In the early 19th century, the American medical field was almost exclusively a men’s club. However, a few resilient women refused to accept the status quo, stepping forward as pioneers to carve out a new path.

Today, that landscape is shifting dramatically. While men currently account for 61% of active physicians in the U.S., women now make up the majority of medical students and residents. We are standing on the brink of a major demographic shift.

Below are the stories of six unsung women who challenged the establishment and moved the field of medicine forward.

Women Medical Leaders: Lydia Pinkham

Lydia Estes Pinkham (1819-1883) was one of the first people to take women’s health issues seriously.  She opened a closed door on the health matters that are unique to women. To help friends and neighbors, she created a vegetable tonic that helped with “women’s ills.” The family decided to package the product, and her sons soon took to the road to help place the tonic in stores.

Up until this time, women had no resources for health advice. Because Pinkham’s product became so popular, women wrote her for advice. Her responses were mostly common sense (eat well, exercise, and avoid the tight, restrictive clothing that was popular in the 19^th century). Eventually some of the advice was collected in pamphlets.

Though the compound has evolved to meet modern FDA standards, Lydia Pinkham’s Compound (now owned by Numark Brands) can still be found online and in major drug stores.

Clara Barton

Clara Barton (1821-1912) is well-known as the “Angel of the Battlefield”for her work during the Civil War. Later she brought the Red Cross to the U.S. and formed the American Red Cross.

Barton is less well-known for running the Office of Missing Soldiers. During the Civil War, the military had no official identification system. Sometimes soldiers caried a note in their pocket or wallet. Other times, their buddies buried them with something saying who they were.

Clara Barton set up an office in Washington, D.C. that operated from 1865-1867. She received 63,000 letters from families whose loved ones were missing, and she or her staff answered them all. They also managed to identify 22,000 soldiers.

Dr. Rebecca Crumpler

Dr. Rebecca Crumpler (1831-1895) was a Black woman who worked as a nurse for several white doctors in Massachusetts in the 1860s. She was so well-regarded by the men that they recommended her for admission the New England Female Medical College; she became the first African American to be admitted.  

Once she became a physician, she cared for Black patients in the Massachusetts area at a time when white doctors refused to treat people of color. At the end of her career, she wrote a home health guide for women about everything from nursing a newborn to managing cuts and wounds.  For the first time, households had a reliable reference as to how to manage various health issues.

Dorothy Harrison Eustis

Dorothy Harrison Eustis (1886-1946) was a dog breeder who became interested in training guide dogs for the blind.  While she was not a medical professional, her service to humanity was important to the health of people with impaired vision.

Eustis trained the first seeing eye dog brought to this country (1928). She went on to dedicate the rest of her life to breeding and training guide dogs. She and Morris Frank, the fellow who received the first dog she trained, created the school, The Seeing Eye. The school still operates today and continues to train and place dogs.

Dr. Virginia Apgar

Dr. Virginia Apgar (1909-1974) hoped to be a surgeon but she graduated from medical school during the Depression when men were taking all the available jobs.  She went into the relatively new field of anesthesiology. This placed her in delivery rooms where she had the opportunity to observe what happened with mothers and babies shortly after birth.

Apgar was alarmed that babies were only cursorily evaluated before being sent off to the hospital nursery. To solve the problem, she developed a method for assessing newborn health.  She originally called it the Newborn Scoring System, and it greatly changed the mortality rate for infants. The system is still used today but it is now referred to as the Apgar Score.  She then went on to run the March of Dimes.

Dr. Antonia Novello

Dr. Antonia Novello (1944–  ) grew up in Puerto Rico and became a physician. She is the first Latino to ever serve as U.S. Surgeon General. Appointed by President George H.W. Bush in 1990, she made many contributions to public health, among them working to improve medical care for women and minorities. 

Dr. Novello also targeted underage drinking and smoking, which involved a focus on cigarette advertising.  The cartoon image of Joe Camel was a particular target that she felt made smoking attractive to the young.

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This information is based on my six-volume history of medicine as well as a speech I gave at Arizona State University for their Barrett Honors Program. If you’d like to see the full presentation given at ASU, click here:

Little-Known Women in Medicine Presentation with Kate Kelly.

The Upjohn Company was a major name in the pharmaceutical business for many years. Its founder, Dr. W.E. Upjohn, invented the dissolvable pill at a time when liquid and powder measurements were inexact. The “friable” pill was a huge step forward in medicine. For the first time, doctors could provide a patient with an accurately-dosed amount of medicine that would dissolve as it went through the body.

For more than 40 years, Dr. Upjohn led the family business. But later on, he dedicated himself to “the most important thing I ever did in my life:” He found ways to help people during the economic depression.

His contributions to the pharmaceutical field changed the face of medicine, and he is still well-remembered for the many ways he helped people in his hometown of Kalamazoo, Michigan.

William Upjohn’s Early Life

William Upjohn was one of 12 children born to parents in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The family lived on a farm, and his father, Dr. Uriah Upjohn, took care of local patients. The children all had farm chores.

William (known as W.E.) was always looking for ways to simplify his tasks. Among his accomplishments were a feed cutter, a cultivator, and a knot-tyer for hay binding machines. This gave him a head start in business as W.E. patented the knot-tyer. Patent rights were purchased by a local company for $1500.

Upjohn also thought riding in buggies was bumpier than necessary, and he created a shock-absorber that could be mounted underneath a carriage to smooth the ride. His experience inventing items for the home and farm undoubtedly paid off when he went into medicine.

After he finished high school, W.E. and several siblings wanted to attend medical school. (In the late 19^th century, medical school was a two-year program.) William Upjohn graduated from the University of Michigan in 1875. He joined his uncle’s medical practice in the rural community of Hastings, Michigan.

Early Medicines

The state of medicine in the late 1800s was highly experimental. There were very few proven “cures,” and there was no regulation. The packaging on patent medicines could over-promise and generally under-deliver.

“Medicine men” still traveled the country explaining why their elixir worked.  However, the content of most mixtures was water, sugar, and alcohol. Some of the medicines replaced alcohol with opium. When alcohol or opium were present, people usually felt the medicine was effective.

But medical science was progressing. During the Civil War the medical community had access to chloroform and ether to ease pain during surgery. The use of both of these chemical mixtures were introduced in the earlier part of the 19^th century.

Other medicines of the day included mercury and arsenic. They were highly toxic, but if used carefully, they were helpful with venereal diseases such as syphilis.

