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| William A. Hinton (Courtesy of the Canton Historical Society) |
In all honesty, Canton does not have a rich history that
includes stories about African-Americans. There are dark elements of stories
that trace the ownership of slaves to Isaac Royal – for whom Royal Street is
named at the foot of the Blue Hill. In fact, while there were blacks living in
that part of Stoughton that is now Canton, many of them had married into the
Ponkapoag Indian Tribe and their stories have mostly been lost to time.
Yet, Canton does celebrate the career and home of William
Augustus “Gus” Hinton, the first African-American to hold the rank of professor
at Harvard University in its 313-year history. Yet, what Gus Hinton is widely
known for is the Hinton Test, one that became the most effective tests leading
to the diagnosis of syphilis.
Born in 1883 in Chicago, Illinois, Hinton was the son of
Augustus Hinton and Maria Clark, emancipated slaves from North Carolina. Little
is known of Hinton’s parents. What we do know is after slavery, Augustus Hinton
was freed following the Civil War and became a farmer and railroad porter. It
is possible that the Hinton surname came from being a slave on one of the
Hinton Plantations. The largest landowner in the early days of Wake County
(then Johnston County), North Carolina was the Hinton family. One of their
early grants was a 136-acre parcel located on the west bank of the Neuse River.
This was followed shortly with multiple grants, which eventually led to their
having some 22,000 acres, extending to Clayton. Hundreds of slaves all took the
name Hinton as a result of being the property of the Hinton Family.
The historical records indicate that the Hinton family
treated their slaves very well and had a small school building erected for
their education. Yet, when you read the slave narratives conducted by the
Federal Writer’s Project in 1938, education did not seem to be a part of the
backstory. Robert Hinton, an emancipated
slave, when interviewed about education said, "De white folks, ole missus,
teached us de catechism, but dey didn't want you to learn to read and write. I
can read and write now; learned since de surrender.” As for Augustus and Maria
Hinton they knew that for their son to be successful in America, he would need
an education.
Shortly after William Hinton was born, the family moved to
Kansas City, Kansas and they determined to give him the education they likely
had not enjoyed. Hinton attended public schools and a private Catholic school and
worked as a newsboy. Through perseverance, young Gus Hinton would propel
himself into the upper echelons of medicine and earn a place in history and
science.
Hinton’s career choice was medicine, sparked by a high
school biology teacher. Graduating from high school as the youngest in its
history at age 16, Hinton went on to attend the University of Kansas in 1900. Within
two years he was forced to drop out, unable to pay the tuition. Taking a leave
he was able to earn enough money to return, yet the program of studies changed
such that instead he transferred to Harvard College in Cambridge on a
scholarship. A recurring theme in Hinton’s education was the fact that he would
be forced repeatedly to leave school to finance his education, returning each
and every time to move forward. For three years after his graduation, Hinton
worked teaching biology, chemistry and physics in colleges in Tennessee and
Oklahoma. It was in Langston, Oklahoma that Hinton met fellow teacher, Ada
Hawes, who was teaching Latin at the Agricultural and Mechanical College. In
1909, Ada and Gus married, and that same year, they moved to Boston and rented
a small apartment at 52 Fenwood Road, Jamaica Plain.
Although several years had passed since Hinton had done his
pre-medical studies, he was able to enter Harvard Medical School and skip the
second year, thus graduating in three years. Remarkably, and also in character,
Hinton won the Edward Wigglesworth Scholarship – recommended by the
administrative board to a “needy and deserving student.” At the same time,
Hinton refused to accept the Lewis and Harriet Hayden Scholarship for “colored”
students. Hinton stated that he wanted to be rewarded on his merit, not
compensated because of his race. Graduating with cum laude in 1912, Hinton
initially desired to become a surgeon, yet hospitals in Boston denied blacks
the opportunity to intern with patients.
After Hinton’s graduation, Dr. Richard C. Cabot, a close
friend and eminent physician, remarked that “but for Hinton’s courage,
determination, and perseverance, his contributions to humanity might have been
lost.” A former student of Cabot’s, Hinton had worked in the Harvard
Laboratories that would become the backdrop of his groundbreaking research. “He
was determined to succeed without benefit of internship which is considered
essential for every doctor,” observed Cabot.
By 1915, Hinton moved his family to a modest house at 154
Dedham Street in Canton. It is likely that fellow classmate, Henry Lyman told
Hinton of the four-acre parcel just a few miles from his own home on Elm
Street. Lyman was a research chemist at Harvard, and by many accounts a close
personal friend of the Hinton’s. Lyman was married into the Cabot family and
kept homes on Commonwealth Avenue as well. The connection between Hinton and
Lyman certainly shows the respect that the medical community of scholars held for
this remarkable man.
