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head became visible, the nurse pushed against it. An hour later, the doctor arrived and nature was allowed to take its course, bringing little Rosemary into the world. After declaring her healthy, the doctor left mm. No one realized that delaying the birth had caused a lack of oxygen to Rosemary's brain. They only noticed years later when she took longer to learn than her siblings. Teachers recommended that Rosemary repeat kindergarten and the first grade. Her parents, who demanded the best

from their children, were embarrassed. Determined to fix their daughter, they paid for special tutoring and experimental injections. Through it all, Rosemary tried to keep up with her brothers and sisters and desperately wanted to please her parents. Despite her best efforts and those of her teachers, she couldn't seem to

advance past the intellectual age of ten or eleven. While rose looked for a way to cure their daughter, Joe turned his attention to his son, Joseph Jr. Fearing Rosemary's disability would tarnish his son's chances in politics, he sent her to boarding schools where she would be out of the public eye. A Rosemary couldn't help but notice her father's disapproval. She wrote to him, I would do anything to make you so happy. I hate to disappoint you in any way. Come to see me very soon. Her

teachers commented that Rosemary was always optimistic, always cheerful. Over the years, she flourished under the care of English Montessori schools, but when she grew older and returned to the States, Rosemary began acting out. Joe looked into surgery for his daughter.

The botanies had been performed on those diagnosed with intellectual disabilities, gay men and lesbians, criminals and women considered overly promiscuous, but the American Medical Association strongly recommended against the surgery due to a high death rate still, Joe arranged for the operation without telling his wife or family. Doctors shaved

Rosemary's head and strapped her to the operating table. They kept her awake during the procedure, telling her to sing or talk while they cut away parts of her brain, stopping when Rosemary fell silent. The surgery reduced her mental capacity to that of a two year old. Joe had her institutionalized in New York, refusing to allow the family to see her. He told the public she was away studying to become a teacher. He never saw his daughter again.

Her brother Jack often snuck visits to see his sister. Rosemary lived the rest of her life in a cottage in Wisconsin. She died in two thousand five, surrounded by her surviving siblings and the pets she loved to spoil. Rosemary never realized the changes her brother made when he became president. Though his family called him Jack, we know him as John F. Kennedy. He felt research and education for people diagnosed with an intellectual disability was blacking and

wanted bold new approaches for their care. He once said that people with such disabilities need no longer be alien to our affections or beyond the help of our communities, and because of his love for Rosemary, JFK did something else. He paved the way for things hidden in the dark to see the light of day. I'm Lauren Vogelbaum. Welcome to American Shadows. Dr Samuel Gridley Howe stood on the lawn of the school he had created and smiled as the children played. They were unaware of his smile or

the joy he had in watching them. The children were blind, he didn't believe they should be objects of pity, nor that they deserved less of an education than anyone else. He had started work with people with visual impairments in eighty nine as director at the New England Asylum for the Blind, and the research took him to Europe to study similar programs. Back at home, in eighteen thirty two, his school's first students arrived, arranging from six to twenty

one years of age. A wealthy investor donated his home as the school's classroom area, and eventually the asylum was renamed the Perkins School for the Blind. As Hal watched the children, he had high hopes for the school and the changes it would make in the students lives. That hope wasn't misplaced. The school thrived. In eighteen thirty seven, he invited a child who was both deaf and blind

to attend Perkins. Under the care and guidance of the school, Laura Bridgeman became the first deaf and blind student to receive a full and successful education, bringing fame and attention to both the school and doctor. How his personal life flourished too. He had married well Julia Ward was the daughter of a successful New York banker and had talents and ambitions of her own. She was an outspoken up bolitionists, suffragist, and songwriter. She had written the Battle Hymn of the Republic.

Before long, the House helped found other schools in Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee. By et eight, the Perkins School was a well established success. The House set their sights on creating school for those with intellectual disabilities. They partnered with Doorthea Dix, an activist who was a champion for indigenous populations, women in nursing, and mental health. Like the House, she thought anyone experiencing mental trauma or an intellectual disability deserved every

chance to reach their potential. Today, she's accredited with making drastic changes in the medical field by challenging what was known about healing and illness. She had spent years studying how reformers in Europe treated and cared for people with mental illnesses. Upon her return to the States, she visited hospitals across the country in the hopes of making positive changes.