A vaccine for smallpox had been around for about one hundred years, but it was not widely used. Another vaccine for cholera was recently discovered and was not known by most members of the public.

No Reliable Measurement Methods

In cooking and in medicine, there were few ways to measure accurately. Up until the early 20^th century, cooks relied on general measurements—a “dash of salt” or a “teacup full of flour.” (See Fannie Farmer: Cookbook Author Who Instituted Exact Measuring.”)

This problem was also an issue with medications. Medicines were dispensed in liquid or powder form, and there was no standardized way to measure anything.

Aspirin

Aspirin was the first true leap forward. For years, people knew to chew on willow bark to ease aches and pains. An Italian chemist discovered that “salicin” was the compound that helped reduce inflammation. He found a way to extract the salicin from the tree bark so that it could be used medicinally.

But as salicin travels through the human body, it becomes acidic. The medicine worked, but in some people, it causes gastric distress. Felix Hoffman, a chemist who worked for Frederich Bayer & Company, developed a way to alter the acetylsalicylic acid so that it no longer caused gastric distress. His process altered the acid—it did not coat it.

The medicine was initially sold as a powder, but soon Bayer found a way to manufacture a tablet form.

Others Working on Pills

During the first days of W.E. Upjohn’s medical practice, there were a few ways to dispense medicine. Liquids and powders were used, but patients generally didn’t like the taste. There were pills being made, but Dr. Upjohn saw how ineffective they were.

The coatings on these first pills were very hard and generally insoluble. Doctors found that the pills usually traveled through a person’s digestive system whole. If the pill didn’t dissolve, it was totally useless to the person taking it.

Upjohn Starts Experimenting

Dr. Upjohn loved to solve problems, and this particular situation fascinated him. In 1880, he set up part of the attic in his home as a work area.

Dr. Upjohn finally came up with something that satisfied him. He worked with a base particle that he sprayed with layers of medicine. The pill strength built up layer by layer. 

He soon had a “friable” pill. The light coating Upjohn used gave the pill a solid form until it was swallowed. Then it dissolved. The friable pill was also crushable. This was one of the tests he used on his pills.

In 1884, he applied for a patent on his new invention. The patent was granted in February 1885 marking a breakthrough in drug design.

Building Up the Business

Upjohn knew the next step was a machine to mass-produce pills in this method, and he soon developed and patented one.  With the ability to grow the business, he talked to family members about joining the company. Eventually, four of them did, but brother Henry, also a physician, joined him first and remained with the company for longer than the others did.

W.E. and Henry decided to locate the factory in Kalamazoo, Michigan. They named the company the Upjohn Pill and Granule Company. Brother Henry preferred running the manufacturing side of the business. This was agreeable for W.E. who loved thinking about how to sell the product.

Marketing the Friable Pill

Because the “crushability” of the pills was W.E.’s “test” as he created the pills, he decided to offer his potential customers the same opportunity.

The company sent doctors a small pine board with two types of pills—Upjohn’s new friable pills and the older type of pills with the hard shell. The literature inside the package suggested that the recipient try to crush both pills. Only the friable pill would break up, and Upjohn’s literature pointed out that this meant it would break down in a patient’s stomach as well.

For many years, a sketch of a thumb crushing a pill on a pine board was the symbol of the company.

As the company grew, the company’s name was simplified to The Upjohn Pharmaceutical Company and eventually the Upjohn Company.

Early Days in Business

One of the Upjohn brothers’ first medicines was quinine pills. Quinine was the first line of defense against malaria, and it became more effective when could be delivered in pill form where the dosage could be standardized.

When W.E. Upjohn returned to Kalamazoo with his family, he intended to be a contributing member of the community.  In 1892, he was elected to serve as a city alderman and worked with the community to form a commission-manager form of government. In 1918, he became the first mayor.

His municipal work made him aware of what the city needed, and over time, he donated property for a city park and also paid for the creation of a civic auditorium.

The Upjohn Company was a Good Place to Work

Dr. Upjohn believed in respect for his workers. At a time when the customary work week was six days, Upjohn reduced his company’s work week to 5.5 days with no reduction in employee salaries. This in effect gave everyone in the entire company a raise.

As the success of the company grew, W.E. Upjohn became willing to delegate his position as head of the company. He wanted time to participate in civic affairs.

The Company Continues

In W.E. Upjohn’s succession plan, he intended that his son, Harold, would run the company. Harold stepped in as general manager in 1925, and W.E.  took early retirement.

When Harold died unexpectedly in 1928, W.E. returned to full-time management until a successor could be found.  

His nephew, Dr. L.N. Upjohn cleared his schedule to take on the role, letting Dr. Upjohn fully retire in 1930. The company continued to grow and add to a long list of patents they held on medicines and on dispensers.

Gardening and His Country Home

Like other well-to-do society members, W.E. Upjohn wanted a country home where he could enjoy the outdoors. He bought a farm in Augusta, Michigan. Eventually, he turned the creamery into a home for his family, calling it Brook Lodge.

Upjohn became obsessed with gardening. He eventually planted and maintained 14 acres of peonies. He grew 600 different varieties from seed, and of that number, he chose 175 varieties to feature in a seed catalogue he produced. Local people loved coming to see the beauty of the gardens.

Helping During the Depression

By the time of his retirement, the U.S. economy was in trouble. After the stock market crash, nothing rebounded. People were having trouble finding work and feeding their families.

Dr. W.E. Upjohn dedicated himself to finding solutions. In late 1931, he purchased a 1200-acre farm in Richland, Michigan and set it up so that 100 people could provide for their families by working the land. If the farm produced more than was needed by those living there, then anything remaining could be sold locally.

Dr. W.E. Upjohn referred to it as “the most important thing I ever did.”

Though W.E. Upjohn died in 1932, he lived long enough to understand how important work was to each individual—not only for providing a living but for providing a sense of identity.

Toward the end of the 1930s, people were finding jobs so they could leave the farm. If the farm was sold, Upjohn specified that the funds should be used to create the Upjohn Unemployment Trustee Corp. It still operates today. It is known as the Upjohn Institute for Employment Research. Its purpose is to study methods to combat unemployment and ease the distress caused by being out of work.

What Happened to the Upjohn Company?

The dissolvable pill continues to be a vital part of pharmaceuticals, and timed-release systems have been added to the basic friable pill. Otherwise, over the next 100 years the company produced over 186 different medications in pill form, many of which are well-known (e.g. Lipitor and Xanax). 

