Unsung Afram female pioneers, legends and heroes that most (you) never heard of

[IllmaticDelta]

Alexa Irene Canady (born November 7, 1950)

(born November 7, 1950) is a retired American medical doctor specializing in pediatric neurosurgery. She was born in Lansing, Michigan and earned both her bachelors and medical degree from the University of Michigan. After completing her residency at the University of Minnesota in 1981, she became the first black woman to become a neurosurgeon.[1] This came after the first American woman was board certified in neurosurgery in 1960.[2]

Canady specialized in pediatric neurosurgery and was the chief of neurosurgery at the Children's Hospital in Michigan from 1987 until her partial retirement in 2001. In addition to surgery, she also conducted research and was a professor of neurosurgery at Wayne State University. After her retirement, she moved to Florida and maintained a part-time practice at Pensacola's Sacred Heart Hospital until her full retirement in January 2012. In 1989, Canady was inducted into the Michigan Women's Hall of Fame, and in 1993 she also received the American Medical Women's Association President's Award. Dr. Canady was known amongst her peers as a patient-focused surgeon who cared deeply about each of her patients.[3]


Career and research

In 1982, after finishing residency, Dr. Canady decided to specialize as a pediatric neurosurgeon, becoming the first African-American and the first woman to do so. She chose pediatrics because of her love of the children in the pediatric ward during her residency stating “it never ceased to amaze me how happy the children were”. As a patient-focused surgeon, she was known to play videogames with her pediatric patients and form relationships with each patient.[3]

She started practicing for a short time at the Henry Ford Hospital before going to work at the Children's Hospital of Michigan.[10] She then became the first African-American woman to be a board-certified Neurosurgeon in 1984.[11] She became Chief of Neurosurgery at the Children's Hospital of Michigan in 1987 and held the position until her partial retirement in 2001. During her time as Chief, she specialized in congenital spinal abnormalities, hydrocephalus, trauma and brain tumors.[12] She conducted research and published an article about the effectiveness of the treatment for hydrocephalus that were available in 2001. While initially she was worried about how she would be received by her peers, she quickly gained admiration for being a patient-care focused surgeon. In a recent interview she stated, “It’s fun to make people better”.[13]

During her years at the Children's Hospital of Michigan, Dr. Canady also continued research with Wayne State University. She served as a Professor of Neurosurgery there as well.[5] Her work and accomplishments have opened the door for many surgeons of all races and genders. From 2001 to her retirement in 2012, Dr. Canady worked as a part-time surgeon and consultant at Sacred Heart Hospital in Pensacola, Fl.[11] After moving to Pensacola, Dr. Canady initially considered herself retired. However, after meeting local doctors and realizing the need for a pediatric neurosurgeon in the area, Dr. Canady decided to join the staff at Sacred Heart Hospital, working part-time.[9] In addition to her career as a surgeon, Dr. Canady continued to do research with Wayne State University. This research would eventually lead to the development of an antisiphon shunt that helps to treat hydrocephalus.[14] In a recent interview on why she thinks students should choose neurosurgery she states, "It's intellectually challenging, you get kind of a high when everybody says 'ah, the neurosurgeon is here'". Dr. Canady continues to be both an advocate for her profession as well as diversity in medicine.[13]

 

[IllmaticDelta]

Mary Eliza Mahoney (May 7, 1845 – January 4, 1926)

was the first African American to study and work as a professionally trained nurse in the United States. In 1879, Mahoney was the first African American to graduate from an American school of nursing.[1][2]

Mary Eliza Mahoney was born in 1845 in Dorchester, Massachusetts. Mahoney's parents were freed slaves, originally from North Carolina, who moved north before the American Civil War in pursuit of a life with less racial discrimination. Mahoney was the oldest of two children; with one sibling dying early on as a child. At a young age, Mahoney was a devout Baptist and churchgoer who frequently attended People's Baptist Church in Roxbury. Mahoney was admitted into the Phillips School at age 10, one of the first integrated schools in Boston, and stayed from first to fourth grade. Phillips School was known for teaching its students the value of morality and humanity, alongside general subjects such as English, History, Arithmetic, and more. It is said this instruction influenced Mahoney's early interest in nursing.

