Woman of Valor (95 page)

35.
Birth Control Federation of America, “Memo to State and Local Affiliates from the National Clinic Service Department, Mar. 1, 1940,” explains the difficulties first encountered in trying to maintain uniform standards for affiliated clinics. For an overall view of PPFA in this period, see Martin Rein, “An Organizational Analysis of a National Agency's Local Affiliates in Their Community Contexts,” Planned Parenthood Federation of America, 1961, copy in PPFA-SS. Also see Piotrow,
World Population
, p. 16.

36.
M.S. to George Plummer, Feb. 5, 1939, MS-LC.

19: INTERMEZZO

1.
M.S. to Edith How-Martyn, June 16, 1940, MS-SS; M.S. to Lillian Hellman, July 19, 1941, and to H.G.W., Oct. 14, 1941, MS-LC; M.S. to Françoise Cyon, June 18, 1943, MS-SS; M.S. to H.G.W., May 31, 1943, MS-SS, and Feb. 8, 1944, Wells Papers, U. of Illinois, Champagne-Urbana; Juliet Rublee to M.S., passim, 1938-41, MS-SS; M.S. to William L. Holt, a Tucson doctor, Apr. 22, 1941, MS-LC; C. V. and Bessie Drysdale to M.S., Sept. 13, 1945, copy in Rosika Schwimmer papers, New York Public Library. The final quote is from the Sanger Journals, 1938-1941, MS-SS.
Sanger's pacifism and her sympathies for Indian independence, of course, came to the attention of the FBI, which tracked the activities of the American Round Table on India, to which she belonged, in a memorandum dated Mar. 6, 1943.

2.
M.S., Journal, Aug. 11, 1940, MS-SS; Florence Kerr to M.S., Jan. 24, 1941, MS-LC; M.S. to Carrie Catt, Feb. 12, 1940, MS-LC; Alice Paul to Florence Rose, Nov. 12, 1941, and Rose memo to D. K. Rose, Mrs. Sanger et al., Nov. 17, 1941, MS-SS; M.S. to Nora Stanton Barney, Man 29, 1943, MS-LC, and June 14, 1943, MS-SS; N.S.B. to M.S., June 10, 1944, and M.S. to “Editor Saturday Evening Post,” Dec. 4, 1942; M.S. manuscript, “Is This the Time to Have a Child?” June 1942; M.S.
The Daily Worker
manuscript for article, “Women in War,” n.d. (1942 or '43); M.S. to Marie Equi, Mar. 23, 1943, all in MS-SS. Finally, see D. Kenneth Rose to Clarence Gamble, Mar. 11, 1943, for his sense that neither American industry nor organized labor was interested in health programs for American workers, Gamble correspondence, MS-SS.

3.
M.S. to H.G.W., May 31, 1943, MS-SS; M.S. to H.G.W., Feb. 9, 1944, and M.S. to Kip Wells, cablegram, Aug. 15, 1946, Wells Papers, U. of Illinois. David Smith,
H.G. Wells, Desperately Mortal, A Biography
(New Haven: 1986), pp. 457-8.
Crux Ansata
translates literally as “cross with a handle,” presumably a reference to the cross born by the earliest Christian crusaders, whose motivation, in Wells's view, had been primarily economic and not religious.

4.
Sanger Journal, Aug. 23, 1940, Mar. 15, 1941, Aug. 8, 1943, MS-SS; M.S. to George Ferguson, Aug. 31, 1942, MS-LC; M.S. to Lawrence Lader, April 2, 1953, MS-SS, has the final memory.

