Rachelle Slobodinsky Yarros (May 18, 1869March 17, 1946) was an American physician who supported the use of
birth control
Birth control, also known as contraception, anticonception, and fertility control, is the use of methods or devices to prevent unwanted pregnancy. Birth control has been used since ancient times, but effective and safe methods of birth contr ...
and the
social hygiene movement
The social hygiene movement was an attempt by Progressive era reformers to control venereal disease, regulate prostitution and vice, and disseminate sexual education through the use of scientific research methods and modern media techniques. Soci ...
. A graduate of the
Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania
The Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania (WMCP) was founded in 1850, and was the second medical institution in the world established to train women in medicine to earn the M.D. degree. The New England Female Medical College had been established ...
, Yarros resided at
Hull House
Hull House was a settlement house in Chicago, Illinois, United States that was co-founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr. Located on the Near West Side of the city, Hull House (named after the original house's first owner Cha ...
for many years and opened the second birth control clinic in the nation there. She was an obstetrician/gynecologist affiliated with the
University of Illinois at Chicago
The University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) is a Public university, public research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its campus is in the Near West Side, Chicago, Near West Side community area, adjacent to the Chicago Loop. The second campus esta ...
and the
Chicago Lying-in Hospital.
Yarros' social causes included assisting with the founding of the
American Social Hygiene Association
The American Sexual Health Association (ASHA), formally known as the American Social Hygiene Association and the American Social Health Association, is an American nonprofit organization established in 1914, that cites a mission to improve the heal ...
and founding the first premarital and marital counseling service in the United States. Yarros was married to journalist and anarchist
Victor Yarros
Victor S. Yarros (1865–1956) was an American anarchist, lawyer and author. He immigrated to the United States with his friend Charles David Spivak in 1882. He was law partner to Clarence Darrow for eleven years in Chicago, husband to the femini ...
. Late in life, she left Chicago for Florida and then California, dying of heart problems in
San Diego
San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the List of United States cities by population, eigh ...
. She has also used the penname ''Rosa Slobodinsky'' when writing an Anarchist pamphlet.
Early life
Rachelle Slobodinsky was born into a wealthy family in
Berdychiv
Berdychiv ( uk, Берди́чів, ; pl, Berdyczów; yi, באַרדיטשעװ, Barditshev; russian: Берди́чев, Berdichev) is a historic city in the Zhytomyr Oblast (province) of northern Ukraine. Serving as the administrative center ...
, a city near
Kiev
Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...
. Her parents were Joachim and Bernice Slobodinsky.
[ Joining a subversive political organization when she was 13, Slobodinsky found herself gaining attention from Czarist police when she was 17, and her parents gave her enough money to escape to the United States.] She fled to New York, where she got a job sewing at a sweatshop. She later 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 ...
, where she met her future husband, Victor Yarros
Victor S. Yarros (1865–1956) was an American anarchist, lawyer and author. He immigrated to the United States with his friend Charles David Spivak in 1882. He was law partner to Clarence Darrow for eleven years in Chicago, husband to the femini ...
. He was a Russian immigrant, journalist and anarchist.
Career
In 1890, Slobodinsky became the first woman admitted to the College of Physicians and Surgeons in Boston. Attending a year of medical school there, Slobodinsky graduated from the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania in 1893. She married Victor Yarros in 1894.[ She completed postgraduate training at the ]New England Hospital for Women and Children
The New England Hospital for Women and Children was founded by Marie Zakrzewska on July 1, 1862. The Hospitals goal was to provide patients with competent female physicians, educate women in the study of medicine and train nurses to care for the ...
, the New York Infirmary for Infants and Children and Michael Reese Hospital
Michael Reese Hospital and Medical Center was an American hospital located in the Bronzeville neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. Founded in 1881, Michael Reese Hospital was a major research and teaching hospital and one of the oldest and largest ...
.[ Yarros and her husband moved to Chicago, where Yarros established a practice as an obstetrician/gynecologist and became a volunteer faculty member at the University of Illinois at Chicago.][
Yarros was deeply affected by the suicide of one of her patients. A young woman had become pregnant and had been abandoned by her fiancé, and she was afraid of the ramifications that pregnancy would have for her career as a business supervisor. The woman saw Yarros in her office and begged for an abortion, but abortion was illegal and Yarros refused to perform one. The woman committed suicide on ]Lake Michigan
Lake Michigan is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is the second-largest of the Great Lakes by volume () and the third-largest by surface area (), after Lake Superior and Lake Huron. To the east, its basin is conjoined with that o ...
that day. Yarros hoped that contraception and sex education would eliminate the need for abortions. Though some birth control advocates of the time supported the notion of eugenics
Eugenics ( ; ) is a fringe set of beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population. Historically, eugenicists have attempted to alter human gene pools by excluding people and groups judged to be inferior or ...
