Event
"A New Witch Hunt in Salem": The Rise & Fall of Low-Cost Birth Control Clinics during the Great Depression
Author: Jeanna Kinnebrew, Boston University
Comment: Lauren MacIvor Thompson, Kennesaw State University
This is a hybrid event. The in-person reception will begin at 4:30 PM.
For over a century, elite Bostonians attempted to keep “pernicious and dangerous” contraceptive knowledge from poor and working-class citizens. During the Great Depression, a group of socially prominent women set out to upset this status quo, establishing a statewide network of low-cost birth control clinics. Although the clinics operated for years to great acclaim, all came crashing down after a dramatic police raid in 1937. The case sparked a statewide debate and set the stage for the next four decades of birth control battles.
Join the conversation at the History of Women, Gender, & Sexuality Seminar. Seminars bring together a diverse group of scholars and interested members of the public to workshop a pre-circulated paper. Learn more.
Purchasing the $25 seminar subscription gives you advance access to the seminar papers of all seven seminar series for the current academic year. Subscribe at www.masshist.org/research/seminars. Subscribers for the current year may login to view currently available essays.
Hybrid Event
The in-person reception starts at 4:30 PM and the seminar will begin at 5:00 PM.
Masks are optional for this event.
The virtual seminar begins at 5:00 PM and will be hosted on the video conference platform, Zoom. Registrants will receive a confirmation message with attendance information.