Finding are inadequate, Dix lobbied politicians for state hospitals and funding to help, though she was unsuccessful in persuading the government. Dix helped to establish asylums in New Jersey, North Carolina, and Illinois. During the Civil War, Dix treated both Union and Confederate soldiers, earning her respect from both sides, though female nurses were looked down on at the time, and she pushed for formal training and more opportunities in the

medical field for women. After comparing notes, how and Dix opened their school in Massachusetts in eighteen fifty one with a total of ten students, and not only did they supply the children with a proper education, but they taught practical skills in the hopes that students would be able to support themselves and become productive members of the community.

They took on students with more severe symptoms. Although not every student went on to earn an education or become self sufficient, How and Dix successfully helped the majority of the children they oversaw. Ap parents from as far as Texas began sending their children to the school. Even so, the medical community continued to consider their approach experimental, although how Indix preferred the term school. More began calling the

school's asylums in eighteen sixty seven. Determined to make even more changes in the lives of others, How began to teach deaf students to lip read. For blind students, he developed an embossed letter system that remained the preferred format until Braille came into use in the late eighteen hundreds. Between eighteen seventy and eighteen ninety, the public's attitude toward

people with intellectual disabilities changed. Instead of a push to make the deviant undeviant, as society put it, the focus shifted on removing them from society indefinitely, and the more remote the asylum, the better. Doctor how continued his work in rehabilitation until his death in eighteen seventy six. The school carried on, still using his methods to help people,

while others chose to permanently rehome them. A society's philosophy had become out of sight, out of mind, and in seven How school was moved to a more remote location, are tract just outside of Waltham. His methods of teaching and caring for the children had fallen from favor. Instead, many in the scientific community had taken a work of natural science and begun to twist it, making cases for a drastic approach to dealing with people with intellectual disabilities

and mental illnesses. The once sunny yards where How had watched the children play We're about to change into something much darker. Charles Darwin's book on the Origin of the Species took the world by storm in eighteen denine from religious leaders to scientists. The contents and words were challenged, praised, or misconstrued, depending on vocation and beliefs. Everyone had an opinion, and for many opinion was fact. The book renewed interest

in Gregor Mendel's work in genetics. Some argued that intelligence, character, and morality were rooted in biology nature instead of nurture. These theories were derailments from both Mendel and Darwin's scientific findings. A misconstrued or not that didn't stop the progression of some to believe that all people with disabilities came from poor breeding and genetics. In the eighteen eighties, author R. L. Dugdale wrote that society's problems were the direct result of

overbreeding among the lower classes. Environment, he claimed, had less to do with crime, disease, and ability than genetics, and he didn't just supply a problem. He had an answer, eugenics, which is basically the concept of trying to improve the genetic qualities of people through selective reproduction. The theory was that people with what were deemed poor character traits, intellectual or physical disabilities, or criminal or immoral behaviors should not

have children. Meanwhile, those deemed to have desirable physical and mental traits and who were wealthy should have children. Francis Galton coined the term eugenics in eighteen thirty three, but it's an idea that's circulated in many cultures throughout the ages. Back in four hundred b c e. Those considered unfit were forbidden to marry or had forced sterilization procedures. Over the centuries, different cultures had different ideas of how far

to take this practice. If you're already thinking of Nazi Germany as a later example of eugenics. Then you'd be correct. Doug Bail had come up with his theory regarding humans by loosely taking from Mendel's work on using genetics to produce better and new varieties of vegetables, and from Darwin's observations that strong, healthy animals lived to propagate their species in the wild. In his opinion, the lower class was a burden on society, and he made a case for

preventing them from having children. People in the United States, Canada, Sweden, England, and other countries across Europe all believed in eugenics in some way or another. These societies began to fear that too many people who were not the fittest, healthiest, or most intelligent would water down the human race. They began to think reform for people with intellectual or physical disabilities wasn't the right course of action. Instead, they believed in

preventing their existence. For instance, doctors and prompted parents to forego life saving treatment for newborns who had visible defects. In their opinion, these children would grow to burden society, and at the very least they certainly couldn't contribute to furthering the human race. Despite what how and Dix had accomplished. Such children who survived, or those who experienced an injury or ailment, were sent to asylums and institutions to live