5.
My warmest thanks to Leon Thikoll, Esq., of Tucson for uncovering Noah Slee's Last Will and Testament of Oct. 8, 1942, and an Affidavit and Petition for Administration of Estate Less Than $500.00, in the Superior Court of the State of Arizona, copies of which were submitted by Stuart Sanger for the probate of his mother's estate on Dec. 27, 1967. A “Statement of Securities” held by the Bank of New York & Trust Company as custodian for Margaret Sanger Slee, dated June 30, 1936, MS-SS, identifies hundreds of shares of stock in companies like Bethlehem Steel, Chrysler Corporation, GM, and various oils and minerals, showing some losses and some gains recorded in Slee's handwriting. There are no subsequent records until the 1950s, when her portfolio was valued at less than $200,000, but by that time she had already spent down or given away some of her principal. At her own death in 1966, Margaret's estate, consisting of cash, treasury bonds, stocks, and a $15,000 legacy from Juliet Rublee, was appraised at a total value of only $111,891.11, according to the Certificate of Appointment of Appraisers, In the Matter of the Estate of Margaret Sanger Slee, Superior Court of the State of Arizona, filed Sept. 12, 1967. Finally, see Anne Slee Willis to M.S., July 29, n.d. (1943), MS-LC.

6.
M.S. to Dorothy Brush Dick, June 26, 1943, MS-SS; D.B.D., remarks at Slee Memorial Service, Sept. 1943, MS-LC. Also see M.S. to Elizabeth Arden, July 19, 1943, MS-LC; and “In Memoriam,” July 1943, the obituary published by the Margaret Sanger Research Bureau, copy in AS-Countway. Finally, compare Sanger's nasty mention of Slee in
Autobiography
, p. 379, with quotes in Lawrence Lader,
The Margaret Sanger Story
(New York: 1955). Personal letterhead, newspaper articles, and some professional conference brochures from the 1950s use the Slee surname.

7.
M.S. to Françoise Cyon, Aug. 14, 1943, MS-SS; quotes are in order from M.S., Journals, June 24, 1942, and Nov. 8, 1944. Also see entry for Sept. 1, 1942. An account of Nan's death is in the Van Voris interview with Olive Byrne Richard, p. 27. Margaret was so frantic when Nan refused medical care that she left Ethel in charge and went shopping, but then carried on when she was gone at the moment of Nan's death.

8.
William Sanger to M.S., Sept. 18, “1942” (probably 1943, judging by the content), MS-SS.

9.
The quote is from Stuart Sanger to J.N.H.S., Jan. 14, 1938, MS-SS.

10.
Stuart Sanger to M.S., Oct. 27, 1939; Grant Sanger to M.S., n.d. (sometime during the war), concerning Stuart's behavior; Anna Werner to M.S., miscellaneous letters from 1931 and 1932 regarding Stuart's drinking and gambling; Sanger Journal, June 1941; all in MS-SS. Also see the Jacqueline Van Voris interview with Margaret Sanger Marston and Nancy Sanger Ivins, MS-SS, esp. pp. 1-11. Finally, I must again express thanks to Margaret Sanger Marston for the candor of our interview on Jan. 17, 1985, in Arlington, Va., and to Olive Byrne Richard for the same.

11.
Morris Fishbein of the AMA to Grant Sanger (with Margaret's comments), Jan. 23, 1939, MS-LC; G.S. to M.S., correspondence passim, 1938-39; and Edwina Campbell Sanger to M.S., passim, with quotes from Aug. 2 and Nov. 18, 1939: M.S., Journal, n.d. (1944), all in MS-SS. Grant Sanger, in an interview of Nov. 16, 1984, also remarked on the similarities between Peter and Bob Higgins, the football player. In 1986, Peter Sanger was killed in a plane crash at Fishers Island, New York, where he ran a marina.

12.
Sanger Journal, passim, Oct. 22, Nov. 8, 1944; April 17, April 18, and Dec. 25, 1945, MS-SS. Also see Pandit, Address to the Family Planning Association of Great Britain, June 2, 1956, MS-SS. “Woman of the Week,”
The Arizona Daily Star
, Dec. 15, 1946, clipping in scrapbooks of Planned Parenthood of Tucson, shows Margaret pictured with her dog.

