Rebecca was born free (not into slavery) in Delaware in about 1833 to Absolum and Matilda Davis. She was raised by an aunt in Pennsylvania who had a profound effect on Rebecca. The aunt was the person in the community to whom everyone came for medical assistance, and as a result of watching her aunt, Rebecca wrote that when she began work she knew it had to be in a field where she could “relieve the sufferings of others.”

Rebecca moved to Charlestown, Massachusetts where she became a nurse (1852-1860); there were no schools of nursing at that time, so she learned on the job. She impressed the doctors with whom she worked, and they submitted letters recommending that she be admitted to the New England Female Medical College. Her acceptance at the college was highly unusual as there were few medical schools and most did not admit African Americans.

She started classes in 1860 but her studies were interrupted by the Civil War so she did not graduate until 1864. When she did, she became the first African American woman in the United States to earn a medical degree, and the only African American woman to ever graduate from the New England Female Medical College.

Rebecca began a medical practice in Boston, but when the war ended in 1865, she moved to Richmond, Virginia to help the freed slaves who otherwise would have had no access to medical care. She noted that it would be “a proper field for real missionary work,” and it was; racism was widespread.
In 1869, she and her husband (she married Dr. Arthur Crumpler) returned to Boston and established a practice in Boston at 67 Joy Street on Beacon Hill, which was a mostly black neighborhood. Rebecca specialized in caring for women and children. By 1880 the Crumplers had moved to Hyde Park, Massachusetts, and she began work on her book which was based on journals she kept during her years of active practice. In 1883 Book of Medical Discourses was published; the book was written for women to provide them with information to understand how to care for the health of their families.

Dr. Rebecca Davis Lee Crumpler died in 1895 in Fairview, Massachusetts.

No photos or other images of Dr. Crumpler survive from her lifetime. The little we know about her comes from the introduction to her book. Though her story was not known for many years, today she is recognized for her groundbreaking achievements. In 1989 two women physicians founded the Rebecca Lee Society, an organization which supports and promotes black women physicians. Today there is an Association of Black Women Physicians, and a scholarship is still given in the name of Rebecca Lee.

 

• The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

• Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.

• A right delayed is a right denied.

• All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.

• Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable… Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.

• All progress is precarious, and the solution of one problem brings us face to face with another problem.

King was assassinated in Memphis in 1968 when he was in town to appear at an event being held in support of striking garbage workers.

The more I explore our American stories, the more I find men and women who have been forgotten. To this end, I will be celebrating both Black History Month (February) and Women’s History Month (March) by sending out three to four mailings per week with short reports on people or accomplishments that shouldn’t be forgotten. To be added to these regular mailings, please enter your email on the form to the right of the column. Check off the list that interests you.

 

In checking into the background of it, I was surprised to learn that Friday itself has long been viewed as an unlucky day.  In today’s culture, I think most of us like Friday because we are anticipating the pleasure of a weekend. That seems to be a more modern phenomenon that must have arrived when unions began to insist on the concept of the weekend or equivalent.

Friday is thought to have gotten a bad rap because Friday was the day that Jesus was crucified. Long after that, The Canterbury Tales put forth the idea that a Friday was a bad day to begin a journey.

Fear of 13

Experts say that the dread of 13 is rooted in ancient history, with no one story where we can proclaim, “this is the beginning.”  Ancient Greeks and Romans practiced numerology, and they considered 13 to be a number signaling destruction.  Witches’ covens were believed to involve 13 members.  Norse mythology tells of 12 gods having dinner together when a 13^th uninvited god appeared and played a trick on them all.

Ancient Vikings considered the number 13 unlucky and their hangman’s noose always has 13 knots.  There are also13 steps to the gallows.  Thirteen people attended the Last Supper; the 13^th guest was Judas who betrayed Jesus.

As we move forward in time, I have read about how throughout the 19^th century, ship captains preferred not to start journeys on Fridays, and definitely not on Friday the 13^th.

