Lessons from the Past, Shared Ideals for the Future

CIR Regional VP Reflects on 65 Years of Progress in Her Own Family

By Anyka McClain, MD
Within days of media reports that the proposed health care reform bills might exclude a public health insurance option, I was among other physicians and community members meeting with Representative Sheila Jackson Lee, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Jr., and civil rights icon and former congressman Walter E. Fauntroy at hearings to advocate for that element of reform.

On the Amtrak train from New York to Washington, DC, I called my parents with my latest good news.  My family had always been the first to learn about my career milestones, from acceptance to Spelman College and Howard University College of Medicine, to matching in emergency medicine at Lincoln Hospital, to my election as NY Regional VP for CIR and appointment as Chief Resident.  Now, I let them know I was awaiting an offer letter for a faculty position at the University of Maryland. Mom was elated. She said that my 90-year-old cousin, Erla McKinnon, should be the next to know. In an enlightening phone conversation, I heard Erla’s story for myself.


Dr. Anyka McClain (right) was offered a position at the same
university that rejected her cousin Erla McKinnon (left)
because of her race 65 years ago.

In 1944, 10 years before the milestone Brown vs. Board of Education decision which ended legal segregation in the nation’s schools, Erla applied to the University of Maryland to pursue a master’s degree. She was denied admission because she was black.  She said that in those days, segregation and discrimination were so firmly entrenched that Maryland legislators set aside state money to fund tuition, transportation and accommodation for black students to earn advanced degrees anywhere but in Maryland. She told me: “They paid you.You could go anywhere—except the University of Maryland.”

Getting to New York City was convenient, so Cousin Erla opted for classes at NYU. She started in 1945 with one course per semester, and in1950, after six years of weekend train trips from Baltimore, earned her Master Degree in Elementary Education. A sympathetic principal excused Erla from teaching early each Friday to catch the 2 p.m. train to New York for class from 6-8 p.m. Class continued on Saturday morning, and she studied while on the train back to Baltimore. Sundays were for preparing lesson plans and completing college assignments. When I asked about her motivation under such trying circumstances, she responded: “I thought I could save the world. I always wanted to save somebody, help somebody.” That’s our shared ideal; it has remained a driving force as I chart my course in life.

The State of Maryland abided by Brown vs. Board of Education, and in1954 the university enrolled black students. My cousin had an illustrious 35-year career in the Baltimore City schools while keeping up her civic and political activity outside of school. In 1977, Governor Marvin Mandel proclaimed July 29th “Erla McKinnon Day.” Now, in 2009, sixty-five years after Cousin Erla was denied admission as a student to the University of Maryland, I have an opportunity to accept a faculty position there.

Reforming health care is an arduous task that crosses racial lines, and these are different days. A lot has changed. Barack Obama is president of the United States, and I am living Martin Luther King’s dream. But the ideal of helping others unites my cousin and myself across the years. Advocacy — this time for equal access to health care — must continue. Cousin Erla showed us what persistence can produce; it is the lesson for our times.