Katherine Dexter McCormick
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Katharine Dexter McCormick (August 27, 1875 – December 28, 1967) was a U.S. suffragist,
philanthropist Philanthropy is a form of altruism that consists of "private initiatives, for the Public good (economics), public good, focusing on quality of life". Philanthropy contrasts with business initiatives, which are private initiatives for private goo ...
and, after her husband's death, heir to a substantial part of the McCormick family fortune. She funded most of the research necessary to develop the first birth control pill.


Early life and education

Katharine Dexter was born on August 27, 1875, in Dexter, Michigan, in her grandparents' mansion, Gordon Hall, and grew up in
Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...
where her father, Wirt Dexter (a descendent of
Samuel Dexter Samuel Dexter (May 14, 1761May 4, 1816) was an early American statesman who served both in Congress and in the Presidential Cabinets of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. A native of Boston, Massachusetts, Dexter was an 1881 graduate of Harvard ...
), was a prominent lawyer. Following the early death of her father of a heart attack at age 57 when she was 14 years old, she and her mother Josephine moved to
Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
in 1890. Four years later, her brother Samuel died of meningitis at age 25. Katharine graduated from the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...
in 1904, earning a
BSc A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University of ...
in biology.


Marriage to Stanley McCormick

She planned to attend medical school, but instead married Stanley Robert McCormick, the youngest son of Cyrus McCormick and heir to the
International Harvester The International Harvester Company (often abbreviated by IHC, IH, or simply International ( colloq.)) was an American manufacturer of agricultural and construction equipment, automobiles, commercial trucks, lawn and garden products, household e ...
fortune, on September 15, 1904. In September 1905, they moved into a house in
Brookline, Massachusetts Brookline is a town in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, Norfolk County, Massachusetts, in the United States, and part of the Greater Boston, Boston metropolitan area. Brookline borders six of Boston's neighborhoods: Brighton, Boston, Brighton, A ...
. The couple did not have any children. Stanley graduated ''
cum laude Latin honors are a system of Latin phrases used in some colleges and universities to indicate the level of distinction with which an academic degree has been earned. The system is primarily used in the United States. It is also used in some Sou ...
'' from
Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...
in 1895 where he had also been a gifted athlete on the varsity tennis team. He had been showing signs of progressively worsening mental illness. In September 1906, he was hospitalized for over a year at
McLean Hospital McLean Hospital () (formerly known as Somerville Asylum and Charlestown Asylum) is a psychiatric hospital in Belmont, Massachusetts. It is noted for its clinical staff expertise and neuroscience research and is also known for the large number of ...
and was originally diagnosed with dementia praecox, an early label for what is now today known as
schizophrenia Schizophrenia is a mental disorder characterized by continuous or relapsing episodes of psychosis. Major symptoms include hallucinations (typically hearing voices), delusions, and disorganized thinking. Other symptoms include social withdra ...
. In June 1908, Stanley was moved to the McCormicks'
Riven Rock ''Riven Rock'' is a 1998 novel by American author T. Coraghessan Boyle. It concerns the life of Stanley McCormick, a son of Cyrus McCormick, inventor of the reaper, and Stanley's devoted wife, Katherine McCormick, daughter of Wirt Dexter, a pro ...
estate in
Montecito, California Montecito (Spanish for "Little mountain") is an unincorporated town and census-designated place in Santa Barbara County, California.McCormack, Don (1999). ''McCormack's Guides Santa Barbara and Ventura 2000''. Mccormacks Guides. p. 58. . Located ...
, where his schizophrenic older sister, Mary Virginia, had lived from 1898 to 1904 before being placed in a
Huntsville, Alabama Huntsville is a city in Madison County, Limestone County, and Morgan County, Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Madison County. Located in the Appalachian region of northern Alabama, Huntsville is the most populous city in t ...
, sanitarium. While there, he was examined by the prominent German psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin and diagnosed with the catatonic form of dementia praecox. In 1909, Stanley was declared legally incompetent and his guardianship divided between Katharine and the McCormick family.


