Sara Josephine Baker
Encyclopedia
Sara Josephine Baker was an American physician notable for contributions to public health
in New York City. She is best known for commenting on urban conditions for the poor in her statement that a person was more likely to die by being born in the United States than as a soldier in World War I
.
, and graduated in 1898. In 1901 Baker passed the civil service
exam and qualified to be a medical inspector at the Department of Health, working as a school inspector. Upon working in these schools, she was offered the opportunity to lower the death rate in Hell's Kitchen
, which was considered the worst slum in New York at the turn of the century with as many as 4,500 people dying every week. Baker decided to focus on the infant mortality
rate, as babies accounted for about 1,500 deaths every seven days. Most of the deaths were due to dysentery
.
due to gonorrhea
: to prevent blindness, babies were given drops of silver nitrate
in their eyes, but often the bottles in which the silver nitrate were kept would become unsanitary or too highly concentrated, causing blindness anyway. Baker started using small containers made out of beeswax
that held enough silver nitrate for one eye. This way the silver nitrate would stay at a safe level and wouldn't get dirty. Through Josephine Baker's efforts, infants were much safer than they had been the previous year (blindness decreased from 300 babies/year to 3/year within 2 years). But there was still one area where infancy was dangerous: at birth. Babies were all too often delivered by midwives with no guarantee of expertise. Baker convinced New York City to license midwives in order to ensure a degree of quality and expertise.
While Baker was campaigning to license midwives, treat blindness, encourage breastfeeding, provide safe pasteurized milk, and educate mothers, older children were still getting sick and malnourished. Baker worked to make sure each school was given its own doctor and nurse, and the children were routinely checked for diseases like lice and trachoma
. This system worked so well that diseases once rampant in schools become almost obsolete.
Early in her career, she had helped to twice catch Mary Mallon
, also known as Typhoid Mary. Mallon was the first known healthy carrier of typhoid who infected countless people through her job as a cook. Mallon was not the only repeat offender in being a typhoid-contagious cook, but she was the only one put in isolation for the rest of her life. It may have been relevant that the other offenders were male, or that they were not of Irish
heritage.
. After the United States entered World War I
, Baker became even better known. Most of this publicity was generated from her comment to a New York Times reporter. She told him that it was safer to be on the front lines than to be born in the United States because the soldiers died at a rate of 4%, whereas babies died at a rate of 12%. She was able to start a lunch program for school children due to the publicity this comment brought. She made use of the publicity around the high rate of young men being declared 4F (not eligible for draft due to poor health) as a motivating factor for support in her work on improving the health of children.
Baker was offered a job in London
as health director of public schools, a job in France
taking care of war refugees, and a job in the United States as Assistant Surgeon General
. In 1923 she retired, but she didn't stop working.
Josephine Baker became the first woman to be a professional representative to the League of Nations
when she represented the United States in the Health Committee. Many government positions, departments, and committees were created because of her work including the Federal Children's Bureau and Public Health Services (now the Department of Health and Human Services) and child hygiene departments in every state. She was also active in many groups and societies including over twenty-five medical societies and the New York State Department of Health
. She also became the President of the American Medical Women's Association
and wrote 250 articles (both professional and for the popular press), 4 books, and her autobiography before her death in 1945.
, a novelist and essayist from England
, and self-identified as a 'woman-oriented woman'. Wylie is best known for the novel "The Daughter of Brahma", and "Life with George", an autobiography. When Baker retired in 1923, she started to run their household while writing her autobiography. In 1935, Baker and Wylie decided to move to Princeton, New Jersey
, together with their friend Louise Pearce. Pearce was a biological researcher at the Rockefeller Institute, working on animal models for trypanosoma
(African sleeping sickness) and syphilis
, and the testing of treatments. Pearce later became the president of the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania. While Baker and Pearce left little documentation of their personal lives, Wylie was open about her orientation. But she did not identify either Baker or Pearce in her writings. Wylie's papers, including some personal letters, were donated to the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania (now Drexel University College of Medicine
), where they are available in the college's archives.
Public health
Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals" . It is concerned with threats to health based on population health...
in New York City. She is best known for commenting on urban conditions for the poor in her statement that a person was more likely to die by being born in the United States than as a soldier in World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
.
Early life and education
Baker was born in Poughkeepsie, New York in 1873 to a wealthy Quaker family. At the age of 16, Baker decided on a career in medicine after her father and brother died of typhoid. After studying chemistry and biology at home, she enrolled in the New York Infirmary Medical College, a medical school for women, founded by the sisters and physicians Elizabeth Blackwell and Emily BlackwellEmily Blackwell
Emily Blackwell was the second woman to earn a medical degree at what is now Case Western Reserve University, and the third openly identified woman to earn a medical degree in the United States.-Biography:...
