The Strange Case of Dr. Couney
Page 22
Typhoid Mary: Her story appears, among many other places, in Harold Speert, The Sloane Hospital Chronicle: A History of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology of the Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center (New York: Presbyterian Hospital, 1988), pp. 171–173. The alias Mary Brown is widely cited.
“who has at all times been most kind, loving, and considerate”: Mary Isabella Segner’s will, signed in San Francisco on May 22, 1914, filed on September 7, 1916, Tippecanoe County Historical Association and Library, Lafayette, Indiana.
Charles A. Segner was a prominent newspaperman: An untitled item in the Franklin, Indiana, Evening Star, November 15, 1913, p. 3, states that Segner has been named managing editor of the Louisville, Kentucky, Herald after working ten years at The Indianapolis Star.
families’ later apparent estrangement: Although Charles is mentioned in one of Maye’s obituaries, there is no mention of him in her will. More pointedly, Hildegarde’s will says her mother was an only child and her only living relatives are on her father’s side of the family, citing his relatives as far away as Haifa, Israel. But Charles Segner and his children were alive and well in Chicago at the time of Hildegarde’s death. Even if Maye was not her biological mother, the omission is rather glaring.
First came the memos: Correspondence related to infant incubators, Panama Pacific International Exposition Collection, BANC MSS C-A 190, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.
Just enough cash to secure a down payment: The mortgage is recorded as $6,500 in the agreement between Sea Gate Development Company, Inc., and Anabel [sic] Maye Couney, registered in Kings County, New York, October 26, 1916, Kings County Register of Deeds. I believe the recent inheritance was used as the down payment.
One Very Short Lady
“She was a very short lady”: Nedra Justice, interview with the author, July 14, 2015.
the eugenically perfect winner: Alisa Klaus, Every Child a Lion: The Origins of Maternal and Infant Health Policy in the United States and France, 1890–1920 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993), p. 155.
No-Man’s-Land
one would earn the Croix de Guerre: A. J. Liebling, “Patron of the Preemies,” The New Yorker, June 3, 1939, p. 20.
That left the littlest citizens in no-man’s-land: The obstetrician J. W. Ballantyne borrowed the term, popularized in World War I, to describe the plight of the preemie. J. W. Ballantyne, “Where Obstetrics and Pædiatrics Meet: Infant Welfare,” International Clinics 4, 26th series (1916), p. 96.
end up visiting the Coney Island concession every week: Liebling, “Patron of the Preemies,” The New Yorker, p. 24.
He liked to cite the names of famous men: Martin Couney’s list is quoted in many sources, including L. Joseph Butterfield, “The Incubator Doctor in Denver: A Medical Missing Link,” in The Denver Westerners Brand Book, ed. Jackson C. Thode (Denver: Denver Westerners, 1971), p. 343.
“incubators are passé” and “it is a fact that practically all”: Joseph S. Wall, “The Status of the Child in Obstetric Practice,” Journal of the American Medical Association 66 (1916), p. 252.
Later, he could have added Sir Winston Churchill: In writing about Martin Couney’s show, L. Joseph Butterfield added Churchill to the list of prominent preemies, although I have not found an original source of Couney himself having done so—possibly because he received almost no publicity after 1940.
Before it was over, the horrors of involuntary sterilization: Edwin Black, War Against the Weak: Eugenics and America’s Campaign to Create a Master Race, rev. ed. (Washington, DC: Dialog Press, 2012), pp. xv–xvi.
American eugenics would influence: For a rigorously documented examination, see ibid.; in brief, see p. xvii.
Dr. Harry Haiselden unveiled the third prong: Martin S. Pernick, The Black Stork: Eugenics and the Death of “Defective” Babies in American Medicine and Motion Pictures Since 1915 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 4–5.
He eagerly displayed dying babies: Ibid., p. 5.
Helen Keller: Ibid., p. 6. In Chicago, Dr. Joseph Bolivar DeLee of Lying-in was among those to oppose him.
The Chicago Medical Society would finally succeed: Ibid., p. 8.
frightened parents were writing to Dr. Haiselden: Ibid., p. 5.
The movie was called The Black Stork: Ibid., pp. 5–6; also Black, War Against the Weak, p. 257. There were several versions of the movie. As of this writing, at least one is on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9m6OCT8YmfU.
newspaper advertisement read “Kill Defectives”: Ibid., p. 88.