Women's rights activist

Katharine's plea for gender equality was apparent from early on. As an undergraduate at MIT, she confronted administration officials. MIT required that women wear hats (fashionably spruced up with feathers). Katharine refused. She argued that it was a fire hazard for feathered hats to be worn in laboratories. As a result, MIT's administration changed their policies. In 1909 McCormick spoke at the first outdoor rally for woman suffrage in
Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut assachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ...
. She became vice president and treasurer of the
National American Woman Suffrage Association The National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) was an organization formed on February 18, 1890, to advocate in favor of women's suffrage in the United States. It was created by the merger of two existing organizations, the National ...
and funded the association's publication the ''
Woman's Journal ''Woman's Journal'' was an American women's rights periodical published from 1870 to 1931. It was founded in 1870 in Boston, Massachusetts, by Lucy Stone and her husband Henry Browne Blackwell as a weekly newspaper. In 1917 it was purchased by ...
''. McCormick organized much of Carrie Chapman Catt's efforts to gain ratification for the Nineteenth Amendment. While working with Catt, she met other social activists, including Mary Dennett and
Margaret Sanger Margaret Higgins Sanger (born Margaret Louise Higgins; September 14, 1879September 6, 1966), also known as Margaret Sanger Slee, was an American birth control activist, sex educator, writer, and nurse. Sanger popularized the term "birth control ...
. Katharine met Sanger in 1917, and later that year joined the Committee of 100, a group of women who practiced promoting the legalization of birth control. During
World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, Katharine also worked as a chairwoman of the association's War Service Department. In addition, she was a member of the Women's Committee of the Council of National Defense. In 1920, after the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified, McCormick became the vice president of the
League of Women Voters The League of Women Voters (LWV or the League) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan political organization in the United States. Founded in 1920, its ongoing major activities include registering voters, providing voter information, and advocating for vot ...
. Throughout the 1920s McCormick worked with Sanger on birth control issues. McCormick smuggled more than 1,000
diaphragm Diaphragm may refer to: Anatomy * Thoracic diaphragm, a thin sheet of muscle between the thorax and the abdomen * Pelvic diaphragm or pelvic floor, a pelvic structure * Urogenital diaphragm or triangular ligament, a pelvic structure Other * Diap ...
s from Europe to
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
to Sanger's Clinical Research Bureau. She scheduled meetings with major European diaphragm manufacturers in cities such as Rome and Paris, and used her language skills and biology background to pose as a French or German scientist and place large orders for the devices. They were shipped to her family chateau,
Prangins Castle Prangins Castle is a castle in the Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality of Prangins of the Canton of Vaud in Switzerland. It is a Swiss Swiss inventory of cultural property of national and regional significance, heritage site of national ...
, outside
Geneva Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevra ; rm, Genevra is the List of cities in Switzerland, second-most populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich) and the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaki ...
, where they were sewn into the linings of fashionable coats and other garments. She smuggled them past U.S. customs agents in New York, having successfully disguised them as the spoils of extravagant European shopping sprees for high-end fashions. She made these trips every summer from 1922 to 1925, retiring only after the
1925 Santa Barbara earthquake The 1925 Santa Barbara earthquake hit the area of Santa Barbara, California on June 29, with a moment magnitude between 6.5 and 6.8 and a maximum Mercalli Intensity of IX (''Violent''). It resulted in 13 deaths and destroyed the historic center ...
forced her to redirect her attention to rebuilding her husband's estate and devote her energy to helping direct his care. In 1927, McCormick hosted a reception of delegates attending the 1927 World Population Conference at her home in Geneva. In that year McCormick also turned to the science of
endocrinology Endocrinology (from '' endocrine'' + '' -ology'') is a branch of biology and medicine dealing with the endocrine system, its diseases, and its specific secretions known as hormones. It is also concerned with the integration of developmental event ...
to aid her husband, believing that a defective
adrenal gland The adrenal glands (also known as suprarenal glands) are endocrine glands that produce a variety of hormones including adrenaline and the steroids aldosterone and cortisol. They are found above the kidneys. Each gland has an outer cortex which ...
caused his schizophrenia.