, Yarros did not.
Yarros was on the UIC faculty until 1928, becoming an associate professor, and she served as an associate director of the Chicago Lying-in Hospital. Between 1907 and 1927, Rachelle and Victor Yarros resided at Hull House
Hull House was a settlement house in Chicago, Illinois, United States that was co-founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr. Located on the Near West Side of the city, Hull House (named after the original house's first owner Cha ...
, where residents were heavily involved in social reform movements.[ Among the residents at Hull House was Yarros' friend ]Alice Hamilton
Alice Hamilton (February 27, 1869Corn, JHamilton, Alice''American National Biography'' – September 22, 1970) was an American physician, research scientist, and author. She was a leading expert in the field of occupational health and a pioneer ...
. They had become friends during their internship in Boston.[ In the 1910s, Yarros was a member of the Chicago Women's Club and she encouraged them to establish a birth control committee which evolved into the Illinois Birth Control League.]
For many years, Yarros was the director of the Illinois Birth Control League. With the encouragement of 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 ...
, Yarros opened a birth control clinic at Hull House. It was the second such clinic in the United States. The clinic, which provided married females with diaphragms, faced criticism from Chicago's health commissioner, Herman N. Bundesen. However, similar clinics were established across the city in a short time.
An advocate for sexually informed women, Yarros wrote ''Modern Woman and Sex'' in 1933, which was reissued a few years later as ''Sex Problems in Modern Marriage''.[ She was one of the founders of the American Social Hygiene Association (ASHA) and she served as the first vice-president of the Illinois Social Hygiene League. As an arm of the latter organization, Yarros founded the nation's first premarital and marital counseling clinic.][
Even most of the membership of the ASHA supported eugenics, so they did not fully consider the sex education needs of minorities. Compounding the problem, as people realized that American soldiers were returning from ]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 ...
infected with syphilis
Syphilis () is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the bacterium ''Treponema pallidum'' subspecies ''pallidum''. The signs and symptoms of syphilis vary depending in which of the four stages it presents (primary, secondary, latent, an ...
, they were focused on emphasizing sex education for white men. Yarros believed in and campaigned for sex education for women and minorities. "Experiences of a Lecturer", one such speech that was delivered to the ASHA membership in 1918, was later published in the journal ''Social Hygiene''.
Later life
In the late 1930s, Yarros moved to Winter Park, Florida
Winter Park is a city in Orange County, Florida, United States. The population was 30,183 according to the 2022 census population estimate. It is part of the Orlando–Kissimmee–Sanford, Florida Metropolitan Statistical Area.
Winter Park was fo ...
. She moved again in 1941, this time to La Jolla, California
La Jolla ( , ) is a hilly, seaside neighborhood within the city of San Diego, California, United States, occupying of curving coastline along the Pacific Ocean. The population reported in the 2010 census was 46,781.
La Jolla is surrounded on ...
.[ She maintained some involvement in social and civic causes even late in life, chairing the Russian Relief Committee of La Jolla and serving as vice-president of the San Diego Social Hygiene Association.] Victor Yarros, who had at one time been a law partner of Clarence Darrow
Clarence Seward Darrow (; April 18, 1857 – March 13, 1938) was an American lawyer who became famous in the early 20th century for his involvement in the Leopold and Loeb murder trial and the Scopes "Monkey" Trial. He was a leading member of t ...
, lived until 1956. They had one adopted daughter named Elise.[
Yarros died in San Diego in 1946 of ]heart failure
Heart failure (HF), also known as congestive heart failure (CHF), is a syndrome, a group of signs and symptoms caused by an impairment of the heart's blood pumping function. Symptoms typically include shortness of breath, excessive fatigue, a ...
; she had suffered a heart attack
A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when blood flow decreases or stops to the coronary artery of the heart, causing damage to the heart muscle. The most common symptom is chest pain or discomfort which may tr ...
several years earlier.[ Her obituary quoted a passage from an unpublished autobiography, which said that "the enlightened, socially minded doctor will sympathize with labor, with victims of exploitation and industrial autocracy, with the juvenile and adult delinquents who are the products of slums and blighted, ugly, depressing districts. He will work and fight for ripe and genuine reforms."][
]
References
Further reading
Rachelle Slobodinsky-Yarros Archive.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yarros, Rachelle
1869 births
1946 deaths
People from Berdychiv
American obstetricians
University of Illinois Chicago faculty
Birth control activists
19th-century American women physicians
19th-century American physicians
20th-century American women physicians
20th-century American physicians
Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States
Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania alumni
Physicians from Illinois