University of Kentucky UKnowledge University of Kentucky Master's Theses Graduate School 2011 “OBTUSE WOMEN”: VENEREAL DISEASE CONTROL POLICIES AND MAINTAINING A “FIT” NATION, 1920-1945 Evelyn Ashley Sorrell University of Kentucky, [email protected] Right click to open a feedback form in a new tab to let us know how this document benefits ou.y Recommended Citation Sorrell, Evelyn Ashley, "“OBTUSE WOMEN”: VENEREAL DISEASE CONTROL POLICIES AND MAINTAINING A “FIT” NATION, 1920-1945" (2011). University of Kentucky Master's Theses. 113. https://uknowledge.uky.edu/gradschool_theses/113 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at UKnowledge. It has been accepted for inclusion in University of Kentucky Master's Theses by an authorized administrator of UKnowledge. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ABSTRACT OF THESIS “OBTUSE WOMEN”: VENEREAL DISEASE CONTROL POLICIES AND MAINTAINING A “FIT’ NATION, 1920-1945 Public health officials and social reformers grew concerned over the prevalence of gonorrhea and syphilis following World War I. The initiatives put in place by authorities to control the spread of venereal disease lacked any concern for women’s health and sought to control their newly found independence and mobility. This thesis examines public health policies related to venereal disease control from 1920-1945 and how these regulations affected women in the United States. Laws and social reform measures such as pre-marital blood tests, the Sheppard-Towner Maternity and Infancy Act, and the use of quarantining prostitutes during World War I and World War II were passed by government officials to ensure the future of America as a fit fighting force of men, placing women’s health concerns last in its race for domination. Women essentially were marked as the diseased dangers to America’s health. KEYWORDS: Venereal Disease, World War I, World War II, Sheppard-Towner, quarantine Evelyn Ashley Sorrell April. 21, 2011 “OBSTUSE WOMEN”: VENEREAL DISEASE CONTROL POLICIES AND MAINTAINING A “FIT” NATION, 1920-1945 By Evelyn Ashley Sorrell Kathi Kern, Ph.D Director of Thesis David Hamilton, Ph.D Director of Graduate Studies May 6, 2011 RULES FOR THE USE OF THESIS Unpublished theses submitted for the Master’s degree and deposited in the University of Kentucky Library are as a rule open for inspection, but are to be used only with due regard to the rights of the authors. Bibliographical references may be noted, but quotations or summaries of parts may be published only with the permission of the author, and with the usual scholarly acknowledgments. Extensive copying or publication of the thesis in whole or in part also requires the consent of the Dean of the Graduate School of the University of Kentucky. THESIS Evelyn Ashley Sorrell The Graduate School University of Kentucky 2011 “OBTUSE WOMEN”: VENEREAL DISEASE CONTROL POLICIES AND MAINTAINING A “FIT” NATION, 1920-1945 ________________________________________ THESIS _________________________________________ A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of History in the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Kentucky By Evelyn Ashley Sorrell Lexington, Kentucky Director: Dr. Kathi Kern, Professor of History Lexington, Kentucky 2011 Copyright © Evelyn Ashley Sorrell 2011 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The completion of this thesis would not have been possible without the support and guidance from my advisor and committee chair, Dr. Kathi Kern. I am grateful to her ability to provide direction when I felt lost at sea and to her patience, as rambling always has been a weakness of mine. The arguments fleshed out in this thesis would not have been possible without Dr. Kern’s knowledge and suggestions regarding secondary source material. I also owe a debt of gratitude to Dr. Ronald Eller and Dr. Tracy Campbell for taking the time to serve on my thesis committee and offering valuable insight on certain aspects of this thesis. Dr. Ronald Formisano also urged me to look at the bigger picture in the beginning phases of this process. I remain in awe of their scholarship abilities, talent, and intellect. Their influence on my academia career is invaluable. I also would like to extend a special thanks to Kate Black, manuscript archivist at University of Kentucky Libraries Special Collections and Digital Programs, for guiding me through the Linda Neville papers and taking an interest in my research. The staff at UK’s Special Collections was helpful and extremely accommodating throughout my research. Finally, I would not be where I am today if it were not for the undying support of my number one fan, my mom. She instilled in me the strength to weather any storm and was always there with a word of encouragement, even in my darkest hours. