Fighting for life

by Baker, S. Josephine, (Sara Josephine)

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Title Statements

Full title :Fighting for life / by S. Josephine Baker ; introduction by Helen Epstein.

Summary

"New York's Lower East Side was said to be the most densely populated square mile on the face of the earth in the 1890s. City health inspectors called the neighborhood "the suicide ward" and referred to one particular tenement--in an official Health Department report, no less--as an "out and out hog pen." Diarrhea epidemics raged each summer, killing thousands of city children. Sweatshop babies with smallpox and typhus dozed in garment heaps destined for fashionable Broadway shops. Desperate mothers paced the streets to soothe their feverish children, and white mourning cloths hung from every building. A third of children living in the slums died before their fifth birthday. By 1911, the child death rate had fallen sharply and The New York Times hailed the city as the healthiest on earth. In this witty and highly personal autobiography, public health crusader Dr. Sara Josephine Baker explains how this remarkable transformation was achieved. By the time she retired from the New York City Health Department in 1923, Baker was famous worldwide for saving the lives of 90,000 children. The public health programs Baker developed, many still in use today, have probably saved the lives of millions more. She also fought for women's suffrage, toured Russia in the 1930s, and captured "Typhoid" Mary Malone, twice. She was also an astute observer of her times, and Fighting for Life is one of the most honest, compassionate memoirs of American medicine ever written"--Provided by publisher.

Edition Statements

Publication Date:2013

Publication Statements

Publisher(s):New York Review Books
Place of Publication:New York
Language:eng
Publication Date:2013

Notes

Includes index.

The Physical Object

Description:xviii, 264 pages : : illustrations, portraits.

Edition Identifiers

ISBN:9781590177068, 1590177061
oclc:ocn864530917
LC Classification:R690
Dewey Decimal:610.92

Subjects

Autobiographies Autobiography Baker, S. Josephine, (Sara Josephine) Biographies Child Mortality -- history Child welfare Child welfare -- History Child welfare -- History. -- New York (… Children -- Mortality Children -- Mortality -- New York (Stat… Enfants -- Mortalité -- New York (État) History History, 19th Century History, 20th Century Médecine -- Histoire -- 19e siècle Médecine -- Histoire -- 20e siècle Médecins New York (N.Y.) -- Histoire -- 19e sièc… New York (N.Y.) -- Histoire -- 20e sièc… New York (N.Y.) -- History -- 20th cent…