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M arch 09,1994 • T he P ortland O bserver
P age Bö
“Maggie’s American Dream
The Magnificent Healing Lady
P rof . M c K inley B urt
>
READER HAS JUST
/ \ TAKEN ME TO TASK
FOR NOT INCLUDING A
FEMALE IN MY PORTRAITS OF
BLACK CONTRIBUTORS TO
MEDICINE.
by
I was saving this gem tor a spe­
cial monograph to be published this
spring, but let me add this bit ot
reassurance to those women who
might wonder if they had carved a
place in the early history of the heal­
ing arts.
Mary Seacole, bom in Kingston,
Jamaica (1805) was a nurse whose
reputation just after the Crimean War
in Europe (1853-56) rivalled or sur­
passed that of the renowned Florence
Nightingale. Again, I am indebted to
that international “Electronic Infor­
mation Superhighway” for a continu­
ous flow of documentation of impor­
tant elements of black history. At the
end of this article you will find cita­
tions of several key sources.
M ary’s mother was a competent
practitioner o f Jamaican traditional
medicine and kept a boarding-house
where she cared for invalid officers
and their wives. She is said to have
“soaked up” medical knowledge from
early childhood and in early youth
had gained a reputation as “a skillful
nurse and doc tress”. Before and after
marriage to a Horatio Seacole, she
traveled widely -- twice to England
and then, in 1851 during the Califor­
nia Gold Rush, she joined her brother
Edward in Panama where she opened
a hotel.
During this period she saved her
first cholera patient and began the
foundation for a well-deserved inter-
national reputation. Like our other
medical pioneers of color Mary suf­
fered outrageous slurs and insults. “A
white American suggested that she be
bleached in order to make her as
acceptable in any company as she
deserves to be”. A woman of high
intelligence and quick w it, Mary wrote
the man a stinging letter which ended
“...as to the society which the process
[of bleaching] might gain me admis­
sion into,all I can say is, that, judging
from the specimens I have met with
here, I don’t think I shall lose much by
being excluded from it. So, gentle­
men, I drink to you and the general
reformation of American manners”.
The autumn of 1853 found her in
London where news came of the col­
lapse of the British army’s nursing
system in the Crimea and the agonies
heightened by gross m ismanagement.
Volunteering here services she re­
peatedly turned down, even by one of
the noted Florence Nightingale’s as­
sistants. Mary said, “I read in her face
the fact that had there been a vacancy,
I should not have been chosen to fill
it”. Fortunately for the British and
thousands of suffering soldiers, she
had a relative called Day with whom
a business enterprise was formed and
they proceeded to set up a store and
hotel at the main British army camp
in the Crimea.
Mary Seacole’s British hotel (and
army store, dispensary, hospital,etc.)
opened its doors in the summer of
1855 near the besieged town of
Sevstopol, Russia, a lieutenant in the
63rd West Suffolk regiment wrote,
“She was a wonderful w om an-all the
men swore by her, and in any case of
any malady would seek mary ’s advice
and use her herbal medicines, in pref­
erence to reporting themselves to their
own doctors...her never failing pres­
ence among the wounded after a battle
and assisting them made her beloved
by the rank and file of the whole army”.
It was with Russen, the first mod­
em war correspondent w ho made Mary
Seacole famous in England, “This
kind and successful physician”, he
wrote in a dispatch dated September
14,1855,” doctors and coresall m an­
ner o f man w ith ex trao rd in ary
success...I have seen her go down
under fire and a more lender or skill­
ful hand about a wound or a broken
limb could not be found among our
best surgeons”.
But the end of the war left Mary
back in England, broke and with a lot
of unused military stores on hand. A
letter in the London Times asks,
“While the benevolent deeds of Flo­
rence Nightingale are being handed
down to posterity...arc the humbler
deeds of Mrs. Seacole to be forgot­
ten?” Lord Robley and another Brit­
ish commander in the Crimea staged
a gigantic four-day musical benefit
for her at the Royal Gardens—1000
performers, nine military bands. So it
is diat she did not die in poverty and
left forgotten.
Mary published an autobiogra­
phy in 1857, “Wonderful Adventures
of Mrs. Seacole In Many Lands”.
Other citations are Alexander and
Dewjee, Mary Seacole: Jamaican
National Heroine and Doctress In
The Crimean War, Brent Library
Service, 1982. Ed. W.J.S., W onder­
ful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole In
Many Lands, James Blackwood, 1858
and Frederick Robinson, Dairy O f
The Crimean War, Richard Bentley,
1861 (P.290).
Noted psychiatrist and author Dr. James Comer and Maxine Powell (far left), director of c° ntr'but 0™’
Kraft General Foods, discuss the "Maggie’s American Dream" outreach program with students at hiss
Elementary School in Chicago. A donation from Kraft General Foods will help to underwrite the
distribution of audiocassettes of "Maggie's American Dream" to 10,000 schools and community groups
across the United States.
