving public health, such as prostitution, could contribute to prejudice towards unwed mothers.

[7] Through her research Hooker learned that prostitution had been connected to some types of illness, disease and death which she wrote about in an article written for the Journal of Social Hygiene in 1919.

[8] Hooker's work in Berlin led to her determination that men and women should be held equally responsible in the societal issue of prostitution.

[9] Edith and Donald Hooker established the Guild of St. George of Baltimore, which provided housing and services for unwed mothers and their children.

[8] Hooker and other suffragists working in the public health field knew that strategically there would be a struggle because of the entrenched double standard that permeated society.

[8] Similar public health and societal issues worldwide led Hooker and other suffragists to study the benefits of women's right to vote.

[10] Hooker determined that the most efficient way to achieve reform was to campaign for the right of women to vote by joining the suffrage movement in Baltimore.