Oral history and transcript for an interview with Alvin Crawford, Perspectives of Change

Oral history and transcript for an interview with Alvin Crawford, Perspectives of Change

Crawford, Alvin

Diversity and Inclusion

Alvin Crawford, MD, FACS, graduated cum laude from Tennesse State University in 1960, earning degrees in Chemistry and Music. In 1964, he became the first African American to graduate from the University of Tennessee College of Medicine.

Dr. Crawford completed his residency at the U.S. Naval Hospital Chelsea (Boston), and Combined Harvard Orthopaedic Residency Program at Massachusetts General Hospital and Boston Children’s Hospital.

Dr. Crawford became the Director of Orthopaedic Surgery at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center in 1977 and remained chief for 29 years. He is one of the nation's foremost authorities on video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery, and among his achievements was serving as the first African American president of the Scoliosis Society.

Perspectives of Change: The Story of Civil Rights, Diversity, Inclusion, and Access to Education at HMS and HSDM

Center for the History of Medicine (Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine) (repository)

Images courtesy of Dr. Alvin Crawford

Ilacqua, Joan (interviewer)

Crawford, Alvin (interviewee)

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