13.
Edwina and Grant Sanger to M.S., n.d. (1945), MS-SS; M.S. to H.de S., Nov. 11, 1945, MS-LC; John Elliott of Scudder, Stevens & Clark, portfolio managers, to M.S., Nov. 30, 1948, says she loaned $20,000 to Grant; Elliott to M.S., Sept. 18, 1950, says she then purchased the mortgage. There is no record of a comparable amount to Stuart. Also see Grant Sanger to M.S., Dec. 16, 1948, all in MS-SS. Additional information came from my interviews with Grant Sanger on Nov. 16, 1984, and Dec. 18, 1987; my interview with Margaret Marston, Jan. 17, 1985, and various conversations with Alex Sanger.

14.
An extensive correspondence with Leighton and Catherine Rollins is in MS-SS. Mention of a $1,000 loan to “Rawlins” is in Cele Damon Wright to M.S., Apr., 4, 1950, MS-SS. Also see Hobson Pittman to M.S., Sept. 17, 1946, Jan. 2, April 26, June 16, and Aug. 21, 1947, in MS-SS, which also includes a clipping of an article about Pittman from
American Artist
, 1945. Additional Pittman letters are in MS-LC. For recollections of Sanger's social life and her generosity to favored friends and causes, I am also grateful to Grace Sternberg, whom I interviewed in Tucson in March 1986. The material quoted is from M.S. to Dorothy Brush, Jan. 14, 1947; Anne Kennedy to M.S., Oct. 19, 1951, and M.S. to A. K., Oct, 29, 1951; and finally, D.B. to M.S., Mar. 24, 1949, MS-SS. Also see Brush to M.S., Aug. 25, 1949, MS-SS. Accounts of the Haiti holiday are in M.S. to Mary Lasker, Feb. 1 and 17, 1948, in the Lasker personal correspondence, Sanger Papers Project. Margaret wrote many letters during the summer of 1948 on letterhead from “Sailaway” in Bridgehampton.
During the 1930s Brush married Alexander Dick and had a daughter, now Sylvia Dick Karas. Her subsequent relationship with Lewis Walmsley lasted until the 1960s, when they finally married after the death of his wife. My thanks to Sylvia Karas for her reminiscences by phone in Bridgehampton, N.Y, 1988.

15.
Eleanor Roosevelt to M.S. (on black-rimmed mourning stationery) accepting invitation to reception in Tucson, Mar. 3, 1946; M.S. to R. L. Dickinson, May 28, 1946, MS-SS, and M.S. to Rodger S. Callway, chairman, PPFA executive committee, Jan. 6, 1947; D.K.R. to John D. Rockefeller III, July 2, 1948, and Arthur W. Packard to J.D.R. Ill, July 9, 1948, all in Rocky-RG2. Also see James Reed,
The Birth Control Movement and American Society: From Private Vice to Public Virtue
(Princeton: 1984), pp. 261-71.

16.
M.S. to Julian Huxley, Aug. 5, 1946; M.S. to Lady Denman of the FPA, Sept. 11, 1947, and Denman to M.S., Aug. 18, 1947; Arthur W. Packard to “Files,” Dec. 9, 1947. (Packard and John Rockefeller III first authorized only $2,500, but J.D.R. III then extended the amount.) Rocky-RG2. The Brush quote is from Lader,
Sanger Story
, p. 355. Also see “Mrs. Sanger to Sweden,”
The New York Times
, Aug. 21, 1946, 24:4; “Mrs. Sanger's Plan Opposed by Britons,”
NYT
, July 4, 1947, 3:4; and Grace Robinson, “10-Year Moratorium on Europe Babies Urged,” clipping from the
New York Daily News
, July 1, 1947, in AS-Countway. Information on Ottesen-Jensen is from the author's interview with Frances Ferguson, PPFA president in the 1950s, June 1986.

