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{"id":29899,"date":"2024-09-05T11:00:12","date_gmt":"2024-09-05T15:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/?p=29899"},"modified":"2024-09-06T10:00:25","modified_gmt":"2024-09-06T14:00:25","slug":"purple-coffins-death-care-and-life-extension-in-20th-century-american-south","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/09\/05\/purple-coffins-death-care-and-life-extension-in-20th-century-american-south\/","title":{"rendered":"Purple Coffins: Death Care and Life Extension in 20th Century American South"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Circulating Now<em> welcomes Kristine M. McCusker, PhD, to share her research on changes in public health and funeral customs in the American South. Dr. McCusker is a Professor in the Department of History at Middle Tennessee State University with research focuses on American history, folklore and ethnomusicology. She is also a recipient of an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nlm.nih.gov\/ep\/GrantPubs.html\">NLM Grant for Scholarly Works in Biomedicine and Health<\/a> (G13) supporting her 2023 publication <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/catalog.nlm.nih.gov\/permalink\/01NLM_INST\/1o1phhn\/alma9918645980006676\">Just Enough to Put Him Away Decent: Death Care, Life Extension and the Making of a Healthier South<\/a><em>.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The most significant public health story of the early 20th century has to be the significant drop in American mortality rates. Indeed, <a href=\"https:\/\/catalog.nlm.nih.gov\/permalink\/01NLM_INST\/1o1phhn\/alma9917542173406676\">according to economists<\/a>, \u201cconstantly falling death rates were one of the best and best-established features of the twentieth century,\u201d but scholars have not systematically documented the reasons why. Certainly, some have examined philanthropic efforts like the Rockefeller Foundation\u2019s resolve to eradicate hookworm scourges, the initial creation of state-wide public health departments, or the sanitary privy movement that provided safer drinking water for rural residents. But the mortality rate\u2019s drop had to come with a shift in perceptions of death, from it being a constant, though miserable, experience to there being an expectation of a relatively long life. And nowhere was this shift more obvious than in the American South, a region long considered to be especially deadly, whether one looked at its abysmal infant and maternal mortality rates, at its deaths from diseases like typhoid that had been eradicated in other regions or at the violence toward and extrajudicial lynching of Blacks. Scientific and public health advancements certainly made this shift in thinking possible, but the science meant nothing until southerners specifically, and Americans in general, shifted their ideas of how and when one should die. That change came through new consumer assumptions and funeral rituals. In other words, it really comes down to a purple coffin and a Cadillac hearse ride.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_29910\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-29910\" style=\"width: 936px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/will-1930_McCusker_redacted_crop.jpg?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"29910\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/09\/05\/purple-coffins-death-care-and-life-extension-in-20th-century-american-south\/will-1930_mccusker_redacted_crop\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/will-1930_McCusker_redacted_crop.jpg?fit=936%2C455&ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"936,455\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"1"}\" data-image-title=\"will-1930_McCusker_redacted_crop\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"<p>Detail from a Will, 1930<\/p>\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/will-1930_McCusker_redacted_crop.jpg?fit=300%2C146&ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/will-1930_McCusker_redacted_crop.jpg?fit=840%2C408&ssl=1\" class=\"wp-image-29910 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/will-1930_McCusker_redacted_crop.jpg?resize=840%2C408&ssl=1\" alt=\"Detail from a will, redacted.\" width=\"840\" height=\"408\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/will-1930_McCusker_redacted_crop.jpg?w=936&ssl=1 936w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/will-1930_McCusker_redacted_crop.jpg?resize=300%2C146&ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/will-1930_McCusker_redacted_crop.jpg?resize=768%2C373&ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/will-1930_McCusker_redacted_crop.jpg?resize=840%2C408&ssl=1 840w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 840px) 100vw, 840px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-29910\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Detail from a Will, 1930 <br \/><em>Courtesy Memphis Public Library<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Families, until World War I, cared for the dead at home, burying them within a day of death in handmade coffins and family shrouds. Certainly, funeral directors in large southern cities found a willing clientele, but the rural southerner still buried the dead using vernacular cultural practices and only rarely purchased death goods, like brass handles for a handmade coffin. The federal government\u2019s differing practices during World War I\u2014using funeral directors to mediate between families and deceased soldiers, for example\u2014helped introduce rural southerners to different rituals and customs. Marking graves with headstones noting a veteran\u2019s service rather than a peony bush became the new norm as did the mass-produced coffin that encased a deceased soldier, a coffin that was easier to buy than to construct. In the 1920s, as World War I munitions plants shifted production away from war goods to domestic ones, even the most intimate parts of daily life, like death, became consumer experiences, and expensive ones at that when new death goods were sold by funeral directors. But it was a short step to death goods becoming social and political statements, conferring dignity in an indignant world and claiming a person\u2019s worth at death, especially among Black southerners.