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• History of Medicine Oral History Transcripts

  Rutgers University's George F. Smith Library of the Health Sciences in Newark maintains a collection of oral history transcripts. The transcripts are part of the library's Special Collections in the History of Medicine. The oral history collection consists of about 40 interviews with medical professionals who worked and lived in New Jersey. The interviews were conducted in the 1980s and 1990s. We have identified one Black interviewee in this collection: the prominent obstetrician/gynecologist Lena Edwards. A list of interviews is available on the library's website, but the audio and transcripts have not been published online. In order to obtain a transcript from the collection, researchers must contact Special Collections in the History of Medicine via the contact form on the library's website.
• Interview: Alexander, Walter G. II, 2009

  Dr. Alexander was born in 1922 in Petersburg, Virginia. He attended Orange High school in New Jersey before he was accepted to Rutgers on a scholarship. He was a member of ROTC, the engineering program, and the Rutgers track team. A Tuskegee Airman, he graduated from Rutgers with a degree in mechanical engineering, then went to work for Douglas Aircraft as a draftsman in California. He enlisted in the USAAF in 1944 and trained at Keesler and Tuskegee Army Airbases as a fighter pilot. World War II ended before he was deployed. He later attended Howard University's dental school and became a distinguished dentist in New Jersey. Dr. Alexander was inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Rutgers African-American Alunni Alliance in 2007. He was inducted into the Rutgers Hall of Distinguished Alumni in 2009.
• Interview: Edwards, Lena Frances, 1982

  Lena Frances Edwards, M.D., (1900-1986) was an African American obstetrician and gynecologist who received the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her service in 1964. Dr. Edwards graduated from Howard University College of Medicine in 1924. For most of her 59 years of professional life, she practiced medicine in Jersey City, New Jersey, both in private practice and on the Margaret Hague Maternity Hospital staff. During her years in Jersey City, Dr. Edwards started a chapter of College Women National, the Jersey City College Women, an organization that raised money to give tuition to women who wanted to earn an education. Dr. Edwards taught at Howard University from 1954 to 1960, following in the footsteps of her father who taught at Howard University School of Dentistry. After her time at Howard, she began an endowment scholarship fund for Black women from poor backgrounds. Dr. Edwards was interviewed as part of the Medical History Society of New Jersey-Oral History Program's project "The Health Professions in New Jersey During the Great Depression, 1929-1939." The interview was conducted on December 7, 1982, at the Jewish Hospital, Jersey City, by Linda Holmes, who was a professor at UMDNJ-School of Health-Related Professions. The interview focuses on Dr. Edwards' general and obstetric practice during the 1920s and 1930s largely centered on the African American, immigrant, and blue-collar populations. The conversation also addresses her philanthropic efforts throughout her life. In addition to this oral history interview housed at Rutgers, researchers interested in Dr. Edwards's life and work in New Jersey are also encouraged to consult the oral history recordings and transcripts on file at Harvard University's Schlesinger Library, where Dr. Edwards was interviewed in 1977 as part of the Black Women Oral History Project. The Schlesinger Library has digitized the transcripts and audio recordings from that project, and they can be found on the library's website. Additionally, a biographical book about Dr. Edwards was published in 1979, titled Medicine, Motherhood and Mercy: The Story of a Black Woman Doctor, written by Sister M. Anthony Scally.
• Interview: Gaither, Cornelius, 2014

  Dr. Cornelius E. Gaither was born in Philadephia in 1928. He attended an all black elementary schooll in West Chester, Pennsylvania before attending an integrated high school. Gaither attended Lincoln University in 1945 and went on to Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tennessee to earn his doctorate degree in Dental Surgery. He joined the Air Force in 1955 and spent three years an oral surgeon in Germany. Gaither retired in 1987 having served over thirty years in the Reserves.
• Interview: Pinn, Vivan, 2018

  Vivian Pinn, MD, was the first full-time Director of the Office of Research on Women’s Health (ORWH) from 1991-2011 at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and NIH Associate Director for Research on Women’s Health. In 1967, Dr. Pinn graduated from the University of Virginia School of Medicine as the only African American woman in her class. Dr. Pinn was a Professor and Chair of the Department of Pathology at Howard University College of Medicine, Associate Professor of Pathology and Assistant Dean of Student Affairs at Tufts University School of Medicine, and Teaching Fellow at Harvard Medical School. In this interview Dr. Pinn discusses impressions of the women in her life and how this influenced the woman she was to become. She then speaks about the moments in her life that impacted her career path in medicine that coincided with the struggles of being black woman in medicine. She closes this interview with advice to women graduating from college and entering the workforce.