Helen Welcomes You to Denver
By Rick Rader, MD, Editor-in-Chief, Helen Journal
Originally printed in the AADMD One Voice COnference Program & Helen Journal Mini-May Issue.
While the AADMD Conference Committee had an abundance of reasons to select Denver as the choice for the 2023 Annual Conference I know one thing that would have sealed the deal for me.
The cheeseburger was invented in Denver!
Louis Ballast, owner of the Humpty Dumpty Barrel Drive Inn in Denver, Colorado, poses in front of his restaurant during the 1940s with “curb girls.” Ballast acquired a trademark for “The Cheeseburger” on March 5, 1935. Photo courtesy of Denver Public Library.
Louis Ballast, who owned the Humpty Dumpty Drive-In applied for a patent for a cheeseburger sandwich in 1935. You can still see the spot where the drive-in used to be in the northwest of downtown Denver. So if you don't see me around Friday afternoon you know where to find me. The comedian Matt Groening cut to the chase when he quipped, 'Oh, loneliness and cheeseburgers are a danger mix.''
There's very little chance you will be lonely at the AADMD Conference as we have the lock on the most engaging, friendly and inviting folks in all of the numerous healthcare organizations in the U.S. The chances that you will find yourself sitting by yourself without an AADMDer approaching you are slim.
It gives me great pleasure to introduce you to Doctors Ford and Sabin. Meet two female physicians from Colorado who would have made great keynote speakers and honorees at our conference.
But beyond being the birthplace of the artery blocking favorite there are two more historical connections that will resonate with the members of the AADMD. It gives me great pleasure to introduce you to Doctors Ford and Sabin. Meet two female physicians from Colorado who would have made great keynote speakers and honorees at our conference. Both personified values that the AADMD has been promoting and embracing since its inception over three decades ago. Both could very well be future AADMD Foundations in Developmental Medicine Heroes. So anytime HELEN can showcase clinicians who personify the “raison d’etre” of the AADMD it’s worth the ink.
Thanks to Patrick McGuinn for telling their stories.
Dr. Florence Rena Sabin 1871 – 1953
Born in Central City, Colorado in 1871, Dr. Florence Rena Sabin reversed the trend seen by many prominent figures of the time by moving east instead of west. She attended Smith College in Massachusetts before moving on to Johns Hopkins University Medical School, which had just started accepting women. Recognizing her talents, the school made her their first female medical professor in 1917.
Photograph of Dr. Florence Rena Sabin, born in Central City, Colorado in 1871 and the first woman to hold a full professorship at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.
This also made her America’s first woman to become a full professor at any medical college in the nation. Dr. Sabin was later elected as the first female president of the American Association of Anatomists and became the first female lifetime member of the National Academy of Sciences. In the mid-1920’s, she shifted from teaching to researching ways to fight tuberculosis by leading the Department of Cellular Studies at the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research.
In 1938, her plans for retiring in Colorado were cut short when she was asked to lead the State Health Committee. At the time, the state was plagued with public health problems and had one of the highest infant death rates in the nation. Dr. Sabin quickly got to work reforming healthcare in Colorado by writing eight bills that were later passed by the legislature. A city-wide x-ray and public education program she launched just a few years before her death reduced tuberculosis rates in Denver by 50%.
Truly Dr. Sabin would have felt welcome and honored to be with us in Denver.
Dr. Justina Ford 1871 – 1952
Justin Ford Headshot Circa 1910
As a child, Justina Laurena Warren displayed an uncanny obsession with medicine. She was known to dissect frogs and follow her mother around as she tended to patients in her role as a nurse. So when she announced that she wanted to become a doctor, it’s safe to assume it came as no surprise to her family even though they knew it would be a challenge because of her race and gender. After attending Hering Medical School in Chicago, she married a Baptist minister and continued studying medicine for the next seven years.
Dr. Justina Ford poses with her doctor’s bag. She was barred from practicing at hospitals, so she saw patients at her home and paid house calls, delivering 7,000 babies. Photo courtesy of the Black American West Museum & Heritage Center.
But after graduation, Ford, a Black woman, was promptly denied a medical license. The medical examiner cited her gender and race as counting as “two strikes” against her. Undeterred, she moved to Denver to join the Colorado Medical Association and practice at a hospital. When her race kept her from doing this, she established a private practice in her home.
Ford is remembered for her willingness to treat anyone and everyone, no matter their age, gender, citizenship, or ability to pay. The bulk of her patients were African-Americans and non-English speakers who other hospitals refused to treat. To adequately diagnose and treat her patients, Ford learned multiple languages, and when her patients couldn’t pay in cash, they compensated her in goods and services instead. Ford wasn’t accepted into the Colorado and American Medical Association until 1950, just two years before her death.
Dr. Ford overcame prejudice and bigotry to realize her dream and in doing so helped those who were refused treatment by the medical establishment.
Dr. Ford overcame prejudice and bigotry to realize her dream and in doing so helped those who were refused treatment by the medical establishment. I know AADMDers would have lined up to buy her a drink.
So the choice of Denver to conduct the 2023 AADMD Annual Conference was a top choice and on behalf of HELEN, The AADMD’s Journal of Human Exceptionality - Welcome!