, and graduated in 1898. In 1901 Baker passed the civil service
Civil service
The term civil service has two distinct meanings:* A branch of governmental service in which individuals are employed on the basis of professional merit as proven by competitive examinations....
exam and qualified to be a medical inspector at the Department of Health, working as a school inspector. Upon working in these schools, she was offered the opportunity to lower the death rate in Hell's Kitchen
Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan
Hell's Kitchen, also known as Clinton and Midtown West, is a neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City between 34th Street and 59th Street, from 8th Avenue to the Hudson River....
, which was considered the worst slum in New York at the turn of the century with as many as 4,500 people dying every week. Baker decided to focus on the infant mortality
Infant mortality
Infant mortality is defined as the number of infant deaths per 1000 live births. Traditionally, the most common cause worldwide was dehydration from diarrhea. However, the spreading information about Oral Re-hydration Solution to mothers around the world has decreased the rate of children dying...
rate, as babies accounted for about 1,500 deaths every seven days. Most of the deaths were due to dysentery
Dysentery
Dysentery is an inflammatory disorder of the intestine, especially of the colon, that results in severe diarrhea containing mucus and/or blood in the faeces with fever and abdominal pain. If left untreated, dysentery can be fatal.There are differences between dysentery and normal bloody diarrhoea...
.
Public health
Baker and a group of nurses started to train mothers in how to care for their babies: how to clothe infants to keep them from getting too hot, how to feed them a good diet, how to keep them from suffocating, and how to keep them clean. She set up a milk station where clean, pasteurized milk was handed out to the indigent families in Hell's Kitchen. Pasteurized milk was a new innovation. Commercial milk at that time was often contaminated, or mixed with water and chalk to maximize profit. Baker also invented an infant formula made out of water, calcium carbonate, lactose, and cow milk. This enabled mothers to go to work so they could support their families. In 1910, to further help working mothers, Baker started the 'Little Mothers League' to train older sisters to care for their young siblings. She also aided in the prevention of blindnessBlindness
Blindness is the condition of lacking visual perception due to physiological or neurological factors.Various scales have been developed to describe the extent of vision loss and define blindness...
due to gonorrhea
Gonorrhea
Gonorrhea is a common sexually transmitted infection caused by the bacterium Neisseria gonorrhoeae. The usual symptoms in men are burning with urination and penile discharge. Women, on the other hand, are asymptomatic half the time or have vaginal discharge and pelvic pain...
: to prevent blindness, babies were given drops of silver nitrate
Silver nitrate
Silver nitrate is an inorganic compound with chemical formula . This compound is a versatile precursor to many other silver compounds, such as those used in photography. It is far less sensitive to light than the halides...
in their eyes, but often the bottles in which the silver nitrate were kept would become unsanitary or too highly concentrated, causing blindness anyway. Baker started using small containers made out of beeswax
Beeswax
Beeswax is a natural wax produced in the bee hive of honey bees of the genus Apis. It is mainly esters of fatty acids and various long chain alcohols...
that held enough silver nitrate for one eye. This way the silver nitrate would stay at a safe level and wouldn't get dirty. Through Josephine Baker's efforts, infants were much safer than they had been the previous year (blindness decreased from 300 babies/year to 3/year within 2 years). But there was still one area where infancy was dangerous: at birth. Babies were all too often delivered by midwives with no guarantee of expertise. Baker convinced New York City to license midwives in order to ensure a degree of quality and expertise.
While Baker was campaigning to license midwives, treat blindness, encourage breastfeeding, provide safe pasteurized milk, and educate mothers, older children were still getting sick and malnourished. Baker worked to make sure each school was given its own doctor and nurse, and the children were routinely checked for diseases like lice and trachoma
Trachoma
Trachoma is an infectious disease causing a characteristic roughening of the inner surface of the eyelids. Also called granular conjunctivitis and Egyptian ophthalmia, it is the leading cause of infectious blindness in the world...
. This system worked so well that diseases once rampant in schools become almost obsolete.
Early in her career, she had helped to twice catch Mary Mallon
Mary Mallon
Mary Mallon , also known as Typhoid Mary, was the first person in the United States identified as an asymptomatic carrier of the pathogen associated with typhoid fever. She was presumed to have infected some 53 people, three of whom died, over the course of her career as a cook...
, also known as Typhoid Mary. Mallon was the first known healthy carrier of typhoid who infected countless people through her job as a cook. Mallon was not the only repeat offender in being a typhoid-contagious cook, but she was the only one put in isolation for the rest of her life. It may have been relevant that the other offenders were male, or that they were not of Irish
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
heritage.
Professional recognition
Josephine Baker was becoming famous, so much so that New York University Medical School asked her to lecture there on children’s health, or 'child hygiene', as it was known at the time. Baker said she would if she could also enroll in the School. The school initially turned her down, but eventually acquiesced after looking for a male lecturer to match her knowledge. So in 1917 Baker graduated with a doctorate in public healthPublic health
Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals" . It is concerned with threats to health based on population health...