Mahoney knew early on that she wanted to become a nurse; possibly due to seeing immediate emergence of nurses during the American Civil War. Black women in the 19th century often had a difficult time becoming trained and licensed nurses. Nursing schools in the South rejected applications from African American women, whereas in the North, though the opportunity was still severely limited, African Americans had a greater chance at acceptance into training and graduate programs.[5] As soon as the New England Hospital for Women and Children was created she then began to show an interest in nursing at age 18.[5] The NEHWC became the first institution to offer such a program allowing women to work towards entering the healthcare industry, which was predominantly led by men. She was admitted into a 16-month program at the New England Hospital for Women and Children (now the Dimock Community Health Center) at the age of 33, alongside 39 other students in 1878.

In recognition of her outstanding example to nurses of all races, the NACGN established the Mary Mahoney Award in 1936.[11] When NACGN merged with the American Nurses Association in 1951, the award was continued. Today, the Mary Mahoney Award[18] is bestowed biennially by the ANA in recognition of significant contributions in advancing equal opportunities in nursing for members of minority groups.

Mahoney was inducted into the American Nurses Association Hall of Fame in 1976.[19][20] She was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 1993.[21][20]

Other honors include:

• Mary Mahoney Memorial Health Center, Oklahoma City[22]
• Mary Mahoney Lecture Series, Indiana University Northwest[23]
• Honoring Mary Eliza Mahoney, America's first professionally trained African-American nurse. House of Representatives resolution, US Congress, April 2006 H.CON.RES.386[24]
• The Mary Eliza Mahoney Dialysis Center is a stop on the Boston Women's Heritage Trail.[25]

 

[Jemmy]

Great thread on the culture salute

 

[IllmaticDelta]

Beverly Loraine Greene (October 4, 1915 – August 22, 1957)

At 27 years old, architect, engineer, and urban planner Beverly Loraine Greene became the first black female architect licensed in the United States—in Illinois in 1942. She started her practice in Chicago; however, when racial prejudice caused her to be often passed over for projects and ignored by the media, she moved to New York City to work, ironically, on the Stuyvesant Town housing project: In 1945 it did not allow African Americans to live in its apartments. She would go on to push past further barriers, working with some of the most well-known international modernists on iconic structures—with Edward Durell Stone on the Sarah Lawrence College arts complex and Marcel Breuer on the UNESCO Headquarters in Paris (pictured). In her final project she designed several buildings for New York University but died before she saw their completion.

 

[IllmaticDelta]

Jane Matilda Bolin, LL.B. (April 11, 1908 – January 8, 2007)

was the first black woman to graduate from Yale Law School, the first to join the New York City Bar Association and the first to join the New York City Law Department. She became the first black woman to serve as a judge in the United States when she was sworn into the bench of the New York City Domestic Relations Court in 1939.

Her pops here

https://www.thecoli.com/posts/41037385/

 

[IllmaticDelta]

Jewel Plummer Cobb (January 17, 1924 – January 1, 2017)

was an American biologist, cancer researcher, professor, dean, and academic administrator. She contributed to the field of cancer research by studying the cure for melanoma. Cobb was an advocate for increasing the representation of women and students of color in universities, and she created programs to support students interested in pursuing graduate school.[2]

Jewel Plummer Cobb is an African-American cancer researcher who is most famous for the tests of Methotrexate on various forms of cancer. She tested the drug while working on treatments for melanoma, and found it effective on lung and skin cancer. She received her Doctorate in cell physiology in 1950, in the midst of heavy segregation. Today, Methotrexate is used extensively in the treatment for breast cancer.