Lloyds of London refused to insure any ship that was set to sail on a Friday the 13^th.

Even today many people try to avoid traveling on this day.

There are also often rumors of computer virus threats that are to unleash on Friday the 13^th.

Culture Reinforces It

This whole belief system of avoiding “13” is buffered by many business and cultural practices.   Otis Elevator Company reports that about 90 percent of high-rise buildings do not have a 13th floor.

Hospitals, hotels and office complexes tend to avoid giving a room a number of 13.

Universal Studios in Los Angeles has no studio 13.

Airlines and sports arenas usually omit the number 13 for seat numbers.  Some places avoid the gate number too.

Amazingly, all these efforts at avoidance add up to serious business loss.  The North Carolina Stress Management Center and Phobia Institute estimates that between 800 and 900 million dollars are lost in the U.S. economy because of travelers deciding to stay home or shoppers opting not to go out and spend money.

But You Can Protect Yourself

But there are some things you can do to avoid having bad luck on Friday the 13^th:

• Walk around your house 13 times on Friday the 13th.
• Hang your shoes outside on Friday the 13^th.
• For the three Friday nights preceding a Friday the 13^th, sleep with a mirror under your pillow. On Friday the 13^th you will dream of your true love.
• Walk around the block with your mouth full of water. (Don’t swallow!) This will make you safe for Friday the 13^th.

And with that in mind, there are some people who just went right along with what they were doing, and it was a good thing for us.  Here are just a few of them:

George Washington laid the cornerstone for the White House on October 13, 1792; the cornerstone for the Supreme Court was laid on the same date in 1932.

Francis Scott Key wrote “The Star Spangled Banner” on September 13, 1814.

Igor Sikorsky successfully tested his new invention, the helicopter, on Friday September 13, 1939.

It may be too late in the day to take protective measures for today so here’s a heads up on the next Friday the 13^th to worry about: April!

 

I hope you had a great Thanksgiving weekend and thank you for spending a little of your time with me at America Comes Alive!

 

This morning I was preparing for my “transportation” class at UCLA’s Osher Institute when I came upon the fact that Garrett Morgan (1877-1963) was given the first patent on a three-signal traffic light, and he was the son of two former slaves. Wow. Reading about the invention had already sent me looking for more information but the “son of two former slaves” sent me over the top with excitement as a black businessman navigating through the world of business in the early 20th century is a great story.

I’ll give you a peek at some of what I learned. Garrett Morgan was born in Kentucky and went on to a successful career in business. He ran several businesses in Cleveland, Ohio. In 1920 he became a newspaperman, and the Cleveland Call became one of the best-known black papers of its day.

Car ownership was far from commonplace in the 1920s but Morgan owned a car so he was aware of the safety issues involved in driving. In that day there were few rules of the road, resulting in many accidents. Morgan came up with the concept of a three-way signal: red for stop, green for go, and an all-ways stop to give pedestrians a safe opportunity to cross. Wonderful.

If you’d like to read more stories about early roads and driving, check out “In the Days of Crank and Sputter.”

Morgan also invented several other items, and I’ll write more about him in February when we celebrate Black History Month.

Tomorrow I’ll begin sharing stories of Thanksgiving.

 

I’ve been working on my notes for a class I’m teaching at the Osher Institute at UCLA starting on Tuesday so I have been re-reading some of the posts I have written in the past.  Today I thought I would direct you to one that I wrote about the beginning of the Weather Service.  There were many steps involved in getting us where we are today!  “How the U.S. Weather Service Began.“

 

The photographs are drawn from the collection of Grolier member and art dealer Robert Dance, as curated by Anne H. Hoy. They are being shown together for the first time.