Are You Fit to Marry?: Pernick, The Black Stork, p. 53.
newborns would be coming from Midwood, Zion: Finding the hospital and institutional records of babies sent to Coney Island proved impossible, as many records no longer exist and others indicate only discharge, without saying where the baby went. This list was compiled from interviews with the babies themselves, now adults; newspaper articles from the time; and written endorsements from physicians in 1937, when Couney applied for the concession at the New York World’s Fair.
a Luna Park ride called the Toboggan: “Incubator Babies Saved from Fire,” New York Tribune, August 20, 1917, p. 12.
A Charmed Life
“Appleton—Jean Dubinsky”: Death notice, The New York Times, January 25, 2015, p. A-17.
She sat with me at her kitchen table: Ryna Appleton Segal, interview with the author, May 11, 2016.
The Rise and Rise of Julius Hess
“in the United States the care of premature infants”: Julius H. Hess, Premature and Congenitally Diseased Infants (Philadelphia: Lea & Febiger, 1922), p. v, in Julius Hays Hess Papers, Crerar Ms 51, Box 2, untitled folder, University of Chicago Library.
“I desire to acknowledge”: Hess, Premature and Congenitally Diseased Infants, p. vi.
Julius Hess used a donation: Julius H. Hess, George J. Mohr, and Phyllis F. Bartelme, The Physical and Mental Growth of Prematurely Born Children (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1934), p. ix. The initial donor was Arthur Lowenstein. The additional endowments are detailed here.
In 1924, he had a dozen Hess beds: Evelyn Lundeen, “History of the Hortense Schoen Joseph Premature Station,” The Voice of the Clinic 2 (Fall 1937), in Julius Hays Hess Papers, Crerar Ms 51, Box 4, Folder 9, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.
A Legend Is Born
Inside, character actors also served as lecturers: The actor-lecturers who explained the exhibits were frequently mentioned in newspaper accounts at the time. For one, see “About New York,” The News-Palladium (Benton Harbor, Michigan), June 7, 1929, p. 1.
One barker alum, Don Carney, went on: “Jo Ranson’s Radio Dial Log: Uncle Don to Stage Benefit Show Sunday,” The Brooklyn Eagle, December 12, 1940, p. 22.
Another was said: William A. Silverman, “Incubator-Baby Side Shows,” Pediatrics 64, no. 2 (August 1979), p. 136. The diplomat was George Stewart, who became the American consul in Venice.
The most delicious story involves a British youth: Ibid., p. 136. The Couney buffs held it to be true, but I couldn’t find their source.
“Y’see, with the children out of school roaming around”: “Archie Leach by Cary Grant,” part 3, Ladies’ Home Journal, April 1963, pp. 87, 148.
“Cary Grant was a stiltwalker”: George C. Tilyou III, interview with the author, June 27, 2015.
Alone in a Crowd
the Alligator Boy: This specific freak, along with Lulu the Fat Girl, is mentioned in “‘Incubator Man’ Saves 2750 Lives!,” The Scranton Republican, August 6, 1926, p. 6. I do not know the exact year he arrived.
He used no medicine other than whiskey: Marjorie Dorman, “Coney Incubators Saved 6,000 Babies in 25 Years; Old Idea, Used by Chinese,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, August 4, 1928, p. 3.
Later, he’d claim he would fire any wet nurse: A. J. Liebling, �
��Patron of the Preemies,” The New Yorker, June 3, 1939, p. 24.
The business was owned solely by the “family”: A sworn statement by Louise Recht (treasurer), dated May 28, 1936, within the 1936 probate file of Annabelle Maye Couney attests that all shares of the Infant Incubator Company passed to the shareholders cited “around 1922.” Kings County Surrogate Court Archive.
“I’m not surprised to hear there are rumors”: Dorman, “Coney Incubators Saved 6,000 Babies in 25 Years,” p. 3.
Mrs. Richard Elkins: “Incubator Baby Is War Orphan No More,” The Parsons Daily Sun (Parsons, Kansas; dateline New York), September 21, 1916, p. 1.
Occasionally, he said, a couple: Ilsa and Alfred Ephraim, interview with Lawrence Gartner, 1980 (exact date unknown), from Dr. Gartner’s handwritten notes.
if a rich family whose baby he’d saved: E. Harrison Nickman, in an interview with Lawrence Gartner, May 1, 1970, mentioned wealthy families giving donations; some of the “babies” I interviewed also said their parents gave him a little money.
