TUSKEGEE SCHOOL OF NURSE-MIDWIDERY Lucinda Canty CNM, MSN Hartford Hospital. At the completion of the presentation attendees will be able to:

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1 TUSKEGEE SCHOOL OF NURSE-MIDWIDERY Lucinda Canty CNM, MSN Hartford Hospital OBJECTIVES At the completion of the presentation attendees will be able to: INTRODUCTION 1. Identify three reasons the Tuskegee School of Nurse-Midwifery Program was established. 2. Identify the number of graduated of the Tuskegee School of Nurse- Midwifery. 3. Discuss the contributions of the graduates of the Tuskegee School of Nurse-Midwifery to the profession of nurse-midwifery. The Tuskegee School of Nurse-Midwifery opened September 15, 1941 in Tuskegee, Alabama. The main goal was to decrease maternal and infant mortality rates in the South, particularly in the Black Community. The School closed 1946, graduating 31 Black nurse-midwives. These nurse-midwives made major contributions to the nursemidwifery profession and made major impacts on the obstetrical and general health care in their communities. GENERAL SOCIAL CONTEXT OF THE TIME PERIOD Black Americans in the South during the 1940 s. World War II was a major event occurring at the time. This period occurred before the Civil Rights Movement of the late 1950s & 1960s. Black Americans faced segregation in health care, housing, education and employment. Health care issue in the Black community: o Inadequate number of health care facilities for Blacks and shortage of Black health care professionals. o Access to health care was difficult for those living in rural areas due to lack of transportation and inability to afford health care. o Black Americans were at increased risk of developing tuberculosis, syphilis, gonorrhea, infections disease, and maternal complications. o Black women had higher maternal and infant mortality rates than whites. Granny Midwives o Black women received little if any obstetrical care in the 1940s. Segregation and poverty prevented these women from utilizing obstetrical care. o Granny midwives were essential to the Black community, even before coming to America from Africa in 1619.

2 o Many Black women would not have received any obstetrical care if they did not have granny midwives. Grannies attended two-thirds of births in Mississippi, South Carolina, Arkansas, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Louisiana. o Granny midwives did not receive any formal training, they learned by apprenticeship though family association. o Many physicians, nurse-midwives and nurses believed that grannies placed women and babies at serious risk because of their age, lack of education, unsanitary practices and superstitions. This resulted in state and local health departments developing training programs for midwives. o Many granny midwives cooperated and participated in these programs.. TUSKEGEE SCHOOL OF NURSE-MIDWIFERY Organizations involved with planning of the school: o The State of Alabama Department of Public Health o Macon County Health Department o Julius Rosenwald Fund o Tuskegee Institute o U.S. Bureau o Maternity Center Association Objectives of the nurse-midwifery project: o To reduce maternal and infant morbidity and mortality through an improved and expanded maternity service. o To make better provisions for hospitalization of maternity and pediatric cases. o To train nurse-midwives. o To study the problems of rural maternal and infant care where adequate medical service is not available, and attempt to arrive at a solution. The school opened September 15, 1941 on the campus of Tuskegee Institute. Requirements for Admission: o R.N. from an accredited nursing program o One year nursing experience o Public Health &/or obstetrical experience o Age years old, in good health o Eligible for college matriculation

3 Directors of the School: o Margaret Thomas September 1941 June1942 & September 1943 August 1945 Nurse-midwife and staff member of Maternity Center Association (MCA) o F. Carrington Owens June 1942 June 1943 Black nurse-midwife graduate of MCA o Claudia Durham August 1945 June 1946 Black nurse-midwife 1944 graduate of Tuskegee Nurse-Midwifery Program: o The program was for 6 months and consisted of lectures, discussions and demonstrations. o Clinical experience consisted of weekly clinics, home visiting and taking prenatal and postnatal call. Each student was expected to deliver babies under supervision. Also participated in teaching classes for grannymidwives. The school closed June 30, 1946 after 5 years of operation. It graduated 31 Black nurse-midwives from the program. GRADUATES OF THE TUSKEGEE SCHOOL OF NURSE-MIDWIFERY March Salina Lestrice Johnson Claudia Marie Durham* Helen Sullivan-Miller* Bessie D. Johnson Fannie Mamie Prentice-Dubois* Marjorie A. Hawkins Frances Mosley SEPTEMBER 1942 Nettie B. Jones* Mary Louise Miller Alice Matthews Evelyn Helen Thomas Marie Jackson Lillie Charvis Flossie Elizabeth Jones 1945 Susie D. Thomas 1943 Viney Ford Winifred Lucille Ellis-Pittman* Eleanor D. Brown Susie L. Davis (5 Students Name unknown) Johnnie Mae Picket-Baskin Marie Cecelia McKnight* 1946 Maude Callen* Constance Manning Derrell* Mamie O. Hale* (?) Thorton Girth Ree Wilkerson*

4 CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE TUSKEGEE NURSE-MIDWIVES: Worked in several capacities: o Clinical nurse-midwives o General public health practitioners o Educators in nursing and nurse-midwifery o Trained and supervised granny midwives o Nursing Administrators Maude Callen increased visibility of nurse-midwives when she appeared in Life magazine. Constance Derrell broke down barriers by becoming the first nurse-midwife at New York Cornell Medical Center s Lying In Hospital. Some graduates provided general health care to the entire community. They provided care to men, women, and children. They worked with various illnesses, including tuberculosis and venereal diseases. They also encouraged people to seek medical care or hospitalization if needed. The Tuskegee nurse-midwives were able to overcome racial, economic, and cultural barriers that prevented Black women from receiving adequate health care. They brought nurse-midwifery care to communities that had a great need for it.