Before Paparazzi

The story revealed by the exhibit is of a time before there were paparazzi. From the 1920s through the 1950s, movie studios molded the images and the careers of their stars. Before an actor or actress was sent for a screen test, they were hustled over to the portrait studio to see if they could be photographed in such a way that the studio could promote them. Because these portrait studio photographs were so important, so, too, were those who took the pictures.

Portrait shots were the specialty of the studio photographers. These were distributed to the press and welcomed eagerly by the fan clubs that were very important in building a star’s career in that day. Smaller forms of these photographs were what were sent out to individuals who wrote the studios for signed photographs.

Each studio maintained their own photographers, and the photographers themselves eventually established particular bonds with certain stars who believed that one photographer or another made them look their best and most glamorous.

The photographers were also on call throughout the shooting of “their star’s” movies. They would be summoned to the set to document continuity or to take a photograph of the star in her costume within the movie set. Those pictures, too, could be used for publicity.

Robert Dance, a New York City art dealer specializing in old masters paintings, first fell in love with these Hollywood photographs in the early 1980s. “I found the first ones at a shop on 57th Street,” he says. “At that time, few people collected photographs so they could be purchased for very reasonable prices.”

Over time, Dance actively pursued this avocation, and by now has amassed a notable collection. Some of his other photographs are on display elsewhere: Glamour of the Gods: Hollywood Portraits at the National Portrait Gallery in London.

At the Grolier

Silver Screen/Silver Prints presents Hollywood’s invention of the glamour portrait. The exhibition is divided into ten parts, each dedicated to a single photographer, star, or theme. Among the stars depicted are Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, Roman Novarro, Robert Montgomery, and the last star of the studio era, Elizabeth Taylor.

The photographers include a few independent photographers as well as those who worked full-time for the studios, including George Hurrell, Clarence Sinclair Bull, and Ruth Harriet Louise (born Ruth Goldstein), the first female to be employed as a studio photographer. Louise was only 22 when she was hired for the job and had to have a chaperoned place to live before moving from New York to L.A. She quickly established an ability to bring out the best in the stars, and was the particular favorite of Garbo when Garbo fist arrived at MGM. (Robert Dance has co-authored a book about the photographer: Ruth Harriet Louise and Hollywood Glamour Photography.)

The photographs exhibited are all original silver prints, mostly 11 x 14 inches, and printed by or under the supervision of the photographer. These first-generation photographs provide exhibit visitors with a particular sense of the rich tonalities and the dramatic settings of the photographs.

Cultural Changes Change Photography

The year 1960 was a demarcation point for change in American culture, and this began to be felt in the movie business. As stars exerted more control over their careers, studios could no longer control actors’ images, nor was it profitable to do so as actors became free agents. The drop in publicity materials and the new freedom within society in general, also led to a change in what the public wanted.

“The public became more excited about a candid photograph of Elizabeth Taylor stepping out of a Rolls Royce than they were about a retouched portrait photograph of her,” says Dance. And with this shift, freelance photographers soon found they could make big money by capturing Hollywood stars and other notables going about their daily lives.

The term for these photographers, “paparazzi” was first used by Time magazine in 1961, describing a throng of reporters surrounding a car of a princess visiting Rome. The term itself came from Federico Fellini’s 1960 film, La Dolce Vita where a character plays the part of a photographer and is named Paparazzo. “Paparazzo” itself is an Italian dialect word describing the annoyance of a buzzing mosquito.

It was the end of an era: “The movies may have made the stars, but still photographs made them icons.”

Silver Screen/Silver Prints will be on view at the Grolier Club, 47 East 60th Street, New York, from Sept. 14-Nov. 12, 2011, with the exception of October 10, when the Club is closed. The exhibit will be open to the public free of charge, Monday-Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Additional information and directions are available at www.grolierclub.org.

 

Anyone in the military knows that the mode of transport and the types of firepower available to each soldier are important, but ultimately, the most important equipment provided is the “back-up plan.”  What happens in an emergency?