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_29908\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-29908\" style=\"width: 266px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted.jpg?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"29908\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/09\/05\/purple-coffins-death-care-and-life-extension-in-20th-century-american-south\/funeral-1929_mccusker_redacted\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted.jpg?fit=1063%2C1200&ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"1063,1200\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"1"}\" data-image-title=\"funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"<p> J.C. Oats & Sons, Inc. Order form, 1929<\/p>\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted.jpg?fit=266%2C300&ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted.jpg?fit=840%2C948&ssl=1\" class=\"wp-image-29908 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted.jpg?resize=266%2C300&ssl=1\" alt=\"An order form for funeral services filled out for a silver grey casket with a total of $167.68.\" width=\"266\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted.jpg?resize=266%2C300&ssl=1 266w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted.jpg?resize=907%2C1024&ssl=1 907w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted.jpg?resize=768%2C867&ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted.jpg?resize=840%2C948&ssl=1 840w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/funeral-1929_McCusker_redacted.jpg?w=1063&ssl=1 1063w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 266px) 100vw, 266px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-29908\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">J.C. Oats & Sons, Inc. Order form, 1929<br \/><em>Courtesy Memphis Public Library<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>In Memphis, Tennessee, for example, the J.C. Oates Funeral Home regularly sold purple coffins to working-class Black women who used burial society and insurance money to pay for their caskets and their final ride to the cemetery. In southern cosmology, Whites and Blacks believed that no one went to heaven until the last shovelful of dirt hit the casket. Thus, these women believed they would be at their own funerals and see themselves laid out resplendently as queens in a white silk dress on their own purple thrones\u2014purple being the color of royalty. Then, during the Cadillac hearse ride to the cemetery, typically with the top down, all would see their families riding in style in an age when segregation relegated Black southerners to the rear of a streetcar. New funeral goods thus conferred worth in the South on those deemed less worthy by the larger society.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_29906\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-29906\" style=\"width: 1600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"29906\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/09\/05\/purple-coffins-death-care-and-life-extension-in-20th-century-american-south\/screenshot-9\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?fit=1600%2C1009&ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"1600,1009\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"Screenshot","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"Screenshot","orientation":"1"}\" data-image-title=\"article\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"<p>“Funeral Home Symbol of Business Progress of Negro” article in The Black Dispatch, January 7, 1937<\/p>\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?fit=300%2C189&ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?fit=840%2C530&ssl=1\" class=\"wp-image-29906 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?resize=840%2C530&ssl=1\" alt=\"Newspaper article with a photograph of a two story residence-like funeral home\" width=\"840\" height=\"530\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?w=1600&ssl=1 1600w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?resize=300%2C189&ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?resize=1024%2C646&ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?resize=768%2C484&ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?resize=1536%2C969&ssl=1 1536w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker.jpg?resize=840%2C530&ssl=1 840w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 840px) 100vw, 840px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-29906\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">“Funeral Home Symbol of Business Progress of Negro” article in <em>The Black Dispatch<\/em>, January 7, 1937<br \/><em>Courtesy Memphis Public Library<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"attachment_29909\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-29909\" style=\"width: 222px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker.jpg?