Who is Jewel Plummer Cobb?
Jewel Plummer Cobb was born in Chicago in 1924 to African-American college students Frank V. Plummer and Carriebel Plummer. In high school, Cobb was studying biology, which later led to an interest in diseases and cancer research. She started college at University of Michigan, but due to segregation, she transferred to Talladega College in Alabama. There, she earned her Bachelor’s degree in biology. In 1945, she was rejected by New York University when applying for a teaching fellowship due to the color of her skin. After she received this news, she went to New York and impressed the faculty so much that she was awarded the position. In 1950, she was awarded her Doctorate in cell physiology.

What is Jewel Plummer Cobb Famous For?
Cobb has done comprehensive research on skin pigment, skin cancer, and how chemotherapy affects cell division. Cobb’s biggest discovery was when she found out that the antimetabolite drug Methotrexate was effective in breast, skin, and lung cancer treatments.

DID YOU KNOW?

Jewel Plummer Cobb is famous for discovering that Methotrexate could be effective on breast, skin, and lung cancer patients. Despite extensive segregation, Jewel Plummer Cobb went on to earn her full degrees in 1950 and has since been awarded 22 honorary doctorates.

What is Methotrexate?
Methotrexate is an antimetabolite medicine used for treating cancer and autoimmune diseases, among others. The drug is also used for abortion during the early stages. It can be taken orally or by injection. The Food and Drug Administration approved the use of Methotrexate in 1953 as it had been proven to prolong life of children ongoing acute leukemia. By using Methotrexate at very low doses for a prolonged period of time, it was found that the event-free survival rate among leukemia children had been increased significantly

 

[IllmaticDelta]

Clara Washington (Burrill) Bruce (1879-1947)

This inscription appears in BU Law’s 1926 yearbook beside the photo of Clara Burrill Bruce (’26). A mother of three in her mid-40s, Bruce was the only African American woman in her class, and her election to chair of the Boston University Law Review was historic: she was the first woman to head the publication at BU and the first African American to become editor-in-chief of a law review anywhere in the country.


Bruce grew up in a Black middle-class family in Washington, DC, graduating in 1897 from the city’s M Street High School, a segregated school known for its rigorous curriculum and exceptional faculty. (Teaching was, at that time, among the few professions available to well-educated African Americans.) After high school, she attended Miner Normal School and then spent a year at Howard University before transferring to Radcliffe College, where she studied history, education, and philosophy. She left Radcliffe in 1903 without earning her degree in order to marry Roscoe Bruce, whose father, Blanche Bruce, had been the first African American to serve a full six-year term in the US Senate.

Over the next 20 years, Bruce raised three children and supported her Harvard-educated husband in his career as an administrator at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama and then as assistant superintendent of Black schools for the District of Columbia. In 1923, with her children mostly grown, she pursued her longtime ambition of studying law.

Bruce excelled at BU Law, where she published three articles in the BU Law Review, served on the student council, and ranked first among the seven women in her class, in addition to serving as editor-in-chief. She was named the 1926 “class day orator” and graduated cum laude.

“Clara’s success in law school was phenomenal,” says Lawrence Otis Graham, author of The Senator and the Socialite, which chronicles the lives of Senator Blanche Bruce and his descendants. Her hard work is particularly impressive, he notes, because she never expected her accomplishments to lead to a career as a practicing attorney. “She knew when she started that it was unlikely that would be permitted in the North,” Graham says. “The only opportunities available to Black attorneys would have been reserved for men.” Rather, she studied law as an intellectual pursuit and in hopes of using her knowledge to benefit the Black community.

 

[voltronblack]

 

[IllmaticDelta]

Alice Augusta Ball (July 24, 1892 – December 31, 1916)

was an American chemist who developed the "Ball Method", the most effective treatment for leprosy during the early 20th century.[1] She was the first woman and first African American to receive a master's degree from the University of Hawaii, and was also the university's first female and African American chemistry professor.[2]


Ball died on December 31, 1916, at age 24. She had become ill during her research and returned to Seattle for treatment a few months before her death.[1] A 1917 Pacific Commercial Advertiser article suggested that the cause may have been chlorine poisoning due to exposure while teaching in the laboratory.[11] It was reported that Ball was giving a demonstration on how to properly use a gas mask in preparation for an attack, as World War I was raging in Europe.[20] But the cause of her death is unknown, as her original death certificate was altered to cite tuberculosis.[3]

