Midwife Monday: Maude Callen

Resting after a long night

In 1951 Grand Midwife Maude Callen’s work as a midwife serving the rural population in South Carolina was photographed and published in Life magazine by Eugene Smith.  Because of the article, readers donated 20,000, and she was able to open the Maude E. Callen clinic in 1953. 

After getting halfway through one evenings letters in response to the photo essay, Maude told her husband;

" I'm too tired and happy to read any more tonight.  I just want to sit here and be thankful"

Maude served her community for 70 years.  She cared.  She waded through mud and traveled miles.  She saved lives.  Eugene Smith's photo essay is a brilliant tribute to Maude's compassion and strength.  The photos speak for themselves.

Washing up by lamplight

"Angel at Twilight" South Carolina Hall of Fame spotlight video

Maude dropping off new dresses

"I’ve seen people in need so much, and so much to be done, I decided then myself I was going to make some effort in order to help them to live a better life”

Maude served about a 400 square mile area.  Much of it was mud and water, and this scene is typical of what she would go through to help someone in need at their own home.  I love her bare feet!

making pads out of newspaper for a birth

Maude was one of 13 sisters and was orphaned at 6.  She was raised by her uncle, who was the first black doctor in Tallahassee.  She became a nurse at 21 and in 1922  she studied nurse midwifery at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama

teaching a class to midwives in training

About LIFE magazine's article "Nurse MIdwife"