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"29909\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/2024\/09\/05\/purple-coffins-death-care-and-life-extension-in-20th-century-american-south\/record-of-funeral-1918_mccusker\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker.jpg?fit=886%2C1200&ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"886,1200\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{"aperture":"0","credit":"","camera":"","caption":"","created_timestamp":"0","copyright":"","focal_length":"0","iso":"0","shutter_speed":"0","title":"","orientation":"1"}\" data-image-title=\"Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"<p>Record of Funeral, 1918<\/p>\n\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker.jpg?fit=222%2C300&ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker.jpg?fit=756%2C1024&ssl=1\" class=\"wp-image-29909 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker.jpg?resize=222%2C300&ssl=1\" alt=\"Record of Funeral form, filled out with a total of $79.50.\" width=\"222\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker.jpg?resize=222%2C300&ssl=1 222w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker.jpg?resize=756%2C1024&ssl=1 756w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker.jpg?resize=768%2C1040&ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker.jpg?resize=840%2C1138&ssl=1 840w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Record-of-funeral-1918_McCusker.jpg?w=886&ssl=1 886w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 222px) 100vw, 222px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-29909\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Record of Funeral, 1918<br \/><em>Courtesy Memphis Public Library<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The burial societies and insurance companies who funded these new funeral goods found out early on, however, that they were expensive and that an early death cost them dearly. The longer their clientele lived, the more likely they had paid enough into the society or company to afford that purple casket. In an era where families purchased burial policies regularly for children because of the poor mortality rates, good health meant a good bottom line. New public health practices called \u201clife extension,\u201d used by public health experts and insurance companies, literally meant investing in public health practices that would make that relatively long life possible. In the 1920s, this meant attacking particularly southern diseases like <a href=\"https:\/\/medlineplus.gov\/ency\/article\/000342.htm\">pellagra<\/a>, caused by poor diet, especially among textile mill workers, and calling upon outside agencies such as the Children\u2019s Bureau to help with high infant and maternal mortality rates. Mobile public health units, typically a truck with information on tuberculosis screening and prevention and other public health practices, made inroads into the rural South, literally bringing public health practices to the hills and hollers that had no modern medical care. The \u201csanitary privy\u201d movement built up the region\u2019s sewer systems, often in an ad hoc manner, as reformers pressured unwilling city, county, and state officials to invest money into public health in an era when few counties even had public health departments. It wasn\u2019t until the New Deal, however, that a more systematic approach to public health appeared in the South, buttressed by the Social Security Act of 1935, and began to lower mortality rates. The successes were announced across the South, with Memphis newspaper headlines in March 1940 that read, \u201cHealth of the City Better; Death Rate Declines.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The 21st century so far has told a different story about death, one that reverses the positive changes in 20th century: mortality rates have risen significantly among those without a college degree with new causes of death driving these rates up, namely alcoholism, drug deaths and suicide. Black maternal deaths have also risen. A new region is now associated with being particularly deadly, namely the old Northwest (Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, etc.) which has usurped the South\u2019s reputation for high death rates. Public health advocates and federal officials are certainly on the case, but perhaps another answer might be found in the 21st century\u2019s version of a purple coffin and a Cadillac hearse ride, something that confers dignity and worth to those dying too young.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Circulating Now welcomes Kristine M. McCusker, PhD, to share her research on changes in public health and funeral customs in<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19605840,"featured_media":29905,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[14520,12763],"tags":[24766,24739,168941,8437,678875941,678875987,28006,678875950,678875988],"class_list":["post-29899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-about-us","category-collections","tag-1920s","tag-1930s","tag-african-american-history","tag-death","tag-health-disparities","tag-nlm-g13-grants","tag-public-health","tag-race","tag-tennesee"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/article_McCusker_feature.jpg?fit=899%2C400&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3xcDk-7Mf","jetpack-related-posts":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19605840"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29899"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29899\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29917,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29899\/revisions\/29917"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/circulatingnow.nlm.nih.gov\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} |