The first recognition of Ball's work came six years after her death when, in 1922, she was briefly mentioned in a medical journal,[18] with her method being called the "Ball Method".[21] After the work of many historians at the University of Hawaii including Kathryn Takara and Stanley Ali, the University of Hawaii finally honored Ball in 2000 by dedicating a plaque to her on the school's only chaulmoogra tree behind Bachman Hall.[11] On the same day, the former Lieutenant Governor of Hawaii, Mazie Hirono, declared February 29 "Alice Ball Day," which is now celebrated every four years.[2][19] In 2007 the University Board of Regents honored Ball with a Medal of Distinction, the school's highest honor.[2] In March 2016 Hawaiʻi Magazine placed Ball on its list of the most influential women in Hawaiian history.[22] In 2018 a new park in Seattle's Greenwood neighborhood was named after Ball.[23][24] In 2019 the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine added her name to the frieze atop its main building, along with Florence Nightingale and Marie Curie, in recognition of their contributions to science and global health research.[25] In February 2020, a short film, The Ball Method will premiere at the Pan African Film Festival.[26] University of Hawaii students have asked whether more should be done to resolve the wrongful actions of former President Dean, including proposals to rename Dean Hall after Ball instead.[27] On November 6, 2020, a satellite named after her (ÑuSat 9 or "Alice", COSPAR 2020-079A) was launched into space.

Before the introduction of an effective antibiotic in the 1940s, Western scientists had long pursued a treatment for leprosy with chaulmoogra oil. The chaulmoogra tree (Hydnocarpus wightiana) produces seeds that had been used for centuries as a treatment for skin diseases in traditional Chinese and Indian medicine. The seed oil, when applied topically, produced highly inconsistent results in the treatment of leprosy. Some scientists claimed greater success by giving it orally, but a bitter taste and emetic effects limited the usefulness of this route.7 Toward the end of the nineteenth century, some patients were treated by intramuscular or subcutaneous injection. But the oil was not absorbed well, the injections were painful, and many suffered severe localized reactions and infection.8 A method was needed to isolate, extract, and modify the active components, but chaulmoogra oil had proven to top scientists that its secrets were not easily revealed. The solution to this conundrum would come from a young, African American chemist whose story was nearly lost to history.

Alice Augusta Ball was born in Seattle, Washington on July 24, 1892, to a family of successful photographers. Growing up around the chemicals used to develop photographs, she took an early interest in science. She received Bachelor of Science degrees from the University of Washington in both pharmaceutical chemistry and pharmacy, and with her pharmacy instructor co-published a paper in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, an especially remarkable achievement for a woman and a person of color at that time. She received scholarship offers to continue her studies from both the University of California at Berkeley and the College of Hawaii. Having lived in Hawaii with her family for some years when she was a girl, in 1914 she took the long voyage alone to begin advanced studies in Hawaii. She completed her master’s degree in one year and identified the active components of the kava root for her thesis. Few African American women had advanced degrees in chemistry at this time, and after graduation she went on to break barriers as the first African American instructor in the chemistry department at the College of Hawaii (now the University of Hawaii), which was soon followed by her promotion to head the department.9

Ball’s work attracted the attention of physician Harry T. Hollmann, a U.S. Public Health Officer and the medical director of the Kalihi Leprosy Hospital in Hawaii. Hollmann had been following attempts in the scientific community to develop a useful formulation of chaulmoogra oil for the treatment of leprosy and thought Ball had the background, skill set, and energy to take on this important work.10 He was correct in his assessment. Ball, at the age of twenty-three, developed a method to create a water-soluble, injectable form of the active components of chaulmoogra oil, which involved saponification of the oil to make potassium salts of the fatty acids, acidification by successive recrystallizations, and conversion to an injectable form of the ethyl esters. This method would come to be known as the Ball method, but not until Hollmann reclaimed her original work from the hands of a colleague, which occurred years after her untimely death.11

