6. Bessie Blount: Unsung inventor - we bet you have used her inventions!

The Remarkable Bessie Blount: Unsung Inventor and Advocate

In this episode of 'She Changed History,' Simon and Vicky delve into the life of Bessie Blount, an extraordinary woman little known but with significant contributions. Bessie’s story, spanning from Virginia, USA, to Scotland Yard, is one of defiance, determination, and ingenuity. Born in 1914, Bessie overcame significant racial and educational barriers, teaching herself to read, write, and eventually becoming a nurse. During her work with World War II veterans, she invented life-changing devices for amputees, including a self-feeding device that gained international recognition. Despite the American government's rejection, her work was embraced by the French government and led to a series of further innovations in assistive technology. Bessie's later career saw her become a groundbreaking figure in forensic handwriting analysis, eventually working with Scotland Yard. Even after her professional career, Bessie continued to advocate for African American achievements and the disabled. Her inventions and transformational work, while not always glamorous, made a profound impact on countless lives.

00:00 Reunion and Birthday Celebrations

00:36 Introduction to Bessie Blount

02:33 Early Life and Education

05:57 Nursing Career and Challenges

07:37 Innovations for Disabled Veterans

12:46 Recognition and Continued Inventions

16:30 The Invention of the Kidney-Shaped Bowl

17:07 Exploring the Kidney Shape

17:51 Unsexy but Essential Inventions

18:53 From Nursing to Graphology

20:02 Becoming an Expert Witness

21:40 Consulting and Overcoming Barriers

26:02 Advocacy and Empowerment

27:57 Legacy and Final Years

29:49 Reflecting on Bessie's Impact

32:11 Closing Remarks and Call to Action

Transcript

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It's nice to have the gang back together. Oh, cute! It was Seah's birthday this week. Amazing. Happy birthday, Seah. She's 45. Oh my gosh, she looks about 32. I know, it's irritating. It's really annoying. She looks amazing. Let's do this. Hello everyone. Hi, Vicky. Hi. How you doing? I'm good. How are you? I'm good. Yeah, very well. Thanks. Yeah. Simon here with She Changed History and today's episode, is about a lady called Bessie Blount. Who, even more so than other people we discuss, I don't think anyone's probably heard of. If you think of great inventions, the first ones that typically come to mind are usually these grand innovations that have touched everyone's life, like the steam engine or wind up radio. But you rarely give thought to the smaller inventions that you maybe never knew existed, or never considered that they were something that needed to be invented, and will most likely never need. But for the people who do need them, that specific niche, they can be really life changing. Today's story of Bessie Blount takes us from Virginia to a hospital treating World War II veterans in New Jersey. all the way to Scotland Yard in London, and shows us how defiance, determination, and ingenuity can, when applied as selflessly as Bessie did, so positively impact the lives of those with need, but not the ability to ask. So today's sources are a Smithsonian Magazine article by Lela McNeill, an obituary originally published in the Star Ledger and now available on Legacy. com, an article from the website America Comes Alive, and an article from MIT's website, in their medicine engineering section. Okay, so it's about little inventions that we might not have known have been invented. Yeah, I guess so, yeah. And just a lady who, you'll find out. Wait and see, Vicky. Wait and see. Those hands up were very much, uh, back off, Vicky. Like, actually, take your time. Although, I love the energy. Thank you. I mean, you can just skip to the conclusion if you want. Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. Shortest episode ever, yeah. I'm an eager beaver, I've been told this before. So Bessie was born in 1914 in Hickory, Virginia. And there were at the time That's South, isn't it? South America. Yeah. And at the time there were limited educational opportunities for African Americans. So she went to a small primary school, just full of black kids. And they didn't have textbooks. They might get hand me down textbooks from the white schools, but they learn to read by each reading out a verse from the Bible. Okay. Um, I was really sort of underprivileged, um, and at the time, I don't know if this was a biblical thing where left handedness was seen as the devil's work, but they had a strict right handed writing policy. So that doesn't surprise me because I was told off. I think I would have been left handed. originally. I was taught, yeah, I remember very clearly. And like