17.
Arthur W. Packard to Lewis H. Weed of the National Research Council, Dec. 12, 1947; M.S. to A.W.P, Mar. 13, 1948, and A.W.P. to M.S., Mar. 16, 1948; Mary Compton, secretary to M.S., to A.W.P. May 14; M.S. to A.W.P., May 17; A.W.P. to J.D.R. III, May 19, including a copy of the program, all in Rocky-RG2; M.S. to Gerda Guy, July 21, 1948; and M.S. to Dr. C. P. Blacker, Nov. 1, 1948, both in IPPF-Cardiff; transcript, Quincy Howe, “Frontiers of Science,” CBS broadcasting from Cheltenham, Aug. 24, 1948, MS-SS. Sanger's speech is in International Congress on Population and World Resources in Relation to the Family,
Proceedings
(London: 1948), pp. 85-95, copy in MSSS. The late Fred Jaffe mentioned the sexual tensions that informed contraceptive policy during this period in numerous conversations. The “unmanly” reference is from Peter Collier & David Horowitz,
The Rockefellers: An American Dynasty
(New York: 1976), p. 284. Frances Ferguson, former president of PPFA and IPPF, also refers to the gender issue at PPFA in the 1950s in her interview with James Reed, June 2, 1974, Schlesinger Library Oral History Project on Women in Family Planning. A good analysis of the history of demography in this period is in John Hajnal, “The Study of Fertility and Reproduction, a Survey of Thirty Years,” in
Thirty Years of Research in Human Fertility: Retrospect and Prospect, Papers Presented at the 1958 Annual Conference of the Milbank Memorial Fund
, (New York: 1959), pp. 11-37. Also see Reed,
Birth Control Movement
, pp. 281-84; and Beryl Suitters,
Be Brave and Angry: Chronicles of the International Planned Parenthood Federation
(London:1971), pp. 4-5.

18.
Helen Donington, executive secretary, to M.S., Nov. 16, 1948, Jan. 28, Mar. 25, 1949; M.S. to Donington, Jan. 13, Feb. 8, Feb. 18 (telegram), 1949; M.S. to Elise Ottesen-Jensen (spelled “Yenssen” in the first instance), Apr. 22, Aug. 2, 1949; M.S. to Helen Cohen (Donington was newly married), May 25, Sept. 14, 1949, all in IPPF-Cardiff.

19.
Arthur W. Packard to “The Files,” Mar. 30, 1949; Frank Lorimer to D. Frank Milam, PPFA, Apr. 11, 1949; Lorimer to Packard, enclosing a copy of Lorimer to M.S., both dated Apr. 11, 1949; Packard to “File,” June 9, 1949, enclosing copy of Shidzue Kato to M.S., n.d. (1949), all in Rocky-RG2; Lorimer to M.S., Feb. 14, 1950, MS-SS. Also see William Vogt,
The Road to Survival
(New York: 1948), p. 280.

20.
M.S. to Dr. Julian Huxley, June 7, 1949, MS-SS. The Smith citation is quoted in a clipping from
The Churchman
, July 1949, also at MS-SS. M.S. to H.de S., Jan. 20, July 3, 1949, MS-LC. Finally, see “Life Congratulates Margaret Sanger,”
Life
26:26 (June 1949), p. 24.

21.
Direct quotes are from M.S. to Françoise Cyon, Dec. 6, 1949, and Dorothy Brush to M.S., both at MS-SS. Also at Smith see M.S. to Cyon, Oct. 8, 1949, along with Sanger's typed responses to the correspondence decorating course, Jan. 31, 1949. Later correspondence with Frank Lloyd Wright from Mar. 1953 is in MS-LC.
Grant Sanger recalled his mother's desire to have Wright's blessing in his interview of Dec. 1986, and Stuart Sanger took me to see the house on Sierra Vista Drive in 1986, then owned by a University of Arizona professor and his wife, Keith and Adrian Lehrer. He remembered that his mother had insisted on leaving the hospital and driving over in an ambulance to inspect it during its construction.

20: LAST ACT

1.
M.S. to Ray Jansen, Harrisburg, Pa., n.d. (1949-50), and M.S. to H. de S., Jan. 29, 1950, MS-LC; Edwina Sanger to M.S., Feb. 22, 1950, MS-SS, mentions the editorial in the
Washington Post
. Also see “Planned Parenthood Honors Its Pioneers,”
The New York Times
, Feb. 2, 1950, 25:1.