During World War II the U.S. aviators and the Royal Air Force servicemen had available to them a vital piece of American-made equipment for emergencies that had only been in use for a few years: an inflatable (Mae West) life preserver, courtesy of a man named Peter Markus (1885-1973). Markus developed his invention in the 1920s and received a patent on it in 1928; in 1930 and 1931 he patented some minor changes to the vest.

Markus came up with the invention when he was living in Minnesota.  He was a merchant in the area who loved to boat and fish, and he was attuned to the fact that boaters and fishermen sometimes went overboard and drowned because they refused to wear the life vests in use at that time.  The vests were cork-filled and bulky; sportsmen didn’t like to wear them because they hindered arm movement.

Looking for an Answer

Markus started experimenting to find an acceptable alternative.  He eventually created a device that was patterned after a man’s vest.  The rubberized cloth was made with air pockets; when deflated it weighed under two pounds.  It was designed to slip over a person’s head and straps were sewn onto the front panels and could be secured behind.

To inflate the vest, two cords with knots on the ends were connected to small cartridges of fluid carbon dioxide.  When the wearer needs to inflate the vest, he or she pulled the cords which triggered the carbon dioxide and caused gas to instantly fill up the vest’s air pockets.

Because the front air pockets filled quite completely, the wearer than had the look of a buxom woman. The World War II men who wore these began to call them the Mae West. (In the 1970s some thought the term should be updated, and they called the vest the Dolly Parton.)

Shortly after perfecting the invention, Peter Markus began marketing the device at sports equipment shows. At one he was attending, a Navy captain saw him demonstrating the life vest and  realized the value the preserver could have to the military.  Markus was invited to come to Washington to demonstrate the device.

Government Puts Vest to Use

The life vest was accepted quickly and the U.S. government began purchasing them, asking for only one change–that of color.  One of the people at the early meetings with Markus noted that a bright yellow-gold color would be more practical if a plane or ship was lost and rescue teams were searching for the crew.

The first demonstration of the value of the vest came shortly after the Navy began purchasing them.  A Hawaiian aviator was flying just off the shore of Honolulu when the plane stalled; both the pilot and passenger were forced to jump before the plane crashed.  Only the pilot was wearing a life vest; only the pilot was saved. That was a powerful message and the vests soon became regulation equipment for Navy fliers; soon more branches of the service began using them.

The vests soon made headlines.  In 1935, the dirigible, the “Macon,” went down in the Pacific, 98 of the craft’s crew of 100 were saved.  Those who died had gotten trapped under the wreckage.  Shortly thereafter Markus began receiving letters from appreciative airmen.

In Laura Hillenbrand’s recent book, Unbroken, the story of Louis Zamperini, an airman in the Pacific during World War II, the Mae West vest is noted for its value to the aviators. According to the author, the only times the vests failed the men was when some of them had tampered with the carbon dioxide cartridges, occasionally removing them to carbonate their drinks. Any soldier will say that wars are terrifying—and boring. Clearly, this is one of the things they did during the boring parts, unfortunately.

Still Saving Lives

Before World War II, the life vest was a profit-making venture for the rubber companies to which Markus had licensed the rights to make the vests, and Markus earned royalties on the units sold and did quite nicely with his invention.

During the war, Congress passed an “Excess Profits” tax on earnings from sales to the military during wartime, and in support of the government, Markus cancelled his patent rights for war time and the future. From that date forward, the vests were available to the government royalty-free.  According to the inventor’s son, Alvin A. Markus, his father “was happy his ingenuity contributed to saving lives.”

Today the military still uses a form of this life vest, and the basic model provided for all commercial airline travelers is based on this “Mae West” model.

In 2005 an inventor named Andrew Toti died, and newspaper obituaries credited him with the invention of the inflatable life preserver.  Alvin A. Markus provided documents to the newspapers and news magazines proving that his father was the inventor and the first patent holder (by many years) for the inflatable life vest. Newspapers ran corrections on their stories, and it was finally determined that Toti held no patent at all on any life vest, though he had added a crotch strap to Markus’ invention, which provided a means of securing the vest so that the chest panels did not bob up.