Leprosy treated with injectable chaulmoogra oil. From Handbook of Medical Treatment, 1919. (Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)



Alice Ball died tragically at the age of twenty-four. Although the circumstances are not entirely clear, her death appears to have been precipitated by the inhalation of chlorine gas in a lab accident. Seriously ill, she returned to Seattle in October and died two months later on December 31, 1916. Her work was taken up by Dr. Arthur Dean, a fellow chemist and the president of the College of Hawaii. Dean published a series of articles using Alice Ball’s research and called the new and innovative treatment “the Dean method.”12 A July 1921 New York Times article touted Dean’s work as a cure for leprosy: “As a result of a series of experiments, Professor Dean determined that the ethyl esters of these acids are thin fluid oils which lend themselves readily to intramuscular injection and are readily absorbed. These ethyl ester derivatives of chaulmoogra oil have now been in use at the United States Public Health Service leprosy investigation station at Kalihi in the Hawaiian Islands for some three years and the results have been very encouraging. During that period some 140 lepers have been paroled and returned to their families, the disease apparently arrested.”13

Kalaupapa settlement on Molokai, 1905. Hawaii State Archives. (Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
Harry Hollmann, the physician who had first tapped Alice Ball’s innovation and talent in his quest to help patients with leprosy in Hawaii, never forgot who had really made the breakthrough. In a 1922 journal article, Hollmann identified Ball’s crucial contribution in developing this treatment and advised the scientific community to call it “the Ball method.” But even with Hollmann’s input, Alice Ball’s important work was lost for decades and only discovered in the 1970s by a few observant investigators who followed the threads of some obscure references.14 Today there is a plaque recognizing Alice Ball’s accomplishments on a chaulmoogra tree (a gift from the Kingdom of Siam for help in treating leprosy) on the University of Hawaii campus and a scholarship in her honor. Every four years on February 29, Alice Ball Day is celebrated in Hawaii and in 2007 the University of Hawaii posthumously presented her with the Medal of Distinction.15 Her contributions have been recognized internationally as well; in 2019 the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine inscribed Alice Ball’s name on its facade along with Florence Nightingale and Marie Sklodowska-Curie. Their names were added to twenty-three other science and medicine innovators—all men—in celebration of the institution’s ninetieth anniversary.16

Although Ball’s therapy was largely abandoned as a treatment for leprosy when effective antibiotics became available in the 1940s, for decades it offered hope to people worldwide that had suffered physically and emotionally from an ancient scourge. Scores were declared cured and able to return home to their communities if they wished—and if the long and lingering memory of old stereotypes allowed them to do so. The hard work and ingenuity of the woman who developed this breakthrough treatment were nearly lost, likely because of racism, sexism, and the clouding of ethics that stems from cutthroat professional ambition. Science has declared that people who contract Mycobacterium leprae in the twenty-first century should no longer be excluded from society. Likewise, those who have made significant contributions to science but were excluded because of race, gender, or status—scientists like Alice Augusta Ball—should also have their achievements brought into the light and their names chiseled in stone.

 

[IllmaticDelta]

Emma Ann Reynolds (1862-1917)

was an African-American teacher, who had a desire to address the health needs of her community. Refused entrance to nurses training schools because of racism, she influenced the creation of Provident Hospital in Chicago and was one of its first four nursing graduates. Continuing her education, Reynolds became a medical doctor serving at posts in Texas, Louisiana and Washington, D.C. before permanently settling in Ohio and completing her practice there.

Emma Ann Reynolds was the first African American woman admitted to the Medical College of Chicago at Northwestern University.