5 BIBLIOGRAPHY Annual Reports of the State Department of Public Health in Alabama State of Alabama Department of Archives and History, Montgomery, Alabama. Bell, Pegge L. "Birthed in the Shadows: The Influence of the Tuskegee School of Nurse-Midwifery for Colored Nurses on the Health Status of Southern Blacks in the 1940s." Presented at the 6th Annual Fall Conference on History of Nursing. September John Hopkins University. Baltimore, Maryland. Bell, Pegge L. "Making Do with the Midwife: Arkansas's Mamie O. Hale in the 1940's." In Nursing History Review, ed. Joan E. Lynaugh, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, Bearsley, Edward H. A History of Neglect: Health Care for Blacks and Mill Workers in the Twentieth-Century South. Knoxville: The University of Tennessee Press, Blackburn, Laura, The Midwife as an Ally, American Journal of Nursing 42(January 1942:5. "Bulletin of the Tuskegee School of Nurse-Midwifery," Washington Collections. Tuskegee Institute, Alabama. Carnegie, M. Elizabeth. The Path We Tread: Blacks in Nursing, nd ed. New York: National League for Nursing Press, Coles, Robert. Migrants, Sharecroppers, Mountaineers: Volume II of Children of Crisis. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, Cornely, Paul B. "A Study of Negro Nursing." Public Health Nursing. 34(1942): Cornely, Paul B. "Segregation and Discrimination in Medical care in the United States." American Journal of Public Health. 46(1956): Deutsch, Naomi and Mary B. Willeford. "Promoting Maternal and Child Health." The American Journal of Nursing. 4(1941): Embree, Edwin R. Brown Americans: The Story of a Tenth of the Nation. New York: The Viking Press, Embree, Edwin R. "Ramparts We Watch." National Negro Health News. 9(1941):

6 Ferguson, Elizabeth R. "Nurse-Midwives Serve A Rural County." National Negro Health News. 2(April-June 1943): Foner, Philip S. and Ronald L. Lewis, eds. Black Workers: A Documentary History from Colonial Times to the Present. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, Goldfield, David R. Black, White, and Southern: Race Relations and Southern Culture 1940 to the Present. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, Grover, Mary. "Negro Mortality." Public Health Reports. 61 (1946): Hale, Mamie O. Arkansas Midwives Have All-Day Graduation Exercises. The Child. 13(October 1948): Harley, Sharon and Rosalyn Terborg-Penn, eds. The Afro-American Woman: Struggles and Images. New York: Kennikat Press, Hine, Darlene Clark. Black Women in White: Racial Conflict and Cooperation in the Nursing Profession, Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, Holmes, Linda. "Thank You Jesus for Myself: The Life of a Traditional Black Midwife." In The Black Women's Health Book: Speaking for Ourselves, ed. Evelyn C. White, Washington: The Seal Press, Holmes, Linda J. African American Midwives in the South, in The American Way of Birth Pamela Eakin, ed., Philadelphia: Temple University Press, Jones, Jacqueline. Labor of Love, Labor of Sorrow: Black Women, Work, and the Family, From Slavery to the Present. New York: Vintage Books, Kenney, John A. "The First Graduating Class of the Tuskegee School of Midwifery." Journal of National Medical Association. 34(1942): Lassiter, Irene M. Nurse Teaches Midwife, Public Health Nursing 33 (1941):462. Lang, Dorothea, Constance Geraldine Manning Derrell, C.N.M., M.A. Paper presented at a ceremony honoring Constance Derrell for her contributions to nurse-midwifery. Sponsored by the American College of Nurse-Midwives and the New York State Fund for Midwifery. September Lemann, Nicholas. The Promised Land: The Great Black Migration and How It Changed America. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Maternity Center Association. Twenty Years Of Nurse-Midwifery New York: Maternity Center Association, 1955.

7 "Maude Callen Receives Public Health Award." Journal of Nurse-Midwifery. 18(1973): McBride, David. From TB to AIDS: Epidemics Among Urban Blacks Since New York: State University of New York Press, Morias, Herbert M. The History of the Negro In Medicine. New York: Publisher Company, Inc., Murray, Florence. The Negro Handbook New York: Wendell Malliet and Company, Murray, Florence. The Negro Handbook New York: Current Reference Publications, Murray, Florence. The Negro Handbook New York: Current Books, Inc., National Organization of Public Health Nursing. "The Negro Public Health Nurse." Public Health Nursing. 34(1942): "Negro Nurse-Midwives," American Journal of Nursing 42(1942): 705. Robinson, Sharon A. "A Historical Development of Midwifery in the Black Community: " Journal of Nurse-Midwifery. 29(1984): Shoemaker, Sister M. History of the Nurse-Midwifery in the United States. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University Press, Smith, W. Eugene. "Nurse-Midwife: Maude Callen Eases Pain of Birth, Life, and Death." Life. 31 (December 3, 1951): ). Thomas, Margaret. "Social Priority No. 1: Mothers and Babies." Public Health Nursing. 34(1942): "Tuskegee School of Midwifery for Colored Nurses Bulletin," Washington Collections, Tuskegee Institute, Alabama.