This story comes to us courtesy of one of our readers.  Alvin Markus, now a retired engineer living in Los Angeles with his wife Hilda, brought the story to my attention as he thought it was a good fit for America Comes Alive.  He was right; the story is perfect because I treasure the opportunity to highlight Americans who have made a difference.

Do any of you have stories about yourself or your families that deserve to be part of the American story?  If so, please contact me: kate@americacomesalive.com

 

From February 2002 to February of 2003, Sergel put into operation a plan that was intended to capture as many voices as possible. She wanted to preserve the people’s experiences before outsiders began to affect the retelling, while the emotions were raw and the manner of expressing the feelings still required great thought.

After creating a video recording booth that could be moved to various locations, Sergel started collecting the stories of New Yorkers. First the booth was placed in midtown, before being moved to Prince Street; stories were also collected on Staten Island.

For the experiences of those who witnessed the downing of Flight 93 and the crash at the Pentagon, the booth was placed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania followed by two locations in Washington, D.C.

From the moment those with experiences to share arrived at the video recording booth, they were given complete control over their experience. There were no restrictions on time or content, and they were alone inside the video recording booth where they could start and stop their own recording.

All together, 550 personal testimonials about the tragedy were collected.

The Importance of the Stories
To those who were nearby any of the locations, the events of 9/11 aren’t — and weren’t — a news story. They were a personal nightmare.

“We tell our stories again and again to shape them into something it is possible to live with,” says Sergel. “It is a forceful way to push back, by owning and validating our own truth outside the expectation of others.”

Up until the last few weeks, these stories were not publicly available, but Sergel has been working hard to get the stories online. (Funding for this project is still needed.) She found a perfect home for the Voices of 9/11 at hereisnewyork.org, a site that was created in the immediate weeks after 9/11/01 as a way to collect and share the countless photographs that were taken by amateurs of all ages (including kids) as well as professionals.

Michael Shulan, one of the site organizers, writes compellingly about the fact that no single image is more important than any other: “They [the photographs] speak not with one voice, but with one purpose, saying that to make sense of this terrifying new phase in our history we must break down the barriers that divide us.”

Later, Shulan continues: “…it is this principle, after all, which America’s Founding Fathers advanced when they developed the notion of democracy — that wisdom lies not in the vision and will of any one individual, or small group of individuals, but in the collective vision of us all.”

Voices of 9.11 is jointly held by The September 11 Digital Archive and the New-York Historical Society (where a “Remembering 9/11″ exhibit has just opened). The September 11 Digital Archive has initiated a long term plan to donate its entire collection, including Here is New York and Voices of 9/11, to the Library of Congress for permanent preservation.

These organizers had the foresight to provide a way for people tell their own story verbally and through pictures — to preserve the memories for those who weren’t there or are too young to remember.

Visit the site and look at the pictures.

Visit the site and listen to the people.

9/11 is the people’s story.

It is our story, too, and we can never forget it.

Ruth Sergel is also the activist who created “Chalk” in 2004, as a way of commemorating the Triangle fire tragedy annually by gathering volunteers to write the victims’ names and ages in chalk outside the buildings where they once lived. Out of this project grew a nationwide and ongoing coalition, Remember the Triangle Fire Coalition.

 

For Sarah, who uses a wheelchair due to spina bifida, the arrival of her first dog Jules was life-changing. For the first time, Sarah could fully manage her life on her own. Her work life was great; she has worked at Channel 13 (WTHR), the NBC affiliate television station in Indianapolis for the past 13 years. What she needed was a little help with some of the day-to-day things the rest of us take for granted. The arrival of Jules in her life made independent living so much easier.