Reynolds was born in Frankfort in Ross County, Ohio in 1862. She eventually attended and graduated from Wilberforce University. Upon graduating, Reynolds moved to Chicago, Illinois, hoping to enter school to become a nurse. Chicago schools refused to admit Reynolds because of her race. In 1889, Reynolds and her brother, Louis H. Reynolds, a Chicago minister, sought the assistance of Dr. Daniel Hale Williams to receive training for Emma Reynolds. Williams proceeded to establish the Provident Hospital and Training School, an interracial hospital and nursing school.


Emma Ann Reynolds was born on August 3, 1862, in Frankfort, Ross County, Ohio to Sarah (née Jones) and William Reynolds.[1][2] After completing her education at Wilberforce University she moved to Kansas City, Missouri where four of her brothers lived and taught school for seven years. During her teaching, she recognized the health needs of the African-American community,[3] and attempted to enroll in nursing school in Chicago. She was repeatedly refused entrance because she was black.[4] Seeking help from her brother, Rev. Louis H. Reynolds, pastor of St. Stephens African Methodist Episcopal Church on the west side of Chicago, the two approached well-known Dr. Daniel Hale Williams in December 1890.[2][5] Williams had previously recognized the need for both trained nursing staff and hospital beds for negro patients, as well as employment opportunities for interns, physicians and surgeons. Reynolds' need, spurred a decision that rather than use his influence to help her gain entrance to a white nurses' training facility, he should instead convince the black community to found their own hospital.[6] In May 1891, the Provident Hospital was opened, with the goal of allowing interracial staff and patients, as well of establishing a training facility for nurses of any race.[7][8]

Reynolds enrolled in the first nursing class, completing her training eighteen months later, and graduated on 27 October 1892 along with Bertha I. Estes, Florence Phillips and Lillian E. Reynolds.[9] The year of her graduation, she enrolled in a medical degree program at Northwestern University Women's Medical School, as the first black student of the school.[10] She graduated as the first African-American woman to complete the training in 1895.[4][3] From her graduation until 1896, Reynolds served as the supervisor of the Training School for Nurses,[11] before becoming the resident physician of the Paul Quinn College in 1896.[12] Two years later, she moved to New Orleans,[13] where in spite of racism she remained until July 1900.[14][15] While she was in New Orleans, Reynolds was active as a club member, serving as one of the officers of the state colored Temperance Union[16] and Afro-American Woman's Club of New Orleans. She founded and organized the Visiting Nurses Association under the women's club umbrella to furnish free nursing to the poor.[17]

On 23 July 1900, Reynolds took up what initially was to be a temporary three-month position, as the head nurse at Howard University's Freedman's Hospital.[18][19] She remained at Freedman's Hospital through 1901, serving on the nursing faculty in dietetics,[20] but the following year, returned to Ohio to care for her ailing parents.[4] She established a practice in Sulphur Lick, Ohio, practicing there until her death.[11]

Provident Hospital,[2] now a public hospital, was the first African-American owned and operated hospital in America.[3] Provident was established in Chicago in 1891 by Dr. Daniel Hale Williams, an African-American surgeon during the time in American history where few public or private medical facilities were open to black Americans. It was founded to provide health care and medical training. Its initial officers were president John M. Brown, vice president Richard Mason Hancock, treasurer John T. Jenifer, secretary Louis H. Reynolds, and auditor Lloyd D. Wheeler[4]

Owned and run by African Americans, from its start Provident was open to all regardless of race. It was also "the first private hospital in the State of Illinois to provide internship opportunities for black physicians . . .[t]he first to establish a school of nursing to train black women . . . one of the first black hospitals to provide postgraduate courses and residencies for black physicians and the first black hospital approved by the American College of Surgeons for full graduate training in surgery. Provident also offered an important forum, a proving ground for ideas about black self determination and institutional survival."[5] In 1893, the first documented heart surgery was performed by Dr. Daniel Williams at Provident Hospital and Training School. Though the historic Provident Hospital was forced to close in 1987 due to financial difficulties, it reopened in 1998 as part of Cook County Hospital System.[6] to provide services to residents of Chicago's South Side. It is now known as Provident Hospital of Cook County.[7] Alton Abraham, the social entrepreneur associated with Sun Ra, worked here.