shuddered away from the rest of the world. Some, like one doctor Walter Fernald, agreed with doug Dale. He suggested that children pass government issued i Q tests early in life. Those who scored below average would be removed from society indefinitely. Fernald believed that their prompt and early removal would benefit the human race. At the time, institutions and asylums seemed the logical place to keep them, but state run institutions

were already understaffed and cost a great deal. Fueling the controversy regarding how much of a burden people who had intellectual disabilities placed on society, Parents were increasingly pressured to surrender children who scored low or had disabilities to institutions. They were often told the children would live better lives, that they would be given the proper care they needed

without burdening their families. And despite how in Dix's success, Fernald claimed that no amount of education could improve these children and that they could never function in society. Instead, he cherry picked the work of esteemed scientists like Mendel and Darwin to prove that these children were greatly inferior, offering little to no benefit in furthering mankind. If a parent refused to surrender a child with an intellectual disability,

doctors in the community alike shamed them. Under the guise of child welfare, the state took parents to court, where they frequently lost custody. Researcher Henry Goddard insisted that these children weren't just a burden, they were a threat. He feared they would escape, and without any noticeable physical malformations, they might go unnoticed long enough to reproduce, which would

deteriorate the human species. Thousands of children deemed feeble were sent to live in asylums and institutions across the country. Taking over as the third director of House Facility, doctor Fernald set out to make a radical departure from the school's original purpose. He increased the residency from four hundred to thirteen hundred. To support the growing population. He purchased

another sixteen hundred acres. Traveling clinics became the norm in many states, the teachers and parents could bring children in for testing. After Fernald died in nine four, the school changed its name, becoming the Walter E. Fernald State School. They even expanded their parameters, taking on not just children with intellectual disabilities or mental illnesses, but those society deemed

as normal with delinquent behaviors labeled as troubled. Boys who acted out, behaved badly, or acted dangerously in any way were sent to the Fernald School. Poverty and crime in overcrowded cities had skyrocketed, and those like Fernald put the blame on immigrants. They claimed these problems were the result of negative eugenics. Some of the country's elite became firm believers and used their influence to encourage the elimination of undesirables as a means to curb crime and reduce a literacy.

At the height of the American eugenics era, and the message was clear, the human race could be free of disabilities and many diseases if the afflicted were prevented from reproducing. Everyone would fit a certain standard. Those of certain racial backgrounds or who acted different, or who had disabilities were less than everyone. Else. Freddie Boyce had been taken from

his abuse of mother when he was seven. At eight, his equally abuse of foster mother died, though he had no formal education, and Freddie passed the IQ test, but instead of another foster home, he was sent to Fernald, and that's where he was kept for eleven years. He was one of the lucky ones. Some were told they'd be there for life. There was no love, no affection. The children were made to feel like they were never supposed to exist, and there were a lot of them.

Thirty six beds were crammed into each dorm room. At its peak, two thousand, five hundred children resided at Fernald. The boys received little education, guards were often violent, and some of the boys suffered other abuse as well. Freddie recalled when Joseph Almeida arrived, his father dropped him off, telling his son to wait in the hall. Then Joe Sor drove away, leaving his son behind. A one night and Howie, a boy with intellectual disabilities, couldn't keep quiet.

The nurse had all the boys line up, then she beat them with a wooden coat hanger. Terrified, Howie wet himself, earning a second beating. By the nineteen fifties, they had television, which brought the outside world to the school, and some of the older boys without disabilities began to realize there was nothing wrong with them. While they were forced to do much of the labor that kept the place running,

they began to plan and escape. Joey Almeida recalled working in the lab slicing up the brains of the boys who had died, also that scientists could study them. Those who escaped were quickly found and returned. Guards stripped them to their shorts, shaved their heads, and locked them in solitary confinement. Most were terrified to talk about an escape for fear of what would happen if they were caught. Other boys so captured didn't matter they were already dead.

