Page 14 - Desert Oracle Nov 2018

The school-chapelʼs miniscule size belied its significance to the
community: it was established at the end of the Civil War to educate

the children of free black people, former slaves and Native

Americans.

It was in this one-room schoolhouse that Blount first learned how to
remake herself. She was born left-handed, and she recalled in

multiple interviews with journalists how her teacher, Carrie Nimmo, hit

her across the knuckles for writing with her left hand. She responded

to the teacherʼs demands by teaching herself how to write with both

hands, her feet—even her teeth.

After Blount finished the sixth grade, she took her education upon

herself. She had no choice; there were no schools in the area that

offered higher education to black children. Eventually, she qualified

for college acceptance at Union Junior College in Cranford, New

Jersey and nursing training at Community Kennedy Memorial Hospital
in Newark, the only hospital owned and run by black people in New

Jersey. She went on to take post-graduate courses at Panzer College

of Physical Education and Hygiene, now part of Montclair State

University. She ultimately became a licensed physiotherapist, and
took up a post at the Bronx Hospital in New York City around 1943.

In 1941, while Blount was still pursuing her medical education, the

United States formally entered World War II. She responded by

putting her nursing skills to use as a volunteer with the Red Crossʼs
Gray Ladies at Base 81, which served servicemen and veterans in the

metro New York and northern New Jersey area. Named for the color

of their uniforms, the Gray Ladies were meant to be a non-medical

group of volunteers who provided hospitality-based services to

military hospitals.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/woman-who-made…edium=email&utm_term=0_f5693aed98-a1a5a8d517-114324049