First Lady Michelle Obama was born at Provident Hospital in 1964.

 

[Cel 510 kid ados forever]

@IllmaticDelta

What got u into knowing and wanting to learn so much ados history

 

[IllmaticDelta]

@IllmaticDelta

What got u into knowing and wanting to learn so much ados history

Everyone should know the history of their own people/ethnic group to the fullest, that way outsiders will never be able to distort reality/history back to you/your people with ducktales

 

[Professor Emeritus]

Some others that could be included:

Frances Harper
Mary Ann Shadd
Mary Church Terrell
Mary Ellen Pleasant
Nannie Helen Burroughs
Daisy Bates

 

[IllmaticDelta]

Alice H. Parker (1895 – 1920)

was an African American inventor known for her patent for a gas furnace.

Alice H. Parker was born in 1895 in Morrison, New Jersey, where she grew up most of her life.[2][3] Parker was a highly educated woman who graduated with honors in 1910 from Howard University Academy, a historically African-American university that accepted both male and female students since its founding in November 1866, shortly after the Civil War.[4] According to census data, Parker worked as a cook in the kitchen in Morristown, NJ and lived with her husband, who was a butler. Unfortunately, despite her revolutionary impact on today's modern heating system, there is little to no information recorded on her personal life. Although the specific date of her death is unknown, it is thought she died in 1920 due to thermal shock

As the northeast region quickly cools down to uncomfortably low temperatures, most of us are fortunate enough to be blessed with the comfort and convenience of home heating, giving us a warm escape from the harsh winter season any time we’re indoors. But who do we have to thank for this modern miracle besides some sort of higher being? As it turns out, there is one individual who is chiefly responsible for leading us to the temperate promised land in which we currently reside. This unsung hero’s name was Alice H. Parker, and by all accounts she is the mother of modern heating.

Despite extensive research, there is very little information to be found about Parker’s life and personal history, as she was given little to no recognition for her enormous contributions to technology field in her own time. However, we’d like to share what we were able to find in order to honor her legacy in some small way as we continue to benefit from said contributions.

As far as what little background info there is, Alice H. Parker was born in either 1885 or 1895 in Morristown, New Jersey, where she apparently lived for most of her life. At one point, Parker attended Howard University Academy in Washington, D.C. (an affiliate school of Howard University), where she was granted honors upon graduating in 1910. As an educated black woman prior to both the Civil Rights Movement and the Women’s Liberation Movement, this achievement would not be the last groundbreaking moment of her life.

While furnaces and the concept of central heating have been around since the Roman Empire, the science hardly advanced in the millenia that followed, and the heating methods being employed by the end of the nineteenth century were still relatively primitive compared to today.

At the turn of the twentieth century, despite a booming global technological revolution, the average home was still heated by furnaces that got their heat from coal or wood burning fireplaces. This made staying warm an inefficient, expensive, time-consuming and dangerous luxury, as homeowners needed to constantly stock their furnaces, which meant you were either constantly buying coal if you could afford it, or constantly procuring and chopping your own firewood. To make matters worse, staying warm at night came at the risk of burning your house down every time you went to sleep with a lit fire burning.

Alice H. Parker aimed to eliminate the hazard and inconvenience of home heating at the time, and she went about doing so by quite literally re-inventing it. While her personal and professional life after 1910 is somewhat of a mystery, we can assume she spent a significant portion of it working on her invention around the same time that WWI was occurring. On December 23, 1919, Parker reappears on public record with another groundbreaking achievement when she is granted a patent for her natural gas run central home heating furnace.

Parker’s new design featured one centrally located heat source with a multi-burner system that provided heat to the rest of the home using pipes and air vents. What made Parker’s design revolutionary, however, is the fact that it ran on natural gas. This allowed the system to heat the home much more effectively and efficiently, not to mention eliminating the need for burning coal or wood. This huge leap in home heating would forever change the way we stay warm. In addition to running on natural gas, Parker’s design also allowed homeowners to moderate the temperature in different rooms, a feature that would inspire the invention of zone heating and the thermostat. All in all, Parker’s invention laid the groundwork for the science of home heating to advance as far as it did in the century that followed.