A Well Tuned Car Is A Pollution Solution
Blacks More Prone to Kidney Disease
Diabetes: Heme Tests Can Help
First, the bad news: Kidney fail­
ure strikes African Americans four
times more often than Whites. They’re
twice as likely to get high blood pres­
sure, the number one cause of kidney
failure. And they’re. And they’re twice
as likely to get high blood pressure,
the number one cause of kidney fail­
ure. And they’re nearly four times
more prone to diabetic kidney dis­
ease. For years, health groups have
urged Blacks to get tested for these
high risk diseases, yet the numbers
haven’t changed much. But there is
some hopeful news” now there arc
inexpensive home health tests avail­
able in local pharmacies that detect
kidney disease or diabetes and can
give Black people an advantage in
their fight against these potential kill­
ers.
Since the early stages of kidney
disease and diabetes are often “silent”
with no outward symptoms, regular
testing can detect an illness before it
becomes more serious and more costly
to treat, noted
Dr. Douglas Lind, a Boston
health care consultant and internal
medicine specialist at St. Elizabeth’s
Hospital.
For instance, adult onset diabe­
tes (the most common form) caught
in the earliest stages can often be
regulated with diet and exercise. But
if left undiagnosed and untreated,
diabetes may lead to blindness, heart
disease, amputations, kidney failure
and other devastating complications,
as well as death, said Lind. This is
especially important to Blacks be­
cause more than 2.1 million arc esti­
mated to have the disease yclonly half
are diagnosed. Once an African
American develops diabetes, they arc
3.6 times as likely as Whites to also
get kidney disease.
The same goes for kidney disease
caused by high blood pressure, said
Lind. As many as a quarter of those on
dialysis (an artificial kidney machine)
started out with slightly high blood
• weakness
• vomiting, nausea
• blood or protein in the urine
Prevention tip s-
• reduce high blood pressure by
losing weight if overweight, stop
smoking,
• cut back on salt use, get regular
exercise, reduce stress
• avoid m edications that may dam­
age kidneys (ask your pharmacist
or doctor)
• eat less protein in meals
• get early treatm en t for urin ary
trac t infections, that can travel up
to kidneys-regular testing for kid­
ney disorders can be done with a
simple, inexpensive home test like
Biotel Kidney home screeningTest,
which detects blood and protein tin
the urine and can alert you to prob­
lems before symptoms appear. If
the test is positive, see your doctor
immediately for every treatment.
Diabetes: In Type I (insulin de­
pendent) diabetes, the pancreas can’t
produce insulin. In Type 2 diabetes,
insulin is produced , but the body
can’t use it properly. Untreated dia­
betes can have devastating complica­
tions like blindness, kidney failure
heart disease and even death.
Common signs o f problems—
• frequent urination
• excessive thirst-extreme tiredness
• unexplained weight loss
• blurry vision
• a parent, b ro th er or sister who
has diabetes
Prevention tip s-
• lose weight if overweight, follow
a healthy diet, get regular ex er­
cise-regular testing for diabetes
can be done with a simple, inexpen­
sive home test like Biotel Diabetes
following tips:
Home Screening Test, which de­
Common signs o f problems--
tects higher than normal amount so
• b u rn in g during urination, in­
blood sugar in the urine and can
creased frequency
u nation
alert you to problems before symp­
• pudginess around the eyes, swell­
toms appear. If the test is positive,
ing hand or feet-pain in lower back
see your doctor immediately for
or below ribs
early
treatment.
• higliblood pressure
pressure that wasn’t treated effec­
tively.
Now people can screen them­
selves for diabetes and kidney prob­
lems with urine tests made by Biotel
Corp, that are equal in sensitivity to
those used by private physicians and
in hospitals, yet cost less than S I.00
each. The kidney test detects excess
protein and microscopic amounts of
blood in urine, which often signal a
kidney disorder. (Kidneys arc filters
that clean the blood. When they lose
any ability to filter, excess protein
winds up in the urine. When kidney
tissue is damaged by stones, infection
ordiscase, blood appears in the urine.)
The diabetes test detects higher than
normal glucose levels, which signal
that diabetes may be present.
Accurate and easy-to-use, the
tests arc done by dipping a test strip
into a urine sample, waiting 30 sec­
onds then comparing the color on the
strip with a chart on the containers. If
the color is in the “not normal” cat­
egory, the user should call the doctor
immediately for early care.
“Since Blacks arc a greater risk
and the health stakes can be so high,
regular self testing can make a huge
difference in uncovering kidney dis­
ease and diabetes as early as pos­
sible,” Lind added.