Upjon was so well-known that in the 1980s, an Upjohn Pharmacy was featured on Main Street in Disneyland.

In 1995 the company merged and became Pharmacia, becoming Pharmacia and Upjohn. This merger then combined with Monsanto and Searle to become Pharmacia Corp. In 2002, it was acquired by Pfizer.

In 2015, Pfizer resurrected the Upjohn name for off-patent drugs. Then in 2020, Pfizer’s Upjohn division merged with Mylan to form a new company called Viatris.

Brook Lodge

As for Brook Lodge, Upjohn’s summer home, people and companies continued to use the beautiful property. During World War II, the family gave access to the Red Cross to use the buildings and grounds for recovering patients.

Later, Brook Lodge was used as a conference center. However, as the facility became more costly to maintain, it was donated to Michigan State University. The university continued to make use of it but the recession in 2008-09 forced it to close. The university put it up for sale. The last mention of it in the media was in 2020, noting that Brook Lodge was on the market.

I

Dr. Charles Drew was a pioneer in medicine who achieved recognition in a racially divided America for his work with blood collection and storage during World War II. But those who knew him said that his greatest pride was in having mentored many Black surgeons who might never have moved forward in the field of medicine if it hadn’t been for Dr. Drew.

Dr. Drew was one of several scientists working on ways to get blood to the battlefields. During World War I, many soldiers died because the only way blood could be transfused then was directly from the donor. Medical people needed effective ways to collect, store, and transport blood.

Among Dr. Drew’s many accomplishments with blood was finding a way to dry plasma, which lengthened its storage and shelf life. The plasma could then be reconstituted when needed. These and other discoveries saved thousands of lives during the war.

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The Drew Family

Charles Drew was one of four children born to middle-class parents. His father was a carpet-layer, and his mother trained as a teacher. The family lived in the Foggy Bottom section of northwest Washington, D.C. The neighborhood was interracial (though D.C. itself was segregated), so the Drews were aware of segregation but not always subjected to it.

As a boy, Charles Drew maintained a large paper route and later attended Dunbar High School, which was well-respected for offering opportunities to all. Drew was a gifted athlete, and he was offered an athletic scholarship by Amherst College (to be one of six Black students in a class of 600). He played on the football team and was asked to participate in track and field as well.  In his studies at Amherst, Drew became interested in science and medicine.

Medical School

During his senior year, Drew applied to the medical schools at Harvard, Howard University and McGill University in Canada. He lacked the required chemistry credits for Howard, and Harvard asked him to defer a year. (Most American colleges held only one spot for a Black student. Presumably, Harvard’s was filled.) However, McGill University, known to be more welcoming to Black students, accepted him for the upcoming year.

At McGill Medical School, Charles Drew excelled. He won the annual scholarship prize in neuroanatomy, was in the medical honor society, and qualified to be part of the staff of the McGill Medical Journal. In 1933, he graduated second in his class and received his M.D.C.M. degree (Doctor of Medicine and Master of Surgery).

Residency in Montreal

After McGill, Charles Drew accepted a residency at Montreal General Hospital. His mentor there was Dr. John Beattie, an anatomy professor who was conducting studies on blood transfusion and shock therapy. (No one then knew that a blood transfusion helped with treating someone in shock. This discovery would be vital during the war years.)

Scientists elsewhere were working on other necessities proven by World War I. They needed to find a way to manage blood so that it could be delivered to the battlefields. Up until the 1930s, blood transfusions needed to be given directly from donor to recipient and only among people with the same blood type.  

Work on Plasma and Storage

At Montreal Hospital, Doctors Beattie and Drew were making progress in two areas: plasma and blood storage.

Plasma is a clear yellow liquid containing proteins and electrolytes that carries blood cells and other substances through the body. Beattie and Drew’s laboratory was working on methods to separate the liquid part of the blood from the whole blood (where the red blood cells exist). 

In their work, they also realized that plasma was interchangeable with all blood types.  When a whole blood transfusion is unnecessary, a plasma transfusion could be administered, regardless of blood type. This was an extraordinary discovery.

During World War I, small quantities of blood could be stored briefly, but it required constant refrigeration. This was not easy during wartime.

Dr. Beattie’s and Dr. Drew’s experimentation with different types of blood products showed that when separated, blood plasma could be stored for a longer period of time than whole blood. There was also less risk of contamination.

Moving Back to the U.S.

After Dr. Drew finished his work under Dr. Beattie, he accepted a faculty position as a professor of surgery at the predominantly Black Howard University. After two years at Howard, he joined the staff of the Freedman’s Hospital, a federally-operated facility connected to Howard. He taught and performed surgeries.  

Fellowship at Columbia

In 1938, Charles Drew was awarded a two-year Rockefeller fellowship in surgery at Columbia University. As part of the fellowship, he worked at Presbyterian Hospital under eminent surgeon Allen Whipple. (Whipple was the first doctor to create a way to perform pancreatic cancer surgery.)

Drew’s graduate work at Columbia was a continuation of the work he had done on blood in Montreal. His doctoral thesis was “Banked Blood: A Study on Blood Preservation,” Among other information presented in the study, Dr. Drew showed that blood plasma could be preserved for two months. This was longer than the shelf life of whole blood.  He also proved that when dried, the plasma lasted even longer. Then when needed, the plasma could be reconstituted to its original form.

Based on his thesis, he was awarded a Doctor of Science in Medicine. He was the first Black man to receive this advanced degree from Columbia (1940).

In September of 1939, Drew married Minnie Lenore Robbins, a professor at Spelman College. They went on to have 4 children. (His children all excelled; one daughter became a neuroscientist.)

Recruited for Blood Bank

After obtaining his advanced degree, Charles Drew was recruited by transfusion specialist Dr. John Scudder who obtained funding to set up an experimental blood bank. Scudder was in talks with British doctors about how America’s findings about plasma could be put to work to help Britain. The country was seeing many injuries because of the Blitz (the German bombing of Britain in 1940-41.)

Scudder appointed Charles Drew as Supervisor of the Blood Transfusion Association for New York City where he also oversaw the Blood for Britain program.

The Challenge

When Drew stepped in, medical centers around the country were already attempting blood collection for the war, but each hospital collected the blood  differently and used their own methods for preservation. This meant that a good deal of blood could not be used, and the Blood for Britain program was in danger of failing.

Drew implemented methods for systematically collecting, treating, and storing the blood. Drawing on Drew’s research, scientists working on the project separated plasma, tested it, and then stored it. It was then bottled in 1-liter units and shipped to Britain by the Red Cross.