little things like if I picked up a tennis racket or something it would be with my left hand not my right hand and then I'd be taught to use my right hand. So I think, uh, I don't ever remember it being a decision you just use the hand that you use don't you? Oh we were, we were taught I, I guess because we, I'm from quite a rural market town. I don't know if we were a bit, about 20 years behind everyone else, but I remember distinctively being encouraged to write with your right hand and then, you know, I remember at some point the lefties got a special pencil or something, I remember that, but yeah, it doesn't surprise me that I think there's probably more left people out there than Than are willing to admit it. Yeah, exactly. They're probably beaten out of them, yeah, even to death. Primary school, there was one in each class of a redhead, a fat kid, and a left hander. And they were the ones that got the most votes. And sometimes, like me, you were all three. Oh, shut up. Shut up. You're not red headed. I was, when I was at, when I was Were you really? Yeah, when I was Um, like four or five, I was very much like light and ginger and So yeah, I remember my first school photo and my mum cut my hair so short. She was, she hated styling hair, so I had really short, really like albany hair. So yeah, ticked all those boxes. So when she started trying to write with her left hand, the teachers very quickly gave her a wrap around the knuckles for it. forced her into learning with her right hand, but defiant even at a young age, she thought, well, if writing with my left hand is wrong, writing with my right hand must be wrong as well. Taught herself to write with her feet and write with her teeth. She could you give her a pen on any part of her body and she could write with it? Oh, and she was ambidextrous and even though she went right-handed in school, she continued to learn and use her left hand. She then left school in the sixth grade, so pretty young because she'd exhausted all of the resources available Oh, to her at that stage. Okay. Her family moved to New Jersey and she taught herself, got up to a sort of high school grade, the equivalent of. What in America is a GED? Which she taught herself. Okay. Taught herself and got into college. Hmm. And I didn't do that. And it's just like, yes miss. so she studied, physical education and then eventually got a place on a nursing program at the Community Kennedy Memorial Hospital, which was one of the only hospitals at the time who would allow black staff to actually tend to patients rather than just being sort of cleaners, if you like. so she did all that with just a few school books from school? Yeah. And then she taught herself. Isn't that insane? It's incredible, isn't it? And now she's a nurse looking after a ward. Ugh, mate. Yeah. And this determination, and it sort of early on gives her this, Uh, sense of wanting to prove what African Americans can do. Do you think that's what it was? You think it was? I think so, yeah. Yeah, there's a quote later on, it's what we as a race have contributed to humanity, that as a black female we can do more than nurse their babies and clean their toilets. And she's, like, even from this young age has got this drive to, Yeah. Prove them wrong and sort of prove a point for, for black women, I guess. Because even to enroll in a nursing program, you need a certain set of skills, don't you? Yeah. You need to be able to read, write, do maths, you know, as well as all the human interaction stuff. Totally. Like, it's not an easy thing to become a nurse, is there? Yeah, you can't just rock up. Yeah, so she must have had like a, like you say, that defiance and maybe it's like with the writing of the feet and stuff like that, there must have been something. So that inherent um, screw you attitude, I'm gonna do it anyway. Yes, yeah. Love it. She's plucky, I like it. She's plucky, yeah. She's plucky, right, cool. then this sort of takes us to around the 1940s when we're looking at the late 1940s when World War II, so America has entered the war, war's over, but all of these veterans come back. Right, okay. Limbs amputated. So all these, all these veterans come back from the war and there are way more amputees than they could have ever envisaged. There's about 14, 000. come back from the second world war. And she's working, volunteering for the gray ladies, which is the division of the red cross. Right. Sorry. Where are we now? Virginia, New Jersey, New Jersey. Sorry. Yeah. And so working for the gray ladies, so called because they wore gray gowns, and she's a physical therapist, an OT, working to rehabilitate these amputeed vets, um, helping them get back into something that resembles normal health, helping them relearn all of these skills. And this is where her ability to write