The Birth of the Pill: How Four Crusaders Reinvented Sex and Launched a Revolution (55 page)

BOOK: The Birth of the Pill: How Four Crusaders Reinvented Sex and Launched a Revolution
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CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

294
three hundred thousand members
: James R. Petersen,
The Century of Sex: Playboy’s History of the Sexual Revolution, 1900–1999
(New York: Grove Press, 1999), p. 264.
294
results of a Gallup poll showed
: George Gallup, “Facts on Birth Control? A Loud ‘Yes,’ ”
Ogden Standard-Examiner
, February 17, 1960, p. 3.
294
massive protests on campus
: “Sympathy for Ousted Prof—But That’s All,”
Mt. Vernon Register-News
, April 12, 1960, p. 8.
295
“Birth control and contraceptive practices”
: Margaret Sanger, “Population Planning,”
New York Times
, January 3, 1960, p. E8.
295
“neither birth control nor foreign aid”
: “Kennedy Renews Bid on Primaries,”
New York Times,
January 4, 1960, p. 1.
296
“You are young”
: Margaret Sanger to John F. Kennedy, January 11, 1960, Margaret Sanger Papers, SSC.
296
He had begun testing . . . on men
: Gregory Pincus,
The Control of Fertility
(New York: Academic Press, 1965), p. 191.
296
She had already committed $152,000
: Katharine Dexter McCormick to Margaret Sanger, January 2, 1960, Margaret Sanger Papers, SSC.
296
doctors leading those experiments
: Seth S. King, “British Find Birth-
Control Pills Cause Too Many Side Effects,”
New York Times
, March 31, 1960, p. 41.
296
“Don’t be afraid of the number”
: “Pope, in Palm Sunday Homily, Makes Plea for Large Families,”
New York Times
, April 11, 1960, p. 1.
297
leaders in the Vatican were growing concerned
: John T. Noonan,
Contraception: A History of Its Treatment by the Catholic Theologians and Canonists
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1965), p. 490.
297
theologians like Reinhold Niebuhr
: Ibid.
297
“I am prepared to go to war”
: John Rock to William Crosson, April 18, 1960, John Rock Papers, CLM.
297
At least two of the doctors
: Memo from W. H. Kessenich to FDA Commissioner George P. Larrick, May 11, 1960, John Rock Papers, CLM.
298
“possible objections from some quarters”
: Ibid.
298
“as far as they could tell”
: Ibid.
298
DeFelice gave him the news
: William Crosson to Pasquale DeFelice, April 7, 1960, CLM.
299
wrote and mailed a memo the same day
: Ibid.
299
“Approval was based on the question of safety”
: “U.S. Approves Pill for Birth Control,”
New York Times
, May 10, 1960.
299
“interfere with the production of the ova”
: “Birth Control Pills Approved as Being Safe,”
Denton Record-Chronicle
, May 16, 1960, p. 12.
299
His daughter remembered no reaction
: Laura Pincus Bernard, interview conducted by the author, July 2013.
300
“Well, the people, I would say”
: David M. Oshinsky,
Polio: An American Story
(Oxford, UK, and New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 211.
301
“Do not forget”
: “The New Pill for the Morning After,”
Sydney Sun
, January 10, 1967.
302
“weed out all the negative points”
: Elizabeth Siegel Watkins,
On the Pill
(Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998), p. 36.
302

UNFETTERED

: Ibid., photo insert.
303
sales would increase 135 percent
: “G. D. Searle & Company,”
International Directory of Company Histories
, 1996,
Encyclopedia.com
, http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G2-2841600069.html (accessed December 12, 2013).
304
“What I am busy over”
: Katharine Dexter McCormick to Margaret Sanger, June 15, 1960, Margaret Sanger Papers, SSC.
305
more men undergo vasectomies
: Armond Fields,
Katharine Dexter McCormick: Pioneer for Women’s Rights
(Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003), p. 296.
305
struggling to kick her addiction
: Ellen Chesler,
Woman of Valor
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992), p. 458.
305
“No one will really miss you”
: Barbara Benoit to Margaret Sanger, July 18, 1960, Margaret Sanger Papers, SSC.
305
“rudderless drifting towards death”
: Dorothy Brush to Stuart Sanger, December 26, 1963, Margaret Sanger Papers, SSC.
305
“so much government and other money”
: Margaret Sanger to Gregory Pincus, June 14, 1960, Gregory Pincus Papers, LOC.
306
“The church hierarchy opposes”
: John Rock, “We Can End the Battle Over Birth Control,”
Good Housekeeping
, July 1961, p. 44.
307
One night before dinner
: Dr. Edward E. Wallach, interview conducted by the author, April 2013.
308
pluck a pink flower
: Ibid.
308
began to dance
: Ibid.