The new system was Immensely successful. Blood for Britain collected over 14,500 blood donations and sent 5000 liters of plasma to Britain.

Red Cross Undertakes Expansion of Blood Bank

After the success of Blood for Britain, the National Research Council and the American Red Cross planned a national blood donation and banking system. Charles Drew’s use of dried plasma was game-changing. The Red Cross offered him the job of organizing the blood program for the Red Cross.

As he had done before, Drew set up a system of uniform procedures and standards for collecting blood as well as packing it into kits where it could be sent to hospitals or directly to a battlefield. Dr. Drew also developed mobile blood donation stations (“bloodmobiles”).

The Question of “Mixing”

The scientists working with blood knew that all people produce the same kind of blood. However, an outside group decided that blood should not be mixed: a white person needing blood must not be given blood from a Black person.

As the Red Cross moved through the stresses of war on behalf of the military, the Army and the Red Cross decided the correct action was to forbid Blacks from donating blood. They disregarded the growing need for donated blood, and disregarded the fact that Blacks were now serving on or near battlefields. What would happen if one of them needed blood?

After the Red Cross announced that Blacks would not be permitted to donate blood, there was an overwhelming outcry of protest. The Red Cross back-tracked and concluded that blood should be segregated. White donated blood would be given to white people; Black soldiers would be given blood donated by Blacks.

And there the matter rested for a time.

Dr. Drew Moves On

After six months with the Red Cross, Dr. Drew returned to Howard University. Some wrote that the decision about segregating the blood was the factor that led to his decision, but historian Spencie Love, author of One Blood: The Death and Resurrection of Charles R. Drew (1996), combed through massive amounts of research pertaining to Dr. Drew. She wrote there was no indication as to that being the cause.

The work Dr. Drew loved was surgery and teaching. It was fitting that after getting a program up and running, Drew would want to return to Howard’s Medical Program.  In the 1940s,  few hospitals accepted Black students for residencies. (Drew himself was turned down by Mayo Clinic because he was Black.)  Returning to Howard to mentor incoming doctors was his top priority.

Drew Takes a Stand on Blood Segregation

But Charles Drew most certainly had an opinion about “mixing” blood, based on his scientific research. In 1942, he wrote: “As you know, there is no scientific basis for the separation of the bloods of different races except on the basis of the individual blood types or groups.”

Two years later in a letter to the director of the Federal Labor Standards Association, he was more blunt about blood separation in the National Blood Bank: “I think the Army made a grievous mistake, a stupid error in first issuing an order to the effect that blood for the Army should not be received from Negroes. It was a bad mistake for 3 reasons: (1) No official department of the Federal Government should willfully humiliate its citizens; (2) There is no scientific basis for the order; and (3) They need the blood.”

Return to Howard

With Drew’s return to Howard in 1941, he served for the next nine years as the Chief of Surgery at Freedman’s Hospital.  For him, the mission to train the next generation was of utmost importance. At the time of Charles Richard Drew’s death in 1950, nearly half the Black physicians in the country had gotten their start because of Dr. Drew. 

Other achievements while at Freedman’s Hospital included a shared patent for an intravenous surgical needle for blood delivery (1943; Patent # 2,389,355.) In 2015, Drew was admitted posthumously  to the National Inventors Hall of Fame.  

The Death of Charles Drew and the Ongoing Controversy

On April 1, 1950, Dr. Charles Drew died in a one-car crash in Almance County, North Carolina. He was traveling with three other doctors on the way to a medical conference in Tuskegee, Alabama. Drew had suggested driving as he knew that two of the doctors couldn’t afford plane fare.

On March 31, Drew worked a full day at Freedman’s Hospital including presenting a lecture that evening. After the lecture, he did his final hospital rounds and then went to meet the other doctors so they could leave that night.

One of the other doctors took the first stint driving, but about 5 a.m., they crossed the Virginia-North Carolina border and stopped to have something to eat. They also changed drivers. Dr. Drew took the wheel. He and the other doctors must have all dozed off.  Suddenly, the right wheels of the car hit the shoulder of the road, waking them. Drew instinctively pulled on the wheel to turn the car sharply left. This caused the car to roll over.

The Crash

On the driver’s side, the car doors snapped open. Cars then had no seatbelts, so both Dr. Drew and his colleague Dr. Ford were thrown from the car.

Dr. Ford broke several bones and suffered cuts and a bad gash to his leg, but he was thrown clear. The car rolled over Charles Drew, causing multiple injuries to his chest and head.

The two shaken but uninjured doctors got up to assess their friends’ situation. Neighbors who heard the crash called an ambulance. Before long, a highway patrol officer showed up.

The ambulance arrived within about 15 minutes. The emergency responders put Dr. Drew on a stretcher, and one of the unhurt doctors climbed into the ambulance to accompany him to the hospital.

Where the Accident Occurred

The car crash happened in Almance County, a county with a small population that was both mixed and segregated.  Almance General Hospital was the only medical facility in the county. It was a small privately-owned hospital that would have been intended for the white population. In 1948, an emergency room was added but given the size of the county, it was minimally supplied.

Anyone requiring advanced care and deemed healthy enough for the trip would have been sent on to the hospital at Duke University. There was also a Black Hospital elsewhere where patients were sometimes sent.

Bringing Dr. Drew to Almance

Dr. Drew is described as light-skinned, so the ambulance drivers may have assumed he was white, or they may simply evaluated the emergency and realized they had to get help as quickly as possible.

At any rate, Drew was taken to Almance Hospital, and Dr. Ford, who was also hurt, was taken there, too. A passing motorist stopped and offered to take him since there wasn’t room in the ambulance.

Dr. George Carrington was one of several doctors who owned Almance. A crash of this type created news immediately, so when Drew and Ford were brought into the hospital, Dr. Carrington came out to see who was going on.

After only a moment of seeing the man on the stretcher, he said. “Is that Dr. Drew?”

The Almance doctor on assignment for emergency cases that morning was Harold Kernodle Sr., an orthopedic surgeon whose brother also worked there.  The doctors saw that Drew needed immediate attention. Both Kernodles as well as Carrington and another doctor, Ralph Brooks, stepped in and out of the room where Drew was being treated. They started fluids, including plasma on him, but the injuries were too serious. He died within an hour.