He’d been filing as a “personal service corporation”: “Baby Incubator Co. Must Pay U.S. Tax,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 8, 1926, p. 14.
“You go where I tell you to go”: “Doctor to Bring Charges Against Overzealous Cop,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, July 24, 1926, p. 1; a similar account of the incident appears in “Doctor Denies He Hit Policeman with Auto,” The New York Times, July 24, 1926.
“hurried out of his cell”: “Doctor to Bring Charges Against Overzealous Cop,” p. 1.
For his day in court, Martin took no chances: “Cops Charges Fail Against Dr. Couney,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, August 3, 1926, p. 1.
Dr. and Mrs. Martin Couney had made a donation: “Democratic League Observes Birthday,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, December 3, 1928 (the archived fragment shows as M-1, in what appears to be the want-ad section).
Miss Hildegarde Couney . . . she would finish: Untitled item, The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, September 26, 1926, p. 25.
Miss Couney had been awarded: Untitled society item, The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, August 9, 1927, p. 9.
Send the Ambulance
“Things were different”: Carol Bird, “Featherweight Babies a New Medical Problem,” The Lincoln Star (Nebraska), July 3, 1932, p. 22; see also Isabelle Keating, “Modernity Is Blamed for Premature Baby,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 5, 1932, p. 12.
If a mother was broke, he might hire her: “9 Mothers, 9 Babies Face Brighter World,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, September 16, 1930, p. 15.
Once in a while, a parent sniped: Keating, “Modernity Is Blamed for Premature Baby,” p. 12.
“Such a grateful boy”: “Incubator Baby Not Immune from Cupid’s Heartening Shaft; Or Was This Not Romance,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, July 3, 1932, p. 11.
“mannish” and “hefty” and “prickly”: These characterizations emerge in interviews with Moe Goldstein, the “assistant” doctor at the New York World’s Fair, and Jerome Champion, the ambulance driver in Atlantic City, and in newspaper articles that describe her as a large woman. By today’s standards, she wasn’t even close to plus-size.
She weighed 135: Elizabeth Walker, “Saving the Babies Who Arrive Too Soon,” Santa Ana Register (California), September 19, 1933, p. 13.
she weighed 160!: A. J. Liebling, “Patron of the Preemies,” The New Yorker, June 3, 1939, p. 24.
“They were absolutely fabulous with these babies”: E. Harrison Nickman, interview with Lawrence Gartner, May 1, 1970.
someone would send the ambulance driver: Jerome Champion, interview with Lawrence Gartner, April 1970.
The news was like a fly in Martin’s ointment: “Stories of 1-Pound Babies False, Says Dr. Couney,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, April 25, 1932, p. 1.
he mailed her mother a Mother’s Day card: “First Round Is Won by Miniature Babies,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, May 9, 1932, p. 17.
“Feed her 2 ½ ounces of milk seven times a day”: “Smacks Incubating Apparatus for a Healthy Home Run After Being Born Weighing a Dubious 2 Pounds,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 26, 1932, p. 2.
“I think I love her as much as her parents”: Ibid.
In Chicago, Julius Hess was forced: Evelyn Lundeen wrote of the ongoing debate over whether preemies were worth saving. She documented the efforts at Sarah Morris—the largest preemie station in the country—to increase the number of babies the hospital could help, and noted that even in 1937, it was still turning patients away. Evelyn Lundeen, “History of the Hortense Schoen Joseph Premature Station,” The Voice of the Clinic 2 (Fall 1937), in Julius Hays Hess Papers, Crerar Ms 51, Box 4, Folder 9, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.
The Century of Progress
the red giant star Arcturus kindled a brilliant Deco city: This news was reported all over the country; for one example, see Philip Kinsley, “Star Sets 1933 Fair Ablaze,” Chicago Tribune, May 28, 1933, p. 1; see also “Four Observatories Will Help Arcturus Open World’s Fair,” Chicago Tribune, May 25, 1933, p. 1.
Chicago’s mayor, Anton Cermak, was hit: Stephan Benzkofer, “Tell Chicago I’ll Pull Through,” Chicago Tribune, February 10, 2013.