EPILOGUE

309
since the exile of Adam and Eve
: Russell Shorto, “Contra-Contraception,”
New York Times Magazine
, May 7, 2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/07/magazine/07contraception.html?pagewanted=all (accessed February 18, 2014).
309
“central fact”
: Mary Eberstadt,
Adam and Eve After the Pill
(San Francisco, CA: Ignatius Press, 2012), p. 11.
309
“solve the recurrent religious dispute”
: John Rock,
The Time Has Come
(London: The Catholic Book Club, 1963), unnumbered page.
310
a majority of the committee members
: “Margaret Sanger is Dead at 82,”
New York Times
, September 7, 1966, p. 1.
310
“total” . . . a “special form”
: Robert McClory,
Turning Point
(New York: Crossroad, 1995), p. 139.
310
“intrinsically dishonest”
: Ibid.
311
G. D. Searle paid him twelve thousand dollars
: Margaret Marsh and Wanda Ronner,
The Fertility Doctor: John Rock and the Reproductive Revolution
(Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008),
p. 282.
311
“It frequently occurs to me, gosh”
: “Doctor Rock’s Magic Pill,”
Esquire
, December 1983.
312
Bone marrow cancer
: Dr. Robert Salomon to Gregory Pincus, September 3, 1963, Gregory Pincus Papers, LOC.
312
“I am healthier than I have been”
: Dwight J. Ingle,
Gregory Goodwin Pincus: A Biographical Memoir
(Washington, D.C.: National Academy of Science, 1971), p. 238.
312
“‘kissed’ your picture”
: Letter to Gregory Pincus, April 24, 1962, Gregory Pincus Papers, LOC.
312
Gloria Steinem switched
: Gloria Steinem, “The Moral Disarmament of Betty Coed,”
Esquire
, September 1962, p. 98.
313
“housewives earning money as prostitutes”
: “The Pill: How It Is Affect-
ing U.S. Morals, Family Life,”
U.S. News & World Report
, July 11, 1966, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/pill/filmmore/ps_revolution.html (accessed February 18, 2014).
314
“I would rather be asked for the pills”
: Ibid.
314
“Mrs. Stanley McCormick”
: Dedication, Gregory Pincus,
The Control of Fertility
(New York: Academic Press, 1965).
314
grown in value to about $25,000
: Leon Speroff, M.D.,
A Good Man: Gregory Goodwin Pincus
(Portland, OR: Arnica Publishing, 2009), p. 271.
314
every possible minute with his wife
: Laura Pincus Bernard, interview conducted by the author, July 2013.
315
“This did wonders”
: Interview with David Wagner conducted by Patricia Gossel, January 1995; David Wagner Collection; Division of Science, Medicine, and Society; National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution; Washington, D.C.
316
earning about $130,000
: Ibid.
317
dressed in proper business attire
: Armond Fields,
Katharine Dexter
McCormick: Pioneer for Women’s Rights
(Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003), p. 297.
317
“I knew I was right”
: Lloyd Shearer, “Margaret Sanger: Fifty Years of Crusading,”
Parade Magazine
, December 1, 1963, p. 6.
318
“willing to accept scorn and abuse”
: Esther Katz, ed.,
The Selected Papers of Margaret Sanger
, Vol. 3 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2010), p. 491.
318
“population growth, when uncontrolled”
: Ibid.
319
“vision was of a world”
: John Reedy, “Margaret Sanger, 1884–1966, R.I.P.,”
Ave Maria
, September 24, 1966, pp. 5–6.
319
“in a mere six years”
: “Freedom from Fear,
Time
magazine, April 7, 1967.
320
The pill . . . lowered the cost of pursuing careers
: Claudia Goldin and Lawrence F. Katz, “The Power of the Pill: Oral Contraceptives and Women’s Career and Marriage Decisions,”
Journal of Political Economy
110, no. 4 (2002), pp. 730–70.
320
30 percent of the convergence
: Martha J. Bailey, Brad Hershein, and Amalia R. Miller, “The Opt-In Revolution? Contraception and the Gender Gap in Wages,” May 13, 2012, http://www-personal.umich.edu/~baileymj/Opt_In_Revolution.pdf (accessed February 16, 2014).
321
“first generation of oral contraceptives”
: Michelle Fay Cortez, “Birth-Control Pills Cut Cancer, Lengthen Women’s Lives in Study,” Bloomberg News, published March 11, 2010, http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=amLgSVxKl4zw (accessed February 16, 2014).

Selected Bibliography

Allyn, David.
Make Love, Not War.
Boston: Little, Brown, 2000.

Asbell, Bernard.
The Pill: A Biography of the Drug That Changed the World
. New York: Random House, 1995.

Bailey, Beth.
Sex in the Heartland.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999.

Baker, Jean H.
Margaret Sanger: A Life of Passion.
New York: Hill and Wang, 2011.

Briggs, Laura,
Reproducing Empire
. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008.

Brynner, Rock, and Trent Stephens.
Dark Remedy.
New York: Basic Books, 2001.

Callaway, Enoch.
Asylum: A Mid-Century Madhouse and Its Lessons about Our Mentally Ill Today.
Westport, CT: Praeger, 2007.

Carpenter, Daniel.
Reputation and Power.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2010.

Chesler, Ellen.
Woman of Valor: Margaret Sanger and the Birth Control Movement in America
. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2007.

Connelly, Matthew.
Fatal Misconception: The Struggle to Control World Population.
Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2008.

Critchlow, Donald T.
Intended Consequences.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Diamond, Jared.
Why Is Sex Fun?
New York: Basic Books, 1997.

Dietz, James L.
Economic History of Puerto Rico
. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986.

Djerassi, Carl.
This Man’s Pill: Reflections on the 50th Birthday of the Pill
. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.

Eberstadt, Mary.
Adam and Eve After the Pill.
San Francisco, CA: Ignatius Press, 2012.

Engelman, Peter C.
A History of the Birth Control Movement in America
. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2011.

Escoffier, Jeffrey.
Sexual Revolution
. New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2003.

Fields, Armond.
Katharine Dexter McCormick: Pioneer for Women’s Rights.
Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003.

Foucault, Michel.
The History of Sexuality,
Vol. 1. New York: Vintage Books, 1990.

Gordon, Linda.
The Moral Property of Women: A History of Birth Control Politics in America
. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2007.

Grant, Linda.
Sexing the Millennium.
New York: Grove Press, 1994.

Gray, Madeline.
Margaret Sanger: A Biography of the Champion of Birth Control.
New York: Richard Marek Publishers, 1979.

Halberstam, David.
The Fifties.
New York: Villard Books, 1993.

Harvey, Brett.
The Fifties: A Women’s Oral History.
New York: HarperCollins, 1993.

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