Philanthropist

Inspired by her husband's diagnosis, Katharine was determined to find a cure. Believing that Stanley's illness was a defective adrenal gland, and could be treated with hormone treatment, she established the Neuroendocrine Research Foundation from 1927 to 1947 at
Harvard Medical School Harvard Medical School (HMS) is the graduate medical school of Harvard University and is located in the Longwood Medical Area of Boston, Massachusetts. Founded in 1782, HMS is one of the oldest medical schools in the United States and is consi ...
, and subsidized the publication of the journal ''Endocrinology''. Originally called the "Stanley R. McCormick Memorial Foundation for Neuro- Endocrine Research Corporation", it was the first U.S institute to launch research on the link between endocrinology and mental illness. She also created a research center for the care of the mentally ill at Worcester State Hospital. Her mother Josephine died on November 16, 1937, at age 91 leaving her an estate of more than 10 million dollars. Stanley died on January 19, 1947, at age 72 leaving an estate of over 35 million dollars to Katharine. She spent five years settling his estate, 85% of which went to pay inheritance taxes. In 1953 McCormick met Gregory Goodwin Pincus through
Margaret Sanger Margaret Higgins Sanger (born Margaret Louise Higgins; September 14, 1879September 6, 1966), also known as Margaret Sanger Slee, was an American birth control activist, sex educator, writer, and nurse. Sanger popularized the term "birth control ...
. Pincus had been working on developing a hormonal birth control method since 1951 and his own research laboratory, the Worcester Foundation for Experimental Biology. The drug company that supported Pincus stopped funding his pioneering research because he had yet to make a profit. As a result, McCormick started to fund Pincus's research foundation. The donations started at $100,000 annually, and later $150,000-$180,000 up until her death in 1967. In sum, McCormick had provided $2 million (around $20 million today) of her own money for the development of the oral contraceptive pill. The
Food and Drug Administration The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA or US FDA) is a List of United States federal agencies, federal agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Health and Human Services. The FDA is respon ...
(FDA) approved the sale of the Pill in 1957 for menstrual disorders and added contraception to its indications in 1960. Even after the pill was approved, she continued to fund Pincus's lab and research on ways into improving birth control research through the 1960s. After the successful development and approval of the contraceptive pill, Katharine yielded her attention to the lack of housing for women at MIT. MIT was always coeducational, but because it could provide housing to only some fifty female students, many of the women who attended MIT had to be local residents. However, the place of women at the Institute was far from secure as Katharine Dexter told Dorothy Weeks (a physicist and mathematician who earned her master's and doctorate from MIT) that she had lived "in a cold fear that suddenly—unexpectedly—Tech might exclude women...". In order to provide female students a permanent place at MIT, she donated the money to found Stanley McCormick Hall, an all female dormitory that would allow MIT to house 200 female students. Katharine's funding made a tremendous impact on the number of women at MIT, increasing the number from 3% to 40%. The ramifications of the hall are best stated by William Hecht '61, executive vice president of the Association of Alumni and Alumnae of MIT when he said, "the visible presence of women at MIT helped open up the science and engineering professions to a large part of the population that before had been excluded. It demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt that at MIT men and women are equal." McCormick was also an avid supporter of the arts, particularly to the Santa Barbara Museum of Art where she was one of the Museum's founding members, vice president and donor of the Stanley McCormick Gallery in 1942. Sharing vice president duties with fellow philanthropist and art collector
Wright S. Ludington Wright Saltus Ludington (1900–1992) was an art collector, artist and one of the founding members of the Santa Barbara Museum of Art. Early life and education Wright Saltus Ludington was born in New York City on June 10, 1900, to Charles an ...
, McCormick served on the Museum's Buildings Committee and was responsible for the hiring of the renowned Chicago architect, David Adler, to convert the old post office into the art museum.


