Onnie Lee Logan

According to an oral autobiography told to Katherine Clark, Onnie Lee was born in 1910 near Sweet Water, Marengo County, Alabama to Len Rodgers (also spelled as Rogers), and Martha Curtis, a midwife and farmer. Her exact date of birth is unknown, but is officially recorded as May 3, 1910. She was the fourteenth child of sixteen. Both her parents were farmers; her father also worked as a carpenter and her mother as a midwife. Onnie Lee was herself delivered by a local granny midwife, in part because of a lack of local practicing physicians who would accept black patients, but mainly because black granny midwives had traditionally performed this task since slavery times. In addition to her mother, many members of her family also practiced, including her mother-in-law, both her grandmothers, and one of her brothers-in-law. which was unusual.[2]

Following in a family tradition of midwifery, Onnie Lee Logan's "motherwit," a spiritual calling from God, wove together the practical knowledge from her American Indian and African American heritage.[3] Her traditions also relied on magical aid, for example, a knife placed under the mother's bed to help "cut" the pain.[2] At the age of 21, Logan launched her midwifery career while working as a domestic servant in a wealthy white household.[4] She learned midwifery from her mother by attending numerous births and added to that with classroom learning.[4] Logan became licensed by the Board of Health in 1949[4] and delivered almost every child born between 1931 and 1984 in Prichard and Crighton, the predominantly black areas of Mobile, Alabama.[5] She delivered the babies of both black and white women of Alabama, losing only one baby in her 40 years of practice. She adopted a family-centered approach by encouraging the participation of fathers, understood the birth process as normal, "not a sickness," and relied on relaxation and gravity to facilitate the birthing process.[3] Logan's clients seldom experienced perineal lacerations because she used a combination of breathing, hot compresses, oil, positioning, and encouragement.[4] The first half of her story focuses on what it was like to grow up in a racist society[4] and positions her career narrative within a complex set of race relations in the south. Her book includes positive stories of encouragement from local doctors as well as instances of Klan terror that included the castration of black males and infanticide of mixed-race babies.[3] Alabama outlawed granny midwifery in 1976 but allowed Logan to continue practicing until 1984 before informing her that her permit would not be renewed and that her services were no longer needed.[6]^:preface Logan trained midwives, including Mary Francis Hill Coley.[7]

Logan was the author of Motherwit: An Alabama Midwife's Story, as told to Katherine Clark, in the summer of 1984.[6] According to a reviewer in the Georgia Historical Quarterly, The editor of her autobiography foregrounds the voice and circular oral narrative of a black midwife with a life of experience she wants to share rather than take to her grave.[3] The Journal of Nurse-Midwifery noted that the autobiography grants respect to the traditional arts of midwifery.[4]

• Thomas, Robert McG. Jr. (1995-07-13). "Onnie Lee Logan, 85, Midwife Whose 'Motherwit' Drew Praise". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-07-16.
• Niven, Steven J. (2013). "Logan, Onnie Lee". Oxford African American Studies Center. doi:10.1093/acref/9780195301731.013.35811. ISBN 9780195301731. Retrieved 2020-07-16.