Dr. Matilda Evans: South Carolina’s Medical Pioneer
Born four years after the end of slavery, Matilda Arabella Evans, who grew up on a family farm in eastern Aiken County, South Carolina, was the first African American and first woman in licensed to practice medicine in South Carolina and an advocate for improved health care for African Americans, including children. Matilda’schildhood experiences, educational background, […]
The Medical University of South Carolina: An Interactive History
This lecture tells the story of the largest medical school in the south, M.U.S.C., whose 19th century origins played a significant role in the history of Charleston, the U.S. South, and American medical education. The rich history of the medical school touches on matters of race, medical experimentation, innovative surgery, nursing, and public health.
South Carolina’s Medical Past
From its earliest inception as a European settlement, South Carolina has been a hotbed of both infectious disease and for innovative approaches to curbing disease and establishing public health. This lecture focuses on the fascinating history of medicine in South Carolina from the 17th to the 21st centuries.
Public Health and Pandemics in the Atlantic World
This presentation places in historical context the long history of how pandemics and epidemics of infectious disease have shaped the American history and the history of the Atlantic World. We will highlight the role of transatlantic slavery, the establishment of the plantation economy, and the last social and political impacts of disease on our world […]
COVID-19 in Historical Perspective
The COVID-19 pandemic has left us with a lot of questions about the role, the place, and repeated occurrence of new diseases. This lecture considers COVID-19 in light of several past pandemics, starting with the global spread of disease in the 19th century, turning to the decline of infectious diseases in the 20th century, and finally, the […]
How FDR Vanquished Polio
Few Americans remember that FDR, besides leading our country through the Great Depression and World War II, was also the founder of the National Foundation of Infantile Paralysis, better known as the March of Dimes. This charity fought the terrible scourge of polio with both assistance to the stricken and research to find a vaccine, […]
Talking to Disaster: Finding healing through poetry
(Adults)After a disaster, communities find comfort in poems that speak to their sense of loss. Whether dealing with personal grief or processing a disaster, individuals can be overwhelmed with emotions. Yet a special type of healing comes from reading and hearing words that echo your own complex feelings. In this reading and discussion, poet Kimberly […]
The Little Chairs – Helping Young Children Understand Mental Illness
In 1999, Warbranch Press published The Little Chairs, a story based on real life experience in Kate’s family. Kate’s father, a WWII veteran, was chronically depressed and would retreat to a dark corner when he didn’t feel like participating in family activities. The book shows in vivid colors and narrative how Kate’s mother eventually got her […]
Mary Draper Ingles, Survivor of the Wilderness, 1755
Talk about a hiking challenge! How about a 500 mile wilderness trek, without food, fire, or weapons, in early winter and while wearing a summer dress? Captured by a Shawnee war party in the French and Indian War and taken more than 450 miles from her home to what is now Cincinnati, Mary Ingles escaped […]
Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, 1962
Rachel Carson is depicted just after the publication of Silent Spring and 18 months before she dies of breast cancer. Warning of dangers of pesticides and pollution, Silent Spring races to the top of the bestseller list, and Rachel Carson is attacked on all sides by the chemical industry. Proclaimed founder of the Environmental Movement, she is still maligned […]
Sports and Humanities
This presentation traces the importance of sport to antiquity and around the world – we begin with sports “propaganda” on Grecian urns and end with a discussion of the who “owns” the modern athlete. Marketing campaigns and the evolution of sport also explored, along with the role of women in sport throughout history, “GOATs,” and […]
The Early Novel as Self-Help Book: The Curious Intersections of Fiction and Medicine
Today we think of novels as little more than entertainment. When the genre emerged in the eighteenth century, novels also had an almost medicinal function: they were texts that helped readers regulate their passions. Drawing on recent scholarship, this talk will explain how reading fiction was thought to improve health. Equally important, it will explore […]
A Poet and the Gift of Blindness
Humphries sees with more than her eyes; she perceives with her entire being—signature of a stride, voices as distinct as thumbprints, memory as toned and sleek as an elite athlete, blended with sense of humor and common sense. Ann’s sensory inventory infuses her poetry, which in turn operates as a vehicle for sense to explore […]
The Joys of Laughter
Did you know that laughter and crying are a baby’s first means of communicating? A speaker laughs 46% more than the people listening? Or that about 1300 AD, Giotto painted the first human smiling? These questions, their answers, and a half-dozen pertinent cartoons are the subject of this Q and A presentation.
The Joys of Aging
Did you know that the peak age for psychological well-being is 82? That prune juice outsells orange juice in Miami? Or that 94% of Clemson faculty and staff remain in the immediate area after retirement? These questions, their answers, and a half-dozen pertinent cartoons are the subject of this Q and A presentation.