Background
Drew was born in 1904 into an African-American middle-class family in Washington, D.C. His father, Richard, was a carpet layer and his mother, Nora Burrell, was a teacher. Drew and his siblings grew up in D.C.'s Foggy Bottom neighborhood.
In 1981, the United States Postal Service issued a 35¢ postage stamp in its Great Americans series to honor Drew.
In 1981, the United States Postal Service issued a 35¢ postage stamp in its Great Americans series to honor Drew.
Spingarn Medal
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Drew was born in 1904 into an African-American middle-class family in Washington, D.C. His father, Richard, was a carpet layer and his mother, Nora Burrell, was a teacher. Drew and his siblings grew up in D.C.'s Foggy Bottom neighborhood.
He graduated from Dunbar High School in 1922. Drew won an athletics scholarship to Amherst College in Massachusetts, where he graduated in 1926. He attended medical school at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, receiving his MDCM in 1933, and ranked 2nd in his class of 127 students. A few years later, Drew did graduate work at Columbia University, where he earned his Doctor of Medical Science degree, becoming the first African American to do so.
Having decided upon a career in surgery, he went to Howard University in Washington, D. C., in 1935.
After the next year as a surgical resident, he was sent by Howard for 2 years of advanced study under a General Education Board fellowship to Columbia University, which awarded him the doctor of medical science degree (1940).
He received the honorary doctor of science degrees from Virginia State College (1945) and Amherst College (1947).
In 1940, during World War II, Scudder suggested that the association ship dried plasma to France and England. The association appointed Drew director of its "Blood for Britain" project in September 1940.
In 1941 Drew was appointed director of the first American Red Cross Bank and assistant director of blood procurement for the National Research Council, in charge of blood for use by the U.S. Army and Navy.
In October 1941 Drew returned to Howard as head of the department of surgery and was made an examiner for the American Board of Surgery. Chief of staff of Freedmen's Hospital from 1944 to 1946, he was appointed medical director of the hospital for 1946-1947. At Howard, Drew firmly established a progressive modern surgery program. He was a dynamic and inspirational teacher. While he was still alive, eight of his residents became diplomates of the American Board of Surgery, and many more who started their training under him became board-certified and did significant work all over the world.
Drew published 19 papers, the first 13 dealing with blood therapy. The last 6 reflected broadening interests, one posthumous title being "Negro Scholars in Scientific Research."
During 6 years as chairman of the surgical section of the National Medical Association, Drew brought new vigor and standards to the group. He was in demand as a speaker, and he served on numerous boards with a wide spectrum of interests, including the 12th Street Branch of the YMCA in Washington.
He served in 1949 as surgical consultant to the surgeon general, U.S. Army. He was killed in an automobile accident on April 1, 1950.
African American surgeon Charles Richard Drew pioneered in developing the blood bank and was an outstanding leader in the training of surgeons. He received the Spingarn Medal of the NAACP (1943).
In 1959 the Sigma Pi Phi fraternity presented an oil portrait of Dr. Drew to the American National Red Cross. In Los Angeles the Charles R. Drew Medical Society and the Charles R. Drew Postgraduate Medical School of the Martin Luther King Jr. Hospital perpetuate his name. A health center in Brooklyn and the Harlem Hospital Center blood bank in New York City are named for him. The surgical section of the National Medical Association has an annual Charles R. Drew Forum for the presentation of original surgical research, and about 20 public schools in America have been named for him.
In 1981, the United States Postal Service issued a 35¢ postage stamp in its Great Americans series to honor Drew.
Drew criticized the policy of segregating blood racially as having no scientific basis.
Quotations:
”Boston was a great city to grow up in, and it probably still is. We were surrounded by two very important elements: academia and the arts. I was surrounded by theater, music, dance, museums. And I learned how to sail on the Charles River. So I had a great childhood in Boston. It was wonderful.”
”Everyone finds their own version of Charles Dickens. The child-victim, the irrepressibly ambitious young man, the reporter, the demonic worker, the tireless walker. The radical, the protector of orphans, helper of the needy, man of good works, the republican. The hater and the lover of America. The giver of parties, the magician, the traveler.”
”Marilyn Monroe wasn’t even her real name, Charles Manson isn’t his real name, and now, I’m taking that to be my real name. But what’s real? You can’t find the truth, you just pick the lie you like the best.”
”I’m not Mother Teresa, but I’m not Charles Manson, either.”
”I cannot even imagine where I would be today were it not for that handful of friends who have given me a heart full of joy. Let’s face it, friends make life a lot more fun.”
”The difference between something good and something great is attention to detail.”
”Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it.”
”We cannot change our past. We can not change the fact that people act in a certain way. We can not change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude.”
An outstanding athlete at Amherst, Drew also joined Omega Psi Phi fraternity.
In 1946 he became a fellow of the International College of Surgeons.
He was a dynamic and inspirational teacher.
Drew's radiant geniality and warm sense of humor endeared him to patients.
He said: ”I do watch a lot of Fox News. I like Charles Krauthammer and Bill O’Reilly.”
He said: ”Johnny Depp is like a brother to me. We have matching tattoos on our backs – Charles Baudelaire, the flowers of evil, this giant skeleton thing. It’s kind of a secret. People say to us, ‘Why did you get that?’ And we say, ‘No reason.'”
In 1939, Drew married Minnie Lenore Robbins, a professor of home economics at Spelman College whom he had met earlier that year. They had three daughters and a son. His daughter Charlene Drew Jarvis was the president of Southeastern University from 1996 until 2009.
( 1945–2008)
(born July 31, 1941 in Washington, D.C. as Charlene Rosella Drew)
She is an American educator and former scientific researcher and politician who served as the president of Southeastern University until March 31, 2009.