with her feet, really then comes into its own because so when she's teaching them, if you come back, these amputees might not have any arms and they think their life is over. but she can say, look, actually, I may not have the same disability, but look what I can do. So they sort of, they really respect her and she's actually trying to help. She's got this attitude that she wants to help people come back to a normal life, rather than just processing them through. She shows real empathy towards these patients. To them improving. And to them improving. Yeah, and having a quality of life, not just living. And it's a sort of determination to teach them to write with their feet. She even wrote, she taught one person to read braille with their toes. Because they came back blind and armless. Nice. Amazing. And that's her Zane look. I was told I couldn't do this, which is what I guess invalids are always told, like, you can't do that anymore. And she's like, now look what I can do. So it's that. Yeah, totally. But she was told by one of the doctors there, that if she really wanted to make a difference, she would help these people eat. They couldn't do that if you've got no arms. So despite the naysayers at the hospital, she was told by one senior doctor at the hospital Yeah. that hand feeding by nursing and attendant personnel is the most satisfactory method. Hand feed? So what, her hand feeding them? So her or nurses or other attendants hand feeding these patients. Ah, and she's more like She's like we need to enable them. Yeah, completely. Yeah, I'm with you. Very different. How can they have any quality of life if they can't even feed themselves once they're not babies? So she went away and with sort of no prior experience, started developing what she called an invalid feeder. And there was no such tech at the time. Yeah. She spent 10 months in her kitchen, using some plastic, a file, an ice pick, a hammer, dishes, boiling water to mold the plastic, developing this prototype of a device that meant that amputees. could feed themselves when they wanted. They would just bite down on a tube and it would feed them a single mouthful of food and it wouldn't sort of just keep pushing. They could control it. Control it at their own pace, have some sort of independence. So she spent 10 months developing this. I imagine in her spare time as well after she's exhausted. Yeah, she says she usually worked from 1 a. m. to 4 a. m. Oh, there you go. Yeah. Working With what energy? Yeah, I know, right? So she filed a patent for this. Okay. She was So she got it working and She got it working Yeah. And became good at drawing so that she could draw up her patent. Sweet. And got the patent approved and then spent a further four years and 3, 000 of her own money making improvements to it. Until at the end of it, she had a working, manufacturable device. Nice. she showed this, she demonstrated it at a New Jersey hospital and people were just staggered by it. Oh, thank God. Thank God they liked it. I was worried that they would be like, what are you doing? Yeah. Standing ovation at the demonstration. What? It's nice. However, despite all this, incredible feedback. When she went to try and sell it to the American government, and said, look, it may seem like a small thing, but it's going to free up the nurses and attendants. It's going to give these people a better quality of life. Yeah. Look at all these extra nursing hours you're getting. Yeah. Yeah. Um, dismissed. They weren't going to buy it. They said, no, too expensive, not interested. It's of no use to us. don't care about it, but fortunately, the French government of all people, of all organizations, who themselves after World War II had a colossal number of, injured veterans, were like, this is incredible, we need this to happen, and She said, okay, fine, you can have it for nothing. You can have it for free. Oh my god, Bessie! She didn't want the money. She didn't want the fame. She herself said that she'd be forgotten. This is where the quote of, I'm not in it for sort of myself or my own thing. It's just to prove what we as a race have contributed to humanity. Oh my gosh. That we're good for something other than nursing babies and cleaning toilets. Yes. Yes. For sure. And like that enabling piece you spoke about earlier in that future proofing, isn't it? But the French their healthcare must be different, to the American healthcare, right? There must have been some sort of fundamental difference in approach. To patient care, yeah, because if you look back at, like, the prosthetics that they had at the time, they would make, solid prosthetics that maybe if you put them under trousers would look like a leg, but they weren't really usable. They weren't replacements for your leg. Were just lumps of wood stumps. They were