Dr. Ford’s Injuries

In the meantime, Dr. Ford’s broken arm and other bones were set. The bad gash on his leg was sewn up, and he was taken to the basement where there were four beds dedicated to Black patients. (This was customary in the South. A certain number of beds were dedicated to the Black population. If those beds were taken, future patients were turned away.)

Dr. Drew’s Family

When Dr. Drew’s wife was notified of his death, she was told of what happened and the treatment he was given.  Later, she sent thank you notes to the staff of the hospital for doing what they could to save her young husband. 

Rumors Began Shortly

Within weeks, rumors began to spread in the community and among the medical conference attendees where Dr. Drew was to speak. There were various forms of the story:

• “The man who created the blood bank system for the United States and Britain was taken to a white hospital where he was refused a badly-needed transfusion and died.”
• “Dr. Drew was injured and taken to a white hospital where he was turned away.”
• “They refused to give him blood, and he died.”

The rumors spread for so many months that it became the “myth of Dr. Drew’s death.” But historian Spencie Love tracked carefully through all available information for her book, “One Blood.” She went through papers, viewed hospital records, and spoke to family members as well as the colleagues traveling with Dr. Drew. They were all in agreement—regardless of what the rumors were, Dr. Charles Drew received the appropriate medical treatment following a very serious accident.

From the time of the accident, Drew family members and his colleagues devoted time to right the wrong perception of Drew’s care, but nothing worked. The story continued.

Becomes Legend

Love writes that fourteen years later (1964), Whitney Young (1921-1971), the national director of the Urban League, wrote that Drew was denied care. He expanded on this information in newspaper columns and speeches. Whitney Young was highly esteemed and people believed he had to be right.

As historian Love worked to unravel the persistence of the untruth, she writes that the legend served a purpose. Just as family stories (and fairy tales) are told and re-told for a reason, so, too, was the legend of Dr. Drew’s death.

To prove her point, Love went out to learn more about what happened to other Black patients in the South.

Black Health Care in the South

In her research, Spencie Love documented that Drew and Ford were fortunate. In the South, it was customary to send Black patients away from white hospitals. Of course, the Black hospitals were often several hours away and were less well-equipped.

To provide a concrete example, Love details the story of Maltheus Avery, a Black man who was a veteran of World War II and was supporting a young family while traveling back and forth to a college that was an hour away. Avery, too, had a car accident on this stretch of the highway. An ambulance picked him up and rushed him to Almance Hospital. The doctors there saw that the Avery’s injury was to the head, and they sent him on to Duke University where they had expertise in these types of wounds.

But when the ambulance arrived at Duke, all the beds allotted for Black patients were filled. The Duke doctors turned him away, saying he belonged at the Black Hospital, where of course, they didn’t have the necessary expertise. But it didn’t matter. Avery died en route.

Another Chilling Story

One other bone-chilling story is worth sharing. Two brothers were at home working on a science experiment to present at school the next day. Something went wrong. An explosion went off in the face of one of the boys. Their father put the family in the car and drove to the nearest hospital. But they were Black, and the hospital refused to help them. Tears streamed down the father’s face, as he begged them to help his son. They refused, and the boy was blinded by the accident.

 Would more rapid treatment care have changed this boy’s fate? That family will never know.

Legends Exist for a Reason

As historian Love writes, rumors/myths/legends exist for a reason. While Dr. Charles Drew may have received the best care possible, far too many Blacks have always known they would never receive proper health care– from slavery, Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and beyond.

Even today, the statistics for the health of people of color are generally much worse than for the white population. According to the Office of Minority Health, (part of the Department for Health and Human Services) Black people are at higher risk for heart disease, stroke, cancer, asthma, influenza and pneumonia, diabetes, HIV/Aids and Covid.

Some Medical Devices not Color Neutral

In further illustration of this point, The Los Angeles Times (February 20, 2024) wrote about how the medical establishment was only now admitting the misinformation provided by pulse oximeters, which are widely used for initial screening for Covid.  Black people often register that their blood oxygen is acceptable with a pulse oximeter, when actually their oxygen level is dangerously low.

Skin pigmentation seems to interfere with proper reading, and thousands died of Covid when they might have been saved.

So What about Dr. Drew?

Is the story about Dr. Drew’s death true? According to sources, it is not. However, the disparity between the health care for Black vs. white people is still very much an issue. While Black people are no longer sent off to a “Black hospital,” they may wait longer to be seen in a crowded neighborhood emergency room where there is inadequate staffing or a dearth of medical supplies. Black women have long said that their health issues are taken less seriously by the medical establishments. The disparity between successful Black births vs. white births bears this out.  See Midwife in Georgia Improved Birth Rates for Black Women.

For that reason, it is understandable that the legend is still repeated even now. It serves a purpose to remind people that this issue is serious indeed.

Dr. Drew’s Legacy

Charles Drew broke barriers in a racially divided country to become one of most important scientists in the country. His work relating to blood banks and blood transfusions was groundbreaking and saved thousands of lives. His mentorship to Black doctors increased the odds that there would be more doctors available to help people get the care they deserve.

He received many honors. The Springarn Medal was awarded to him in 1944 by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. (The Springarn Medal was established in 1914 to be given annually to recognize great achievements by African Americans.

Many schools and medical departments and health facilities have been named in his memory, and there were numerous other honors as well. In 1976, the National Park Service designated the Charles Richard Drew house in Arlington County, Virginia, a National Historic Landmark. In 1981, the United States Postal Service created a 35-cent stamp with Charles Drew’s likeness on it.

There is a Charles Richard Drew Memorial Bridge in Washington, D.C. and a park in Montreal named for him. His name is often on several lists of 100 Greatest African Americans.

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My father was badly injured in the Battle of the Bulge in World War II. I have little doubt that Dr. Drew’s work helped my family.

The method by which yellow fever spread was proposed by Dr. Carlos Finlay (1833-1915), a Cuban physician. It took twenty more years for the Reed Board (Army Surgeon Walter Reed) to definitively prove Finlay’s theory that the disease was carried by the mosquito. Once scientists understood this, they could move forward to reduce the incidence of yellow fever in tropical climates.

In the United States, this was important in the southern states where the weather was often subtropical. The discovery was also crucial in Panama where the U.S. invested heavily to build a canal to reduce the shipping time of goods from the East to California and the West.

About Yellow Fever

Yellow fever was a terrifying disease in the 17^th, 18^th and 19th centuries. The illness was devastating—killing many and sickening even more. Because so many people got sick, economic disruption inevitably followed. Communities were terrified of outbreaks.

Yellow fever predominated in tropical areas of Africa and Central and South America, but it sometimes spread to parts of the United States.