“Flagrant above all other examples”: Ludwig Lewisohn, “The Fallacy of Progress,” Harpers Magazine, June 1933, pp. 104–105.
extra funding through the Infant Aid Society: Evelyn Lundeen, “History of the Hortense Schoen Joseph Premature Station,” The Voice of the Clinic 2 (Fall 1937), in Julius Hays Hess Papers, Crerar Ms 51, Box 4, Folder 9, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library. Lundeen added that after the fair closed, “the nurses were most happy to return to Michael Reese Hospital [the parent hospital of Sarah Morris], where they could care for the babies in a more normal manner.” See also “Babies, Babies, and Babies at World’s Fair,” Chicago Tribune, June 5, 1931, p. 20. Mrs. Kellogg Fairbank of Chicago Lying-in was the only woman on the exposition’s Executive Committee, and was helping to arrange funding.
a 1928 text on infant feeding: William A. Silverman, “Incubator-Baby Side Shows,” Pediatrics 64, no. 2 (August 1979), p. 137.
“Dr. Schulz”: An untitled item that appeared in the Reading, Pennsylvania, Times, June 28, 1934, p. 6, notes that while Martin Couney is in Chicago, “Dr. Schulz” is in charge. Isador Schulz, Martin’s cousin, was a shareholder.
he requested that a barbed-wire fence go up: Internal correspondence of the concessions committee, dated June 7, 1934, refers to the request. A Century of Progress records, Special Collections and University Archives, University of Illinois at Chicago, Box 144. It’s not clear whether the fence went up, but the committee seemed inclined to accommodate him.
Their Nazi friends across the sea would be the ones: For a thorough documentation of the influence of American eugenics on the Holocaust, see Edwin Black, War Against the Weak: Eugenics and America’s Campaign to Create a Master Race, rev. ed. (Washington, DC: Dialog Press, 2012).
At its entrance was a picture of a stork: A. J. Liebling, “Masters of the Midway—II,” The New Yorker, August 19, 1939, p. 25.
Chief Blackhorn adorned Balbo: “Chief Blackhorn and Italo Balbo, 1933,” The Electronic Encyclopedia of Chicago, ed. Janice L. Reiff, Ann Durkin Keating, and James R. Grossman (Chicago History Museum/Historical Society, Newberry Library, and Northwestern University), http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/11277.html.
the German airship Graf Zeppelin: Besides being written up in all the newspapers, this event was marked by a commemorative U.S. postal stamp. Smithsonian National Postal Museum, Stamps of the 1933 World’s Fair, https://postalmuseum.si.edu/collections/object-spotlight/1933-fair.html.
Martin Couney’s Spaghetti Sauce for Newlyweds: Letter from Barbara Fishbein Friedell to Richard F. Snow, 1981 (exact date unknown), Newborn Medicine History Collection, Pediatric History Center, American Academy of Pediatrics.
A woman ate a hot dog at a party: Barbara Gerber, interview with the author, July 16, 2015. All quotations in this chapter are from that interview.
All Aboard the Twentieth Century
One of fifteen children: Accounts of Betty Lou vary, but she herself wrote of providing for her fourteen siblings and helping her parents in “I Am a . . . ,” Jet, December 25, 1952, pp 24–28. At that time, she wrote, her income was $250 a week. Robert Goforth, digital librarian at Ripley Entertainment Inc., in an October 17, 2017, e-mail to me, wrote that at one point she was making $500 a week. Additional information about Betty Lou, including the fact she paid for her siblings’ college education, is found in Marc Hartzman, American Sideshow: An Encyclopedia of History’s Most Wondrous and Strange Performers (New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 2005), p. 230.
people who thought Hitler wouldn’t last long: For an excellent chronicle of life in Germany at that time, see Heinrich Böll, What’s to Become of the Boy? Or, Something to Do with Books, trans. Leila Vennewitz (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1984).
“You have come here to see in epitome”: Official Guide Book of the World’s Fair of 1934 (Chicago: A Century of Progress International Exposition, 1934), p. 15.
Halfway through July, Chicago inaugurated: Press release, July 15, 1934, Century of Progress Press Releases July 16–31, Crerar Ms 225, Box v. 2, University of Chicago Library. The ceremony included a big parade.
which the great Pierre Budin did as well: Jeffrey P. Baker, The Machine in the Nursery: Incubator Technology and the Origins of Newborn Care (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996), p. 52.
Julius Hess was keeping careful track: Statistical results for 1933: Julius Hays Hess Papers, Crerar Ms 51, Box 3, Folder 11, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.
“splendid opportunities”: Herman Bundesen, infant incubator homecoming script for July 25, 1934, Century of Progress International Exposition Scrapbook, Crerar Ms 227, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.