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgments..........................................................................................iii List of Figures ................................................................................................v Chapter One: Introduction .............................................................................1 Chapter Two: ‘She now cries out’: Linda Neville and the Limitations of Kentucky’s Venereal Disease Control Policies .................................................................9 Chapter Three: “Spartan Mothers”: Venereal Disease in Pregnancy and Raising Efficient Citizens ..........................................................................................................35 Chapter Four: ‘Diseased’ Women: Venereal Disease and the use of Quarantine during War .................................................................................................................58 Epilogue .........................................................................................................83 Bibliography ..................................................................................................87 Vita .................................................................................................................92 iv LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1, A 1936 poster from the Works Progress Administration urged women to seek professional medical help during pregnancy…………………………………………....37 Figures 2 and 3,WPA posters created in 1930s…………………………………………45 Figure 4, This is one of many posters produced during World War II that warned against having casual sex with women in America……………………………………………..73 v Chapter 1: Introduction When Susan M. Reverby, a women’s studies professor and historian, unveiled her groundbreaking article on the United States Public Health Service’s syphilis experiments in Guatemala, the U.S. government reacted with outrage and President Barack Obama issued an official apology to Guatemala. In “’Normal Exposure’ and Inoculation Syphilis: A PHS ‘Tuskegee’ Doctor in Guatemala, 1946-1948,” Reverby uncovered that PHS doctors infected Guatemalan prisoners, mental patients, orphans, and soldiers with syphilis and then treated them with penicillin. The purpose of this policy was to determine if penicillin prevented syphilis infections. Reverby focused on how the Guatemalan study differed from the now infamous Tuskegee experiments, which evaluated already infected African-Americans in Alabama and withheld treatment even after the discovery of penicillin.1 Despite the media exposure generated by this story, one aspect was sorely neglected. The test subjects were infected through exposure to prostitutes who were either already infected with syphilis or were exposed to the disease when doctors purposely placed inoculums of syphilis on their cervix.2 Unlike the largely male population of Guatemalan subjects, doctors did not treat the prostitutes with penicillin, but when news agencies began reporting on Reverby’s work, these women fell from view. The focus was on the men who were infected and then treated in the 1940s and the modern-day outrage it caused within the medical community. But what about the women in this story who never received treatment? Why was this not seen as relevant as or more relevant than the male Guatemalans in Reverby’s research? Reverby details the tragedy 1 Susan M. Reverby, “’Normal Exposure’ and the Inoculation Syphilis: A PHS ‘Tuskegee’ Doctor in Guatemala, 1946-1948,” Journal of Policy History 23, no. 1 (January 2011). 2 Ibid., 12. 1 surrounding the use of both male and female inmates as test subjects, but offers no indication of what happened to the prostitutes who were used as the infecting agents. In some ways, my work builds on Reverby’s recent discovery by bringing the focus back to women in the United States. My analysis includes both rural and urban regions. Investigating the public health response in the cities and countryside illustrates how reformers viewed rural and urban women in a different manner. Public health workers perceived prostitution as the main threat to venereal disease control in the cities, while poor sanitation and ignorance was to blame for the spread of syphilis and gonorrhea in rural regions. It is easy to see the blatant outrages arising from America’s venereal disease experiments on African-Americans and Guatemalans, but not all ethical violations are as clear. When it came to women in America, the medical community was more nuanced in its policies to control venereal disease. This systematic but subtle approach to controlling syphilis and gonorrhea placed women in the trigger hairs of public health policy that used women as a scapegoat to explain rising rates