Louis T Wright, MD, FACS (1891 to 1952), and the Integration of American Medicine

摘要

Louis T Wright, MD, (1891 to 1952, Fig. 1) was the most prominent African-American surgeon of the first half of the 20th century. Growing up in the Jim Crow South, training in medicine at Harvard, and practicing as the country's most prominent black surgeon during the Harlem Renaissance, he faced racial animus throughout his life. He advanced racial integration of all hospitals, medical schools, and training programs. He opposed accommodation to segregation, especially all-black hospitals. With a commanding personality and in key positions in both medicine and racial politics, he shaped the integration of US medicine. His legacy came 12 years after his death, when the Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawed discrimination on the basis of race in all public and federally supported facilities, including hospitals. Despite his impact, Wright is not widely known in medical history. Most of the material in this article draws from recent summaries of his work with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) by physician-historian P Preston Reynolds and a self-published biography by Robert C Hayden, not widely circulated but available through an internet vendor. Wright became the second African-American Fellow of the American College of Surgeons (ACS) and brought other qualified black surgeons into the organization, 2 important stories reviewed by others and not included in this article.