terrible for mobility and all of that. And people weren't considering, uh, how to actually make disabled people's lives better. Yes. It was more like aesthetic, right? It was an aesthetic thing, really. Yeah. And you always forget, like, how different countries approach different things, like, because we saw it in the pandemic, I guess, is like a really good example of, like, Taiwan had, like, the lowest number of deaths because they were completely differently prepared to a pandemic than some Western countries. And I always think of, this is quite a sad fact, but Princess Diana, she died in, like, Paris. Um, one of the reports was one of the reasons that contributed to her death was because their approach to emergency services was so different to our approach that they would, I think the ambulance wasn't allowed to go over five or 10 miles an hour. So it meant that with that, the traffic and the paparazzi, it meant that it took her an hour to get to the hospital. And obviously in hours, a long time whilst in the UK, it's. blue lights, big sirens, everybody move out the way, get me to the hospital. But in France, it's completely different. So it just shows, doesn't it, how different countries approach healthcare. And it just sounds like Bessie was just slightly differently centered around it. Right. She was approaching it as. the person's need rather than like society's perception of that person. It's like the solutions at the time were to make them look like they weren't disabled rather than actually improving their life. Just put that plaster over it, just cover that up. That's it. Yeah, exactly. Got you. And this sort of kicked off then a string of inventions, like in the years following hers, there were suddenly 20 patents for new devices for disabled people. Oh, so she kicked that trend. Nice. Very cool. And she had caught the inventing bug. So carried on making assistive devices, that improved the quality of life for these individuals. including one, it's a solution so that, amputees and disabled people could have a drink or a bowl of food in front of them on their chest independently, rather than just sit there starving or thirsty. She also developed, you know, in hospital, um, they'll give you like, a sick bowl or something, and it will be a bit like papier mâché. Yeah, those kidney ones. a shape. Yeah, yeah, like a kidney, yeah. She invented that. No! Specifically that, the kidney shape. So she invented a mixture of papier mâché flour and water. Okay. It could be pressed into shape and then baked. Because before that they were using steel pans for everything, so if anyone was sick they would have to go away and wash it. It was a hygiene issue, it was a time issue, a resource issue, she thought it's much better if we can just have a stack of these really cheaply made up really basic materials. So she came up with that and sold it to the Belgian government and Belgium still uses those in their hospitals to this day. Bessie! Come on! And did she say why the kidney shape worked? Yeah, it's a good question. Why is it kidney shaped? google it? I wonder if it's sort of, when you're holding it with your hand to one side, it sort of still lines up. And you're not going to, like, be sick on your thumb. According to Quora, Can I have one more guess? go on. Is it so that it curves around the front of your body a bit more so it doesn't Yeah, so it's shaped like a kidney bean because it allows the middle to be held very close to the patient's body to catch the fluids in a more efficient manner rather than using a round bowl container, which is what you said, those metal ones were round, so Yeah. She knew, she knew. I would class these as really unsexy inventions. Thanks. Thanks. But to the people who need them, and those little details, everything at one point had to be invented, and she was in on it. And how many hundreds of millions of people have used those kidney show bowls? Yeah, I never think about it later. That's when you know it's like a true invention, don't is this, she wasn't after anything grandiose. She wasn't making. loads of money from it. She just wanted to make small changes to remove these sort of everyday really minimal hurdles that actually sort of chip away at people's lives. Yeah. It's like having your teaspoons near your kettle. Like, when we were growing up, my mum never had her teaspoons to her castle and then I bought my first flat and she was absolutely bamboozled at the idea that you could have your teaspoons near your castle. I think that's the title of the episode right there. Now, while she was, she pivots, as so many of our subjects do, she pivots from this. While she was assisting, rehabilitating these patients, she noticed changes in them that as they got better, their handwriting changed and she was intrigued by this