KIDNEY DISEASE & DIABETES:
What To Look For, What To Do
Blacks arc more likely to get
kidney disease and diabetes. Know­
ing some signs and prevention mea­
sures may help avoid a problem or
catch it early, said Dr. Douglas D.
Lind, a Boston health care consultant
and internal medicine specialist at St.
Elizabeth’s Hospital. He offered the
African American Orchestrates Nike’s
Return To South Africa
American international manage­
m en t c o n s u lta n t, L ey lan d R.
Hazlewood, has helped U.S. footwear
and leisure apparel giant NI KE Inter­
national reestablish direct links with
South Africa. What makes Nike’s
comeback interesting is the manner
in which they elected to do so. Nike
has awarded the distribution and
manufacturing rights for South Af­
rica to O d y ssey S ports. The
Johannesburg company will manu­
facture Nike’s leisurewear, and mar­
ket and distribute Nike footwear
through 400 outlets. This joint-ven­
ture was spearheaded by a group of
South African B lacks who negotiated
the deal with the assistance of Mr.
Hazlewood, Chairman of Dimpcx,
Inc. an African-American owned
com pany
w ith
o ffic e s
in
Johannesburg.
According to the Chairman of Odys­
sey Sports, Sam Noinyane, last Sep­
tember, he and two other independent
Soweto businessmen approached Mr.
Hazlewod for assistance in preparing
a business plan to submit to Nike.
According to Mr. Hazlewood, “ In
less than a month I helped raise $3
million, negotiate a joint-venture in
South Africa to ensure that the con­
sortium could demonstrate to Nike
that it had the financial strength,
warehousing, distribution equipment,
facilities, knowledge of the products
and the trade.” The team clinched the
deal at Nike’s headquarters in Bea­
verton, Oregon in October.
The Nike collaboration with
Soweto businessmen is an al temati vc
model that should help to destroy
myths and negative stereotypes that
serve to inhibit the true economic em­
powerment of enterprising Blacks. It
also demonstrates how African Ameri­
cans and Black South Africans can
work together.
Among the numerous govern­
ment and consume groups most con­
cerned about air quality is the Ameri­
can Lung Association. Every Octo­
ber, during National Car Care Month,
American Lung Assoc iation chapters
participate in vehicle check lanes to
monitor exhaust emissions and safety
conditions of the vehicles in their
communities.
A pioneer among the sponsoring
organizations is the Birmingham
Committee for Car Care and Clean
Air, consisting of the American Lung
Association of alabama, A A A of Ala­
bama, the Jefferson County Depart­
ment of Health, the Birmingham
Audubon Society and the Birming­
ham Regional Planning Commission.
Using the theme, “A Well Tuned Car
is a Pollution Solution,” this commit­
tee provides consumers with free ve­
hicle safety and emission inspections
plus educational material about pre­
ventive maintenance.
At the forefront of this campaign
is American Lung Association of
Alabama’s Executive Director, Jim
Hughes, who initiated the check lane
program in Birmingham. He reports
an overall improvement in vehicle
condition since the program started
in 1986.
“Last October we inspected 305
vehicles, of which 22 percent failed
the emissions test,” he says. “While
there’s plenty of room for improvement,
that still represents significant progress
over 1986, when 35 percent failed.
We continue to see signs of ne­
glected maintenance,” Hughes re­
ports. “Better than one out of four had
lire problems and/or low oil level.
Belts and hoses also showed lack of
attention.
But w e’re making headway.
®tje Jänrtlanö ©bserUer
DISTRIBUTION LOCATIONS
N ,E. PORTLAND (#1-35)
NECDE
TEXA S
R E ST U A R A N T
LOUNGE
AMERICAN RED CROSS
EMANUEL HOSPITAL
DR. REYNOLDS
DR. MORRIS
CHUCK’S MARKET
URBAN LEAGUE
ELDERLY HOME
CH2A
MATT DISHMAN COMMU­
NITY CENTER
KATHY’S MARKET
TROPICANA INN
HOUSE OF SOUND
LOVE LEE LADEE
WILLIAMS MARKET
CRAIGO’S
PESOS RESTUARANT
ADULT AND FAMILY SER­
VICES (WELFARE OFFICE)
UNEMPLOYMENT OFFICE
WILLIAMS GOING STREET
MARKET
SUPER 98 STORE
KC MARKET
LITTLE CHAEL OF THE
CHIMES
LIBRARY
PORTLAND COMMUNITY
COLLEGE (CASCADE)
BEE COMPANY
LIQUOR STORE
LAUNDRY MAT
ASTRO MARKET
PENNINSULA PARK
SENTRY
ELK CLEANERS
COLLINS CORNER
MIAMI CONNECTION
2.
4.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
DOWNTOWN (#36-45)
36.