But Charlie Hatch inspired some of them. In the summer of nineteen fifty seven, he had escaped, living on the streets for weeks. On his return, he told the others that the school attendants who came to get him treated him like an animal, and that the cops had done nothing to stop it. Something has to be done, Charlie said. It all came to a head on November four, of ninety seven. Joey had just returned from his normal mourning chores when he noticed a boy named Curly talking to

Charlie in the lunch room. Many of the boys, like Charlie, were nearly full grown and capable of taking on the guards. Before long, the two had convinced a dozen more to join the pact to escape, Joey being one of them. At three p um the boys who didn't want to fight but did want to escape, gathered in the day room to await the chaos. One of the boys started a fire in the closet. An attendant rushed into the room to pull the fire alarm. The boys tackled him,

then through the employee outside. A second attendant promptly left when he realized who was easily outnumbered. During the commotion, a boy in the solitary cells used a wire hanger to unlock his door and then all the doors. Meanwhile, Joey and the others began to set up defenses against the remaining guards, and some of the boys began to destroy whatever they could. Sirens wailed in the distance. When the fire department arrived, one of the men shouted to

the boys asking if they were okay they were. The boys replied, the fire was out and no one was hurt. The superintendent and police demanded the boys surrender and come out. As you can imagine, though the boys had trust issues. They declined by sneaking around the corner, grabbing the fire hose and paurning it on the men. My nightfall, swarms of state police showed up. Outnumbered and without a plan and no food, the boys surrendered and were taken away.

They ended up at the Bridgewater State Hospital for the criminally Insane, which was more of a prison than a hospital. Two days later they appeared in court. Eight boys were kept imprisoned at Bridgewater indefinitely. The boys, all of them, were labeled as dangerous, but the public, now having heard and seen what treatment they had endured, called for changes. They were slow in coming. It took a lawsuit in the early nineteen seventies for the institution to hire adequate

and qualified staff. Finally, Fernald closed its doors in the state of Massachusetts hired Sandra Marlowe to create a library at the Fernald Institute, honoring Samuel Howe. Being the oldest and largest mental institution in the Northeast, Sandra had a lot of material to sift through, making her task more difficult. She didn't have a background in the history of mental health. For that, she relied on the locals and former resident

turned institute bus driver Joey Almeida. A While Joey helped her sift through countless documents, Sandra listened to his stories and became more interested in Fernald's history. Freddie Boyce, who still lived nearby, also offered his assistance. One afternoon, the three came across a letter from a former superintendent to a parent requesting their son's participation in a nutritional study

noted as the Science Club. Participation was listed as voluntary, of course, if the parents agreed, the test would require blood samples after the child consumed a predetermined amount of calcium. Those in the study would get additional perks, baseball games in an extra quart of milk every day. Sandra hadn't been told about any study and kept digging. What she found shocked her. Some parents had agreed, but others either did not or didn't care to respond. Either way, the

school selected additional participants without their knowledge or consent. In society considered these children invisible or disposable, no one would care or even notice. The study had little to do with the effects of calcium, though it was funded by Quaker oats and run by M. I. T. The children were fed cereal that had milk tainted with radioactive calcium. The researchers wanted to know how a serial heavy diet might affect the body's ability to digest iron and calcium.

The radioactive calcium made it possible to trace the material and the digestive tract through blood and waste. The Quaker wanted evidence that their cereal was nutritionally on par with a competitor cream of wheat. Of course, the experiment bombed. All forty boys who participated suffered ill effects, and the Quaker canceled the experiment. Sandra couldn't believe what they had found, and suddenly the school was replacing her with another librarian

to finish the job. Worried the documents and evidence would soon disappear, Sandra and the men went back to the school in the cover of darkness. For hours, they sifted through boxes and books, taking proof of the experiment with them. After she was fired, Sandra remained determined to bring justice for the victims. When Dr Clemens Benda, the head of Fernald's laboratory, died. Sandra came up with a plan. She met with Freddie and Joey at doctor Bende's estate sale.

Assandra wandered through the rows of items. Freddie and Joey snuck up to the attic to see what else they could find. The men stuffed pages of experiment documentation into books that they then bought. One document listed the names of all forty test subjects. In nineteen ninety eight, a small group of Fernald survivors filed suit against Quaker Oats and m I. T. The scandal was an embarrassment for

both the college and the company. The Quaker Oats immediately put out a statement denying that had a leading part and only provided the grant money, and Oats of claiming the radioactive calcium had been m i T s idea. The judge didn't see it that way. He ordered the college and the company together to make a settlement of one point eight five million dollars and divided up among

the thirty remaining survivors. There's more to this story. Stick around after this brief sponsor break to hear all about it. The day was unseasonably warm on March second of nineteen fifty five. The students at Booker T. Washington High School didn't mind. Though school had led out early. Fifteen year old Claudette made her way to the city bus stop.