Today there is an effective vaccine, but the search for a way to prevent it or treat it took on more urgency in the late 1800s and early 1900s. People were moving into regions where yellow fever outbreaks occurred.

The spread of disease frequently interrupted construction of the badly-wanted Panama Canal.  After 22,000 deaths, the French company attempting to build it pulled out.

Studying the Illness

Scientists saw that they could not prevent the illness unless they learned how it traveled from person to person. Belief in germ theory was still relatively new, so while some doctors felt better sanitation would help reduce spread of the disease, others returned to an old theory that illness traveled by miasma (bad air). As late as 1898, a Marine Hospital Service Report wrote that better management of “railway travel” would help reduce the incidence of the disease. Among their recommendations were that rail cars should have cane seats instead of upholstery. This fell under the belief that inanimate objects could spread the disease.

About Carlos Finlay

Finlay was born in 1833 in Puerto Principe (now Camagüey), Cuba. His mother was French and his father, a doctor, was Scottish. The couple relocated to Cuba before his birth and embraced the country as their own, but as their son became old enough for school, they sent him to Europe for his education.

Twice he returned to Cuba for a prolonged period because of illness. When he eventually finished the equivalent of secondary education in Europe, he attended Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia for his medical degree.

In 1855 he returned to Havana to establish a medical practice. Finlay was known as a kindly man who would not turn away patients even when they could not pay.

Finlay was also a devoted scientific researcher and was fascinated by epidemiology. Cuba often had outbreaks of yellow fever and malaria, and Finlay spent his spare time trying to find the cause. His focus was on yellow fever.

Focus on Yellow Fever

During the 1870s, Finlay noticed that yellow fever cases spiked in areas where the mosquito population was high. He theorized that perhaps a mosquito was the carrier (vector) of the disease.

In 1881, he was invited to present a paper to the International Sanitary Commission that was meeting in Washington, D.C.  His talk put forward his belief that the vector for yellow fever was the mosquito. Finlay identified the Culex (now Aedes aegypti) mosquito as the specific carrier. While some took his report under consideration, many were derisive in their comments.  One reason for skepticism was likely because at that time, only one relatively rare illness– filariasis, caused by the parasitic roundworm–was thought to be spread by mosquito.

Though he was disappointed that no one stepped in to do more research, he stayed in Havana to continue his medical practice and progress on his scientific research. He ultimately contributed at least 40 articles on the disease. 

Americans Take More Interest

Yellow fever outbreaks had occurred in the United States in New Orleans, Mississippi and even Philadelphia. The United States became more interested in understanding yellow fever after many Americans fighting in the Spanish-American War became ill with yellow fever. (The Spanish, too, suffered greatly.)  The United States also wanted the Panama Canal to be finished. Thus far, disease kept halting progress.

Since the 1850s, America and parts of Europe wanted a faster trade route through Central America to avoid the long voyage by ship around Cape Horn. In 1881, the French attempted to span Panama with a canal which would greatly speed the trip. They brought with them the experience of having built the Suez Canal, but they found the engineering challenges in Panama to be far greater than those they had addressed in Egypt.

But it was tropical disease that ultimately halted progress. Both the French engineers and the local labor force suffered mightily from various tropical diseases, particularly yellow fever and malaria.  From 1881-1889 (the duration that France spent trying to build the canal), it is estimated that over 22,000 people died.  Finally the French abandoned their efforts.

Study Needed

At this point, the U.S. medical establishment decided to put some heft behind the need to better understand yellow fever. Army doctors heard Finlay’s theory of the mosquito as vector, but they wanted a doctor or scientist of their own to study the matter.

In 1900, the U.S. Army asked Major Walter Reed (1851-1902) to head a board to study the issue. Reed included assistant surgeons James Carroll, Jesse W.Lazear, and Aristides Agramonte. Reed and James Carroll traveled to Cuba to meet up with doctors Agramonte and Lazear who were already there.

Initially, Reed’s board discounted Finlay’s theory and focused on trying to identify the orgaanism that caused the disease. But they were still without answers. Finally, the doctors turned to Finlay’s research. By this time he had almost 30 years of scientific information.

While Reed was back in Washington on official business, Lazear began mosquito experiments on human volunteers, but Lazear became ill with yellow feer and died. It was believed by those present that he experimented on himself. On Dr. Reed’s return, he went through all of Lazear’s materials and continued the trials with human volunteers.

Dr. Walter Reed is often given credit for this initial break-through, but Dr. Reed was always first to say that they could not have accomplish what they did if it hadn’t been for Carlos Finlay’s work.

The next task was to apply this theory and reduce the mosquito population to halt spread of the disease. This was quickly accomplished in Havana by Army physician William Crawford Gorgas.

The United States Takes Over

When the United States took over the Panama project (1901-1902), they were well aware that 22,000 people died working on the canal in the 1880s, and that 12,000 more people died while working through the same terrain building the Panama Railway (1850s). But now the United States had knowledge on their side.

The Walter Reed Board confirmed what Dr. Finlay had long been telling everyone. Reduce the mosquito population to cut the incident rate of disease.

The Americans now knew that additional preparation and planning were necessary to finish the canal.  U.S. Army physician Dr. William Gorgas (1854-1920) was brought in to implement a sanitation program so that the area would be habitable for humans. A full-scale effort was made to eliminate as many mosquito breeding locations as possible.

Reducing Swamps and Wetlands

Swamps and wetlands around the Canal Zone were filled in, and Gorgas divided Panama into multiple districts so that inspectors could check regularly for stagnant water. In addition, he ordered that sleeping quarters be built with screens so that the workers were protected during the night when the mosquito population is most active.

He also experimented with fumigating buildings where people with yellow fever had been housed. Pans of sulfur or pyrethrum were placed in areas where yellow fever had taken root and the powder in the pans was set on fire. The smoke proved effective at reducing the mosquito population within buildings.

The final measure implemented under Dr. Gorgas involved quarantine of an individual if someone did become sick.  The patient was transported to screened structures that prevented future mosquito bites so that the disease could not be spread from an infected individual.

Finlay’s knowledge, Reed’s successful trials, and Gorgas’s work made the building of the Panama Canal possible. This was to change the course of American transport and greatly speed access to the West.

Finlay Finally Recognized

Carlos Finlay was viewed as a hero in Cuba, but recognition elsewhere came later—fortunately still within his lifetime.  Finlay was nominated seven times for the Nobel Prize in Physiology, though he never was awarded it. However in 1908 he received the Legion of Honour from France.