Death

She died on December 28, 1967, in Boston, Massachusetts, aged 92. Her will provided $5 million to the
Stanford University School of Medicine Stanford University School of Medicine is the medical school of Stanford University and is located in Stanford, California. It traces its roots to the Medical Department of the University of the Pacific, founded in San Francisco in 1858. This ...
to support female physicians, $5 million to the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, which funded the Katharine Dexter McCormick Library in
Manhattan, New York City Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the List of co ...
, and $1 million to the Worcester Foundation for Experimental Biology. In addition, McCormick made arrangements for $500,000 to be donated to the Chicago Art Institute and the donation of nine important impressionist paintings to the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, which included three major landscapes by
Claude Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During ...
. Along with these paintings, McCormick also donated her residence, which is now known as the Ridley-Tree Education Center. It is currently used by the Museum for child and adult art classes.


Legacy

Katharine McCormick is a character in
T.C. Boyle Thomas Coraghessan Boyle, also known as T. C. Boyle and T. Coraghessan Boyle (born December 2, 1948), is an American novelist and short story writer. Since the mid-1970s, he has published sixteen novels and more than 100 short stories. He won the ...
's novel ''
Riven Rock ''Riven Rock'' is a 1998 novel by American author T. Coraghessan Boyle. It concerns the life of Stanley McCormick, a son of Cyrus McCormick, inventor of the reaper, and Stanley's devoted wife, Katherine McCormick, daughter of Wirt Dexter, a pro ...
'' (1998), which is mainly about her husband Stanley's mental illness. McCormick was inducted into the
National Women's Hall of Fame The National Women's Hall of Fame (NWHF) is an American institution incorporated in 1969 by a group of men and women in Seneca Falls, New York, although it did not induct its first enshrinees until 1973. As of 2021, it had 303 inductees. Induc ...
in 1998. She was inducted into the
Michigan Women's Hall of Fame The Michigan Women's Hall of Fame (MWHOF) honors distinguished women, both historical and contemporary, who have been associated with the U.S. state of Michigan Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes regi ...
in 2000. There is a dorm named after her at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.


See also

* Birth control movement in the United States


References


Further reading

*''
Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...
'', "Mrs. McCormick Dies Here at 92", December 30, 1967. *Tuck, S. L. McCormick, Katharine Dexter. ''American National Biography Online'', Feb. 2000. *
Jonathan Eig Jonathan Eig (born April 26, 1964) is an American journalist and biographer and the author of five books. His most recent book, ''Ali: A Life'', is a biography of Muhammad Ali. Biography Eig was born in Brooklyn, New York and grew up in Monsey, N ...
, ''The Birth of the Pill: How Four Crusaders Reinvented Sex and Launched a Revolution'' (N.Y.: W.W. Norton, 2014) *
Armond Fields Armond Fields was an American market research consultant, a painter, a graphic artist, and a prolific social historian who wrote art and theater biographies. Early life and education Fields was born in Chicago, Illinois, to Louis Max and Esther ...
: ''Katharine Dexter McCormick: Pioneer for Women's Rights'' (2003) () *
Richard Noll Richard Noll (born 1959 in Detroit, Michigan) is an American clinical psychologist and historian of medicine. He has published on the history of psychiatry, including two critical volumes on the life and work of Carl Gustav Jung, books and articles ...
, "Styles of psychiatric practice, 1906–1925: Clinical evaluations of the same patient by James Jackson Putnam, Adolf Meyer, August Hoch, Emil Kraepelin and Smith Ely Jelliffe," ''History of Psychiatry'', 2004, 10: 145–189.


External links


Correspondence
between
Margaret Sanger Margaret Higgins Sanger (born Margaret Louise Higgins; September 14, 1879September 6, 1966), also known as Margaret Sanger Slee, was an American birth control activist, sex educator, writer, and nurse. Sanger popularized the term "birth control ...
and McCormick
History of McCormick Hall
{{DEFAULTSORT:McCormick, Katharine 1875 births 1967 deaths Philanthropists from Illinois Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni People from Chicago People from Dexter, Michigan People from Brookline, Massachusetts McCormick family American birth control activists Harvard Medical School people