The Black Angels: The Untold Story of the Nurses Who Helped Cure Tuberculosis

Books

Spanning the Great Depression and moving through World War II and beyond, this remarkable true story follows the intrepid young women known by their patients as the "Black Angels." For twenty years, they risked their lives work­ing under appalling conditions while caring for New York's poorest residents, who languished in wards, waiting to die, or became guinea pigs for experimental surgeries and often deadly drugs. But despite their major role in desegregating the New York City hospital system-and their vital work in helping to find the cure for tuberculo­sis at Sea View-these nurses were completely erased from history. The Black Angels recovers the voices of these extraordinary women and puts them at the center of this riveting story, celebrating their legacy and spirit of survival. In the pre-antibiotic days when tuber­culosis stirred people's darkest fears, killing one in seven, white nurses at Sea View, New York's largest municipal hospital, began quitting en masse. Desperate to avert a public health ...