There is a memorial to him in Havana and a statue of him in Panama City near the canal, the canal he made possible.

But best of all was certainly the statement made by General Leonard Wood, the U.S. military governor of Cuba from 1898 to 1902: “The confirmation of Dr. Finlay’s doctrine is the greatest step forward made in medical science since Jenner’s discovery of the vaccination.”

Finlay concluded his career as the Chief Sanitary Officer of Cuba, a position he held for eight years before retiring in 1909.

****A special thank you to Army physician John R. Pierce, M.D., who took the time to point out some issues in my original article about Finlay and then didn’t give up on me! Thank you, John.

To read about a young American girl and her family who traveled across the Isthmus of Panama before there was a canal and before the railroad was finished, click on Traveling West in 1854.

Safe childbirth for Black women in the early 20^th century was possible but not guaranteed. Hospitals that accepted Black patients were rare, and any doctors who might help were often busy with others. Midwives were popular, but this was the Jim Crow South. Many of the Black midwives were on call to white women who wanted someone to come to deliver their babies at home.

Georgia B. Williams worked as a lay midwife during this time. (Her mother, too, had been a midwife.) The women were constantly on-call to the white women of the area. They helped Black women on a time available basis.

Based in Camilla, Georgia, the sisters primarily served a rural population, and it wasn’t easy to travel from location to location. Roads were often muddy. Like other midwives, they had no transportation. They often walked.

But as times changed, white women began to go to hospitals for births. Midwives were now able to serve their own population.

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Midwife Center Comes Into Being

Beatrice Borders and her mother Georgia realized that establishing one place for maternity care would mean that they could serve more people. Black women could come in for prenatal advice. After a birth, the mothers could stay for a day or two before going home. The babies could be taken care of by the nurses on duty.

Georgia Williams owned her home, so it was the logical place for the center. They set aside one room for a birthing room and another for a nursery. Other rooms had several beds so that mothers could recover after birth.

Today the Georgia B. Williams Nursing Home is listed on the National Register of Historic Places (2011). The house is a rare example of a birthing center that operated during segregation. It has a story to tell, and the Board of Trustees has big plans for it. This is particularly important at a time when Black mothers are still 3-4 times more likely that white women to die during childbirth.

 But as of 2021, the home was added to the Georgia Trust’s “Most Endangered Historic Homes.” While the National Register assures that the home will be remembered, it’s status as imperiled is serious.

In a conversation with the granddaughter of Beatrice Borders, Jacquelyn Briscoe, author of Going to Ms. Bea’s: The Historic Georgia B. Williams Nursing Home, I learned more about what needs to be done. But first, here’s how the house earned recognition.

The Midwife Movement

During the 19th and early 20^th century, childbirth was not seen as a medical crisis or anything that required a doctor, primarily because there were few around. Mothers and babies struggled and sometimes died from a birth. Because deaths from accidents and illnesses were higher than today, it was accepted as an unfortunate part of family life.

Midwives were the accepted way to give birth. On plantations in the South, it was accepted that one of the slaves would help with the birth, another would take care of the baby. In the North, there were also midwives, but women were also prepared to help each other.

When slavery ended, the wealthy women of the South still expected an area midwife to be “on call for her” when needed. Black women received help from a midwife only when one was available. Otherwise, she relied on friends.

First Social Welfare Program

But as medical care in the United States improved, the mortality statistics for mothers and babies changed very little. This motivated activists to push Congressional passage of the Sheppard-Towner Maternity and Infancy Protection Act. It was signed by President Warren Harding in 1921.

This was the nation’s first federally funded social welfare program. The point of the protection act was to provide money to the states to fund midwife training programs run by county health departments. In addition to teaching how to handle various types of births, there was an emphasis on prenatal care and the importance of sanitation in the birthing area. This was not common knowledge everywhere.

The federal funds only lasted until 1929, but the Act still had a big impact on the public health initiative. During those ten years, more midwives were trained, and women learned how important it was to get help if they needed it.

In 1936, Georgia reported that 42 percent of babies were delivered by a midwife. But by 1946, as more doctors pushed for hospital births, the number went down to 26 percent. In rural areas like Camilla, the reliance on midwives remained constant.

Georgia Williams and her Daughter Bea

As white women were encouraged to go to hospitals for “safer” births, Georgia Williams’s daughter, Beatrice Borders (1892-1971) saw that the current model of the “traveling midwife” could be improved upon.

Midwives in rural areas struggled to reach some patients. Many of the women did not have regular access to automobiles. Even if they did, the country roads were poorly maintained.

Bea Borders realized that if mothers could come to a location in town, Bea and her mother Georgia B. Williams could provide a safe, clean environment.

This was how the plan for the Georgia B. Williams Nursing Home began. (Beatrice named it for her mother.)  Using the family home in Camilla, Georgia, Beatrice Borders (called “Miss Bea”), and her mother turned the Williams home into a birthing center.

Starting in 1941, the home serviced families for over 30 years, delivering more than 6,000 babies. According to an article from the Georgia Historic Preservation Division of the Department of Natural Resources, Ms. Bea’s Home eventually added an incubator so they could provide for the littlest babies.

Maternity After Care

Bea also realized that the healthcare did not have to end with delivery. After the birth, Bea encouraged them to stay for a day or two. They were given healthy meals, and because the babies were looked after by nurses and volunteers, the women had time to rest. 

The charges for the delivery along with the stay ranged from $25-55.  She never turned anyone away. If money was tight, the family could pay over time. And because the Home provided meals for the mothers, Bea was also happy to be paid in farm produce.

How the Birthing Center Operated

Pregnant women sometimes contacted the midwives at the Georgia B. Williams home shortly after they realized they were pregnant. Some needed health advice. Others wanted to know how they could afford the service.

As news of the birthing center grew, women from across southwest Georgia came in. The Home was unique for the state and for much of the country.

What The Midwives Accomplished

Today Black women nationwide are three to four times more likely to die during childbirth. In Georgia, those statistics are worse.  As of 2022, the state is ranked last in maternal mortality for the 50 states.

While it existed, the Georgia B. Williams Nursing Home helped improve those statistics. The midwives there knew the importance of cleanliness during the birth process. They also understood emergencies; if they couldn’t manage a situation, they had a network of doctors who were willing to help out. As a result, Black women fared better during this time.