Like other service dogs, Jules (and now Sarah’s current dog, Hepburn) are trained to respond to many commands—some learn as may as 89 different tasks, but the actual work each dog performs varies depending on each owner’s circumstances. While some service dogs are needed for things like turning on lights, opening doors, and throwing things away, the task Sarah most appreciates from her dog is the fact that Jules–now Hepburn–can pick things up.

“When I drop something, Hepburn will pick it up for me right away…”

The task is simple, yet its effect on Sarah’s life is enormous. Imagine dropping something you are using–anything from a wash cloth to a fork or a pencil–and think of the frustration you would feel if you had no possible way to pick it up until the next time someone stopped by your house.

Sarah has a car with hand controls, so she can drive herself to her job at WTHR where she is currently a log editor in the traffic department. She can also do her own shopping and her own errands, but for all of these daily tasks, Hepburn makes life so much easier.
Hepburn goes to work with Sarah to help with anything that comes up during the day, and one of her morning tasks is carrying Sarah’s lunch bag to the car. (That alone is impressive…my dogs would eat it on the way to the car!) When it comes to shopping and errands, Hepburn helps ease the way, and also carries small packages back to the car.

The picture above shows Jules (on the right), Sarah Walker’s first service dog, next to Hepburn, the dog Sarah received when Jules was too old to continue working. (Jules stayed on as a pet even after his retirement, though he passed away this summer.)

The Story Behind Service Dogs
The first use of a service dog in the U.S. dates to 1928 when Morris Frank, who was blind, brought the first Seeing Eye dog to this country and helped gain acceptance of a service animal in public places.

Americans with other types of impairments did not have a “service animal option” until almost fifty years later. Dr. Bonita Bergin, Ed.D was working in Asia and noted that people there used donkeys and other animals to help those who had mobility difficulties. When Bergin returned to the U.S. she was determined to develop this type of program, and in 1975 she founded Canine Companions for Independence, the first service dog training program in the United States. In 1976 the first graduate of the program was placed with a woman who was quadriplegic.

Canine Companions for Independence is based in Santa Rosa, California, and has grown steadily over the years; CCI now has several different training locations. The four basic types of training performed are for preparing dogs to assist individuals with mobility issues; training dogs to help people who have multiple disabilities; teaching dogs to alert the hearing-impaired to information they need to know. In addition, CCI trains dogs to work with staff and patients in various types of convalescent facilities.

Animals are assigned based on need and the program and the animals are funded by donation.

More Progress Needed
Like Sarah Walker, other people had experienced a long wait for their first animal (once you have qualified for an animal, the replacement process is much more rapid.) Dr. Bergin felt her next step was figuring out a way to increase the number of animals trained so that people who needed them could get them without such a long wait.

In 1991, Dr. Bonita Bergin left CCI and founded the Assistance Dog Institute, also based in Santa Rosa. By early 2004, what is now known as Bergin University of Canine Studies received official designation as a university and now can award associate’s degrees, bachelor’s degrees and master’s degrees, all in canine studies.

Within this university setting and its special research programs, Bergin also wanted to more fully explore the canine-human partnership. She hopes to blaze new trails in the way that dogs can help humans and how human knowledge can be enhanced by better understanding of the dog-and-people bond. She has also implemented a program called “Helping Dogs Help People,” and she has developed a High School Assistance Dog Program for at-risk teens.

Bergin is also committed to the fact that dogs can learn to take commands by “reading.” She is pioneering a program where dogs learn to recognize and obey the motions displayed by stick figure illustrations that are shown to them.

Since Bergin first began her program, she and other similar organizations are working to expand the role of dogs and the types of assistance work that they can do. Some dogs are now being trained to be alert to an owner’s seizures or migraines so that help can be at hand more rapidly; dogs are also helping people who have autism, Alzheimer’s, and post-traumatic stress syndrome.

And as a special bonus, many programs are working with their dogs on “snuggle.” At the end of a long day, how nice that would be?