CHILDREN’S CLINIC/VAN-
COUVER & EMERSON
37. POST OFFICE
38. POWELL’S BOOK STORE
39. RICH’S TABBACCO STORE
40. WASHINGTON POST
41. CITY HALL
42. COURTHOUSE
43. PORTLAND BUILDING
44. PORTLAND STATE UNI­
VERSITY
45. VIKING BURGER
LLOYD CENTER AREA
(#46-75)
46.
47.
METRO BUILDING
STATE BUILDING
48.
49.
50.
51.
52.
53.
54.
55.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.
61.
62.
63.
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87.
88.
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90.
91.
92.
93.
94.
B O N N E V IL L E
POW ER
ADMIN
GOLDEN PALACE
7-11
SANDWICH EXPERIENCE
FIRST INTERSTATE BANK
SPARKLE CLEANERS
SKIPPERS
TACO BELL
M ULTNOMAH ATHLETIC
CLUB
LIQUOR STORE
SAFEWAY
FIRST INTERSTATE
WIGLAND
SEI
PRIVATE INDUSTR YCOUN-
CIL
EZCARR
CARR CHEVROLET
MINI MARKET
FRED MEYER
BJ TOUCH OF CLASS
PAPA ALDO’S
VIDEO CHEST
JUSTIN’S MARKET
LEARNING CENTER
STOP IN MARKET
FIRST INTERSTATE
CINDY’S CLEANERS
EVERGREEN MARKET
MINI MAN MARKET
43 & K LAUNDRYMAT
PROFESSIONAL HARI SA-
LON
SUB SHOP
CHUCK HINTON’S
LIQUOR STORE
AINSWORTH DRUG STORE
BRANDEL’S MARKET
ONE STOP RECORDS
HOUSE OF UMOJA
TEXAS I
JOE’S PLACE
LATIENDA VIDEO RENT-
ALS
BOBBY BARBER SHOP
ALBERTA LIQUIDATORS
TACORIA
FARRIS FASHIONS
TIFFANY’S
FOOD KING MARKET
N. AREA (#95-104)
95.
96.
97.
98.
99.
ASTRO MARKET
WINCHELLS
7-11
LUNG FUNG
SUNBRITE’S CLEANERS
• ¿
; t
à.j.
-
According to the Car Care Coun
cil.whoadminister National Car Care
Month, owners should become more
aware of the signs of deteriorating
engine performance. On new cars,
with their numerous sensors and com-
This condition also leads to ex­
cessive exhaust emissions and pol­
luted atmosphere. These vehicles, the
gross polluters, are the target of the
National Car CARE Month effort.
As Jim Hughes em phasizes,
“Public awareness works. We just
have to keep at it.”
For a free pamphletentitled, “The
Eight Most Com mon Signs Your Care
Needs a Tune-up,” send a business­
sized, self-addressed, stamped enve­
lope to Car Care Council, Depart­
ment T, One Grande Lake Drive, Port
Clinton, OH 43452.
sgSx
> ..
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100. TOBBCO SUPER MARKET
101. SKIPPERS
102. PLAID PANTRY
103. CHECK MART
104. KEINOW’S
105. PIETRO’S PIZZA
106. ARTIC CIRCLE
107. MOCK CREST GROCERY
108. COLUMBIA
109. HOUSING AUTHORITY
110. REC
111. HEALTH CENTER
112. MEAT MARKET
113. SUPERFINE FOOD
114. LOMBARD MARKET
115. TACO BELL
116. J ABELL’S
117. SUB-WAY
118. FISHERMAN WARF
119. ONE-STOP
120. WACKY’S BBQ
121. 7-11
122. PIZZA HUT
123. DAIRY QUEEN
124. THE DELI EXPRESS
125. SAFEWAY
126. LIQUOR STORE
127. 7-11
128. PLAID PANTRY
129. FRED MEYERS
130. A M ER IC A N
C H IN E SE
FOOD
132.
133.
134.
135.
136.
137.
138.
139.
140.
PEACOCK CLEANERS
ARCO UNION AVE
ALBERTA ST MARKET
PACIFIC POWER & LIGHT
15TH AVE
NICK’S ARCO MLK LOM-
BARD
KING’S FOOD MART MLK
FRE
MOM
BONNEVILLE POWER
EMANUEL HOSPITAL
14TH PRESCOTT MARKET
VANCOUVER (#141-153)
141.
142.
143.
144.
145.
146.
147.
148.
149.
150.
151.
152.
FRED MEYER 75
CLARK COLLEGE 50
COURT HOUSE 25
CITY HALL 25
PRIVATE IND COUNCIL 20
7-11
SAFEWAY 25 - 100 WITH
RACK
EMPLOYMENT OFFICE 25
POST OFFICE 50
LOTTERY STORE 15
ELEVATIONS FOOTWEAR
HEALTH CLUB