Continues as Daycare Center

In 1971, Georgia’s licensing requirements for midwives changed, so the Home decided to help with another need. One of the midwives, Arilla Smiley, re-opened the center for childcare—an important service in any community.

Restoration To Be Museum and Learning Center

In an interview with Jacquelyn Briscoe, granddaughter of Beatrice Borders and executive director of the Georgia B. Williams Nursing Home, now a 501c3 organization, I learned about the plans to turn the Home into a museum and learning center. (In Nebraska, there is a similar center that was restored to honor Dr. Susan La Flesche Picotte, the first Native American doctor.

Briscoe said that while they had successfully received donations for certain aspects of the restoration, the project ran into immediate problems. As they began the restoration, the workers found that one side of the building was going to collapse. The foundation needed to be shored up, and the building still needs to be tented to get rid of termites. After that, the planned-for work could begin.

The National Trust’s African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund donated $75,000 toward an interpretive center. Another $5,000 was given from the Johanna Favrot Fund to hire an architect.  More recently, they received a African American Civil Rights Grant program administered by the National Park Service is providing $469,014.

To make up the shortfall on the money needed for the remedial work, they undertook more fundraising. The town of Camilla recently provided more funding as well.

Archives Being Digitized

The University of Georgia has been given the archival records, and they are digitizing them. This collection already has the names, photographs, and stories of many of “Bea’s Babies,” as those born in the home are known, but they are on the alert for more people who may have started their life there.

Briscoe foresees that there will be both museum space and classrooms in the house when it is finished. Educating more midwives could take place here. There is also a big need for school enrichment programs in the area.

Briscoe also outlined plans for awarding scholarships to high school students. A former teacher herself, Briscoe knows the importance of education. There would be two scholarships for those interested in midwifery. Another scholarship would be awarded to a student who plans to work in daycare. 

Donations Still Needed

Anyone who has ever been involved in historic restoration or renovation of any type knows that the costs of this project will only go up. Houses always fhold surprises when the walls are opened or the floorboards lifted.

For more information, visit the www.beasbabies.org, a website created by Ethos Preservation, LLC. A fund has been established for donations.

James Durham is considered the first African American to practice medicine in America—first in Philadelphia and then in New Orleans while it was still under Spanish rule.

Durham was born in Philadelphia (ca. 1762) and started life as a slave. His first three owners were all physicians, which was how he received his medical training. His first owner encouraged his slaves to read and write, and this was very helpful for Durham as he took his next step in medical training.   

When he was only eight, he was purchased by John A. Kearsley, Jr., a physician who made him an apprentice. (At that time, there were few medical schools. Apprenticeships were a common method for teaching the art of medicine.) Dr. Kearsley taught him to compound medicines and perform routine medical care.

British Regiment During the War

The next person to own Durham was a surgeon serving in a British regiment. This gave him added experience in binding wounds and performing amputations on the British soldiers who were injured. Smallpox and other fevers were also spreading through most regiments as well as the colonies so there was much to do.

In 1781, Durham and the surgeon were with a British regiment in Pensacola, Florida. The British lost to Spanish forces. The Spanish scooped up the “spoils of war” and decided to take the Black physician with them to Spanish-controlled New Orleans. 

Durham in New Orleans

In New Orleans in 1783, he was purchased by a Scottish physician named Robert Dow.

Dow primarily saw patients in the French Quarter. Partly because of the climate, Dow and Durham found that most of their time was occupied by malaria, yellow fever, diphtheria, and other viruses.

After two years in the master-slave relationship, Dow permitted Durham to purchase his freedom for 500 pesos. Durham remained in New Orleans, and the two men continued to work together.

By this time, James Durham was fluent in French and Spanish as well as English.

Trip to Philadelphia

In 1788, James Durham returned to Philadelphia for a time. He likely had family there. Philadelphia had an active group of abolitionists, among them Dr. Benjamin Rush (1745-1813). Rush was a highly-respected physician and statesman. He had been a representative in the Continental Congress and was among the signers of the Declaration of Independence. He also helped found the College of Physicians of Philadelphia.

Because of his interest in doing away with slavery, Dr. Rush always welcomed the opportunity to meet former slaves. He and James Durham connected, and Dr. Rush admired him greatly.

Dr. Benjamin Rush’s Impression

In 1788, Dr. Rush wrote a letter to the Society for the Abolishment of Slavery: “There is now in this city a black man of the name James Durham, a practitioner of physic, belonging to the Spanish settlement of New Orleans on the Mississippi. I have convened with him upon most of the acute and epidemic disease of the country where he lives, and was pleased to find him perfectly acquainted with the modern simple mode [of treating] those diseases.

“I expected to have suggested some new medicines to him, but he suggested many more to me.”

That year, Rush also wrote an article about James Durham for the American Museum magazine (July-December 1788). This was all part of his effort to show that African Americans should be on an equal footing with white people.

Corresponded with Dr. Rush

In 1789, Durham returned to New Orleans and continued his practice with Dr. Dow. For the next 16 years, Durham remained in New Orleans but wrote regularly to Benjamin Rush.

Because medicines were easier to come by in Philadelphia, Durham frequently requested that certain things be sent to him. It is not clear how often Rush was able to comply. However, he, Durham and Dow compared notes about certain illnesses. Yellow fever was ravaging both New Orleans and Philadelphia at the same time.

Rush thought so highly of James Durham’s medical knowledge that Dr. Rush asked permission to read Durham’s paper about “putrid sore throat” (diphtheria) before a session of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Philadelphia.  It was likely the first time a scholarly paper by a Black man had been read in such an environment. 

Durham continued to practice in New Orleans until 1801 when he encountered more regulations.

New Restrictions on Practitioners

The Spanish commissioners issued new laws that said that people practicing medicine needed to have graduated from a medical school. Durham was mentioned as among those who no longer qualified. However, commissioners acknowledged that he was an authority on diseases of the throat. They intended to let him continue to treat people with those illnesses. 

For another year, Durham remained in New Orleans. In 1802, he wrote to Dr. Rush about a case he and Dr. Dow had involving cowpox. (Perhaps Durham was working under Dow for cases that did not have to do with illnesses of the throat.)

Durham also wrote about other possibilities. Where else might he practice medicine if he were to leave New Orleans?

But as of 1805, there was no more correspondence.

Whether James Durham moved elsewhere or whether he died remains a mystery. 

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To read about women who blazed a trail in the practice of medicine, read about Justina Ford, the first woman doctor in Denver, and Rebecca Lee Crumpler, who wrote the first family medical guide.