After a short wait, she boarded, careful to stick to the rules for black people like her, sit at the back and don't make eye contact, don't touch, especially that when she was younger, a white boy had asked to touch her hands. Innocently enough, Claudette had offered an open palm. The boy's mother had stepped between them and backhanded Claudette across the Now the hard realities of segregation and racism

in Montgomery, Alabama were an everyday occurrence. Claudette realized that many white Americans had little tolerance for black people and anyone else who didn't fit into their definition of acceptable. As a young child, she knew that some people thought the color of her skin made her less human. As more people boarded the bus, all Claudette wanted was to get home early enough to do her homework and her chores. Maybe she would even get in some free time before dinner.

She lived with her great aunt and uncle, whom she loved as though they were her biological parents. Her dad had abandoned the family, and her mom faded from the picture when she found she couldn't afford her or her sister, Delphine. Ambitious and smart, Claudette had high hopes for her future. Many of her classmates had no idea what they wanted to do with their lives, but she had her sight

set on becoming a civil rights attorney. As she sat on the bus that afternoon and staring out the window and contemplating a paper she had to write, she no the bus hadn't moved. The white section of the bus was full, and the bus driver ordered her and some other black passengers to give up their seats. Someone complied, but not all. The heavily pregnant woman sitting next to her refused, sparking something deep inside. Claudette had had enough.

Black people weren't allowed to eat at the same lunch counters, or sit in the same movie houses as white people, or even enter some businesses. She was tired of being made to feel less than human. She wasn't less than anyone for any reason, and on that hot day, Claudett decided that she was going to make herself heard. Claudette and the pregnant woman had both paid the same fair

everyone else had, and both women held their ground. The police were summoned, and although a black man gave up his seat for the pregnant woman, caught it refused to move. She didn't go quietly, shouting that her constitutional rights were being violent at it as police handcuffed her and physically removed her from the bus. The incident landed her in jail with charges of disturbing the peace, violating segregation laws,

and assaulting a police officer. Though she hadn't assaulted anyone, Claudett wasn't the first nor the last black person to be dragged off a bus for not giving up their seat for a white person. Nine months later, Rosa Parks became the face of change when she refused to give up her seat, but Claudette's great aunt and uncle didn't have the money to get her out of jail. When the minister of the local church heard, he posted bail, telling her that she had brought a revolution to Montgomery.

But months later, civil rights leaders didn't make an issue of Claudette's case. They felt most Americans wouldn't sympathize with her because she lived in a low income housing district, wasn't as polished as Rosa, then had darker skin. Even her great aunt told her to stay quiet and to let Parks be the voice because white people liked her. The juvenile court convicted Claudett on all three accounts. She appealed and the court dropped all charges except assault, despite

testimony otherwise. Two months later, her attorney suggested she take part in a civil lawsuit against Alabama and Montgomery bus segregation laws. The next year, four other black women plaintiffs took part in the suit, though Claudette was the youngest. The case escalated to the Supreme Court, where she described her arrest, but she added more perspective. She told the court how dangerous it was for a black person to stand up for equal rights, how such actions were often

met with extreme violence. She recounted how terrified she was in jail with guards who made remarks on her brass eyes. Claudet's testimony moved the court. They ordered Montgomery County and the entire state of Alabama to end bus segregation laws. There would be no hero is welcome, though her community branded her as a troublemaker after struggling to fit in and find employment, she moved to Manhattan, where she worked as a nurses aid. In two thousand four, she finally retired.

In a two thousand five interview, she was asked if she would have changed her actions that day in Claudette didn't hesitate. I feel very proud of what I did, she responded, A fifteen year old had proven that when it comes to human rights, sometimes one person can make a difference. American Shadows as hosted by Lauren Vogelbaum. This episode was written by Michelle Muto, researched by Ali Steed, and produced by Miranda Hawkins and Trevor Young, with executive

producers Aaron Mankey, Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. To learn more about this show, visit Grim and Mild dot com. From more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. M