Tragically, Parker never received due credit for her unprecedented invention, and her exact design was never sold, but rather copied and modified by others in the years that followed. It’s unclear if Parker ever saw any personal benefits from her patent, despite it being the obvious inspiration of later designs that were implemented for widespread commercial and residential use. On top of it all, Parker was a black female inventor at a time when such a designation was virtually unheard of, making her a pioneer in an even larger sense.

https://robairecompany.com/the-mother-of-modern-heating-a-tribute-to-alice-h-parker/

 

[IllmaticDelta]

Eunice Roberta Hunton Carter (July 16, 1899 – January 25, 1970)

was an American lawyer. She was one of New York's first female African-American lawyers, and one of the first prosecutors of color in the United States. She was active in the Pan-African Congress and in United Nations committees to advance the status of women in the world. She led a massive prostitution racketeering investigation, building the case and strategy that allowed New York District Attorney Thomas Dewey to successfully charge Mafioso kingpin Charles "Lucky" Luciano with compulsory prostitution.


Carter was born in Atlanta in 1899, the daughter of William Alphaeus Hunton Sr. (founder of the black division of the Y.M.C.A.) and Addie Waites Hunton (a social worker); both were college educated. Her paternal grandfather Stanton Hunton purchased his freedom from slavery before the American Civil War. Her brother, W. Alphaeus Hunton Jr., was an author, academic and activist noted for his involvement with the Council on African Affairs and promotion of Pan-African identity.[3] The family moved from Atlanta to Brooklyn, New York, after the 1906 Atlanta race riot. They attended local schools. Their mother, Addie Hunton, was active with the NAACP and the YMCA, achieving national status. She was selected as one of two women to go to France during World War I to check on the condition of United States black servicemen.

Eunice graduated from Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, receiving a Bachelor's and a Master's degree. After a brief time as a social worker, she decided to study law. She became the first black woman to receive a law degree from Fordham University in New York City (Gray, 2007, n.p). In mid-May 1933, Eunice Carter passed the New York bar exam (Two New York Women, 6).


Carter soon established a career in both law and international politics. In 1935 Carter became the first black woman assistant district attorney in the state of New York. As assistant DA, she determined that Mafia boss Lucky Luciano must be involved in prostitution.[4] Carter then put together a massive prostitution racketeering case that eventually implicated Luciano. She convinced New York District Attorney Thomas Dewey to personally prosecute the case. Luciano was convicted and served ten years, and then was deported. The conviction was described by Luciano biographer Tim Newark as, "a land-mark in legal history as it was the first against a major organized crime figure for anything other than tax evasion".[5] The case generated national fame for Dewey, which he rode to election as the governor of New York. He also made two unsuccessful runs for the White House, one against President Harry S. Truman. Dewey benefited from Carter's prosecutor skills, and had genuine respect for her. She frequently accompanied him to political events in Harlem and elsewhere, and reporters noted that she offered him advice. ("Judge Paige," 6)

Active in the Pan-African Congress in the 1920s, Carter later became active in the United Nations, serving on committees that advocated improving the status of women ("Eunice Carter," 14). In addition to her work for the UN, she also served on the Executive Committee of the International Council of Women, an organization with representatives from 37 countries. ("U.S. Women's Unit," 9) Additionally, she served on the board of the Y.W.C.A. (Gray, 2007, n.p.)

From Elliot Ness to Robert Kennedy, America has a long history of crusaders against organized crime, but one name is far less known. Back in the 1930s, Eunice Carter, a granddaughter of slaves, became New York’s first African-American assistant district attorney. She's credited with helping take down one of America’s most notorious mob bosses, known as "Lucky Luciano." It's just one of the fascinating stories told in a new biography of Carter, "Invisible," written by her grandson, Yale law professor Stephen Carter. Michelle Miller reports.