The house in Canton was sold as an accessory to the land.
The owner had told the Hinton’s that “the house isn’t worth anything, what you
are getting is the land.” Yet, it was that house that Hinton turned into a
home. Dr. Hinton loved both gardening and furniture making. A friend of Hinton
said that “the pool was always filled with lilies of all colors, there was a
tennis court, a rose garden, and an orchard and grape vines on the hill with
every kind of fruit tree that grows in this part of the country.” His barbecues
were legendary, and he worked to cut paths into the woods, lining the borders
with irises and ladyslippers. “He loved the unusual and the beautiful.”
In 1919, Hinton received an appointment as instructor in
preventative medicine and Hygiene at Harvard Medical School, commencing a more
than three-decade teaching association at Harvard. In 1931, he started a school
that would train women to become laboratory technicians. At the same time,
Hinton was overseeing the expansion of state laboratory facilities and expanded
ten facilities to more than a hundred in order to meet state regulations for
marital blood tests. From 1946 -1949, Hinton worked as a consultant at the
Massachusetts Hospital School here in Canton.
What Hinton was best known for, however, was his
groundbreaking medical research in the field of sexually transmitted diseases,
in particular, syphilis. During the period between 1930 and 1943, the rate of
syphilis climbed by over 150%, and the treatment was a long series of painful
injections or oral doses of mercury, bismuth and arsenic. As early as the mid
1920’s, Hinton insisted that treatment “not be guided by the persistence of
positive tests, but by the physician’s diagnosis, since many patients react
positively long after the disease has become inactive.” Hinton had come to
recognize the problem of false positive tests, and set out to develop a more
definitive test for syphilis.
False positive tests resulted in painful treatment,
dangerous prognoses and the stigma of a shameful venereal disease. By 1927, Hinton published the finding of a
test that would become the widely known Hinton Test. Ten years later; the
Hinton Test was the most sensitive and accurate test for syphilis ever created.
False positives were almost eliminated, and as a result Hinton’s test became
the gold standard. More importantly, in 1935 Hinton wrote the seminal text Syphilis and Its Treatment, devoting
extensive sections to patient care. He made it clear that such diseases were “a
by-product of poverty and ignorance and poor living conditions.” Race was not a
factor in the spread of venereal diseases.
In fact, Hinton worked his whole life to ensure that race
was not a factor in his work. So much so that he generally felt that widespread
knowledge of the fact that he was black would delay the acceptance of his test.
Robert C. Hayden, a biographer that wrote extensively on Hinton explains that “he
was very realistic, and felt if his work got out there and they found out that
he was black, his science would be devalued. In fact, some southern states
stopped using the Hinton Test when they learned of his race.” Hinton turned down the NAACP's 1938 Spingarn
Medal award because he wanted his work to stand on its own merit. "Race
should never get mixed up in the struggle for human welfare," he would
later comment.
On February 10, 1941, Hinton left his home in Canton and was
involved in accident on icy roads on Morton Street in Mattapan. His car skidded
and a second car driving 15 mph crashed into him and caused such injury that
Hinton’s leg was amputated above the knee. The next 18 years were filled with
pain and acute diabetes, yet Hinton worked tirelessly at Harvard. In 1949, one
year before academic retirement, Hinton was made Clinical Professor of
Bacteriology, the first black to be named to a professorial rank in Harvard’s
history.
Hinton died at his home here in Canton on August 8, 1959 and
was celebrated at First Parish Church at Canton Corner. In his will he left
$75,000 to be put into a special scholarship for Harvard graduate students. The
fund, a memorial to his parents, “who although born into slavery and without
formal education, nevertheless recognized and practiced not only the highest
ideals of their personal conduct, but also the true democratic principle of
equal opportunity for all, without regard to racial or religious origins or to
political status.” Hinton named the fund the Dwight D. Eisenhower Scholarship
Fund in honor of the president whom he had felt made great strides in providing
equal opportunity employment during his administration. President Eisenhower wrote, “I could not
recall having been given a personal distinction that had touched me more
deeply.”
In 2008, Governor Deval Patrick dedicated the Massachusetts
Department of Public Health’s Laboratory Institute in honor of Dr. William A.
Hinton.
Special thanks to
members of the Hinton family and to Robert C. Hayden, Jr. historian, author,
and educator.