. After the United States entered World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, Baker became even better known. Most of this publicity was generated from her comment to a New York Times reporter. She told him that it was safer to be on the front lines than to be born in the United States because the soldiers died at a rate of 4%, whereas babies died at a rate of 12%. She was able to start a lunch program for school children due to the publicity this comment brought. She made use of the publicity around the high rate of young men being declared 4F (not eligible for draft due to poor health) as a motivating factor for support in her work on improving the health of children.
Baker was offered a job in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
as health director of public schools, a job in France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
taking care of war refugees, and a job in the United States as Assistant Surgeon General
Surgeon General of the United States
The Surgeon General of the United States is the operational head of the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps and thus the leading spokesperson on matters of public health in the federal government...
. In 1923 she retired, but she didn't stop working.
Josephine Baker became the first woman to be a professional representative to the League of Nations
League of Nations
The League of Nations was an intergovernmental organization founded as a result of the Paris Peace Conference that ended the First World War. It was the first permanent international organization whose principal mission was to maintain world peace...
when she represented the United States in the Health Committee. Many government positions, departments, and committees were created because of her work including the Federal Children's Bureau and Public Health Services (now the Department of Health and Human Services) and child hygiene departments in every state. She was also active in many groups and societies including over twenty-five medical societies and the New York State Department of Health
New York State Department of Health
The New York State Department of Health, ', is the governmental body responsible for public health in the state of New York. The cabinet-level department is headed by the Health Commissioner, a position held since January 24, 2011 by Nirav R. Shah, M.D., M.P.H.....
. She also became the President of the American Medical Women's Association
American Medical Women's Association
The American Medical Women's Association is a professional advocacy and educational organization of women physicians and medical students. Founded in 1915 by Bertha VanHoosen, the AMWA works to advance women in medicine and to serve as a voice for women's health...
and wrote 250 articles (both professional and for the popular press), 4 books, and her autobiography before her death in 1945.
Personal life
Josephine Baker wrote very little about her personal life, however her lover and partner for much of the later part of her life was Ida Alexa Ross WylieIda Alexa Ross Wylie
Ida Alexa Ross Wylie, also Ida Alena Ross Wylie, born 16 March 1885 in Melbourne, died 4 November 1959 in Princeton, New Jersey, usually known by her pen name I. A. R...
, a novelist and essayist from England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, and self-identified as a 'woman-oriented woman'. Wylie is best known for the novel "The Daughter of Brahma", and "Life with George", an autobiography. When Baker retired in 1923, she started to run their household while writing her autobiography. In 1935, Baker and Wylie decided to move to Princeton, New Jersey
Princeton, New Jersey
Princeton is a community located in Mercer County, New Jersey, United States. It is best known as the location of Princeton University, which has been sited in the community since 1756...
, together with their friend Louise Pearce. Pearce was a biological researcher at the Rockefeller Institute, working on animal models for trypanosoma
Trypanosoma
Trypanosoma is a genus of kinetoplastids , a monophyletic group of unicellular parasitic flagellate protozoa. The name is derived from the Greek trypano and soma because of their corkscrew-like motion. All trypanosomes are heteroxenous and are transmitted via a vector...
(African sleeping sickness) and syphilis
Syphilis
Syphilis is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the spirochete bacterium Treponema pallidum subspecies pallidum. The primary route of transmission is through sexual contact; however, it may also be transmitted from mother to fetus during pregnancy or at birth, resulting in congenital syphilis...
, and the testing of treatments. Pearce later became the president of the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania. While Baker and Pearce left little documentation of their personal lives, Wylie was open about her orientation. But she did not identify either Baker or Pearce in her writings. Wylie's papers, including some personal letters, were donated to the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania (now Drexel University College of Medicine
Drexel University College of Medicine
Drexel University College of Medicine is the medical school of Drexel University. The medical school has the nation's largest enrollment for a private medical school, and represents the consolidation of two medical schools: the nation's first medical school for women and the first U.S. college of...
), where they are available in the college's archives.
Further reading
- 1 Baker, Josephine S. Fighting For Life. New York: Arno Press, 1974.
- Sarah Josephine Baker:Physician and Public Health Worker at www.harvardsquarelibrary.org
- Leavitt, Judith Walzer (1996) Typhoid Mary. Captive to the Public's Health. Boston: Beacon Press.
- Changing the Face of Medicine | Dr. S. Josephine Baker at www.nlm.nih.gov
- Sample Module 2 at www.the-aps.org
- Scholer, A.M. (1997) Louise Pearce, (1885–1959) In, Women in the biological sciences: a bibliographic sourcebook. *Grinstein, L.S., C. A. Biermann, & R. K. Rose. Greenwood Press.