Letter from Martha Tracy to Pauline Dinkins

Born in 1935 in Marion, Alabama, Pauline Dinkins grew up in Selma, Alabama, the daughter of parents born into slavery. She experienced racism while a student at WMCP,  and wrote to Dean Martha Tracy about it shortly after she graduated in 1919. By September she had taken the Alabama  state licensing exam and went on to work as the resident physician  at the Tuskegee Institute (c. 1924-25)and later served as medical director of Brewer Hospital and Nurse training School in Greenwood, SC (1925 to  1927). In 1928 Dinkins served as a medical missionary to Liberia, but became ill and returned to Selma in 1929, where she opened a private medical practice. Dinkins dies in 1961 Martha Tracy graduated WMCP in 1904, and went on to become dean of the college 1917-1935. During her tenure as dean, Tracy often encountered difficulty placing African American WMCP graduates in hospital internships after graduation. Tracy advocated for these students by writing letters  on their behalf and raising the issue with leaders of the medical community.

In the early and mid-twentieth century, educational opportunities available to African-Americans were not equal to those available to whites. Even at schools that accepted African-Americans as students, there was racial discrimination. The dean of WMCP responds to one student’s experiences.