and she studied their handwriting and how it evolved and, but could still see that it was the same hand, the same handwriting from the same person, but it changed on, but she could sort of still pick out. That it had developed, and whatever their disability, she helped them rewrite but got really interested then on what's called graphology, which is the study of handwriting. So she published a paper on medical graphology, linking handwriting characteristics to people's physical health. Oh. That then attracted the attention. Also shows that if you put the word medical in front of anything, like immediately. Suddenly sounds legitimate. Yeah, it's, as soon as you said that, I was like, fine. Oh right, yeah, that's a thing. That's totally a thing, yeah. We've all heard of it, yeah. So she attracted attention from law enforcement agencies after writing this paper because she made herself an expert on the sort of medical graphology. So they then asked for her, her expertise, her help in forgery analysis. So back then, before everything was done by computer, forging a check, forging a signature, forging documents and everything. The signature mattered. These days it seems to have no consequence whatsoever. You can scroll anything and that's that. But it mattered back then. So she started helping, the Portsmouth, Portmouth in the us uh, police department became their chief examiner and was helping in real life cases, real world cases. Oh my gosh. And then she was invited by Scotland Yard to This is accelerated. Absolutely. It's Scotland Yard. Are we like, is this after the war stuff? So this is like Paul 50 after the war stuff. Of course I can go to Scotland Yard. Of course I can help Scotland Yard with their foraging cases, The first African American woman to work at Scotland Yard, and got her advanced studies in graphology, really solidifying her expertise. Peace. she did try to do some work, at the FBI, but I think she was jumping the gun then slightly on, their inclusivity policy. But you know, she applied. She applied, yeah. It's quite right. She's like one world leaders in this field. Incredibly experienced, but instead of that, she set up her own consulting company. Yes! This is another theme. If you get told no, you go and create it. Isn't it? Totally. Yeah. And just making it happen and, Sod you. I'll go and do it myself. Isn't it? Yeah, absolutely. By the time she got into consulting, she was getting on. Well, she wasn't old. She was in her fifties. Um, and just alienated half our listener group. She wasn't old. She was not. But she was not a typical, her son said she was not a typical courtroom expert. So she became an expert witness at court cases that involved, handwriting, forgeries, many cases they would get her in to give her expert, expert witness, appraisal of things. And she had a real ability to break down these complex theories. If you actually look at graphology, it's, it's, a really scientific study and they can tell the particular pressure points of which bit of the stroke applies more pressure And that's dictated by the shape of the hand and the fingers and everybody. It's like a fingerprint, yeah Yeah, I might do a little bonus episode on the study of gravology Yeah, because I'm so sceptical of it. But like, you know, but the fact that she's been invited into court, and like you say, star witnesses, they're pretty. That's pretty cool, isn't it? Come on. Yeah. You are the person we need for this. Yeah. That's it. Who are you going to call? Yeah. Bessie. Obviously. Of course. Her son said that she really didn't look like the typical sort of courtroom expert. he quoted her saying, there's this old black woman sitting in the back row and not saying anything. And when the lawyer would say, okay, I have my expert witness, she'd stand up, throw off her coat, throw off her rain bonnet, silver. Silver hair would come up. Or like a mane. Yeah, it's like a fabulous entrance. And she'd stand up and present her theory and it just absolutely blew them away. In this beautiful detail. Yeah, in such excellent detail, complex ideas broken down for the jury. And she won loads of cases, like the case would hinge on her testimony and Yeah, so she was influential as well, yeah. Yeah, and just sort of blown away. So she must have had Like a certain set of characteristics to be able to be influential and apply herself in all these different situations. Because that's very different, isn't it? To a nursing center, to a fiddling about in your kitchen setting. Like they're very different. Like she must have had something special within her, and I wonder this again about, loads of our subjects, they seem to be able to just turn their hand to whatever. They see something that's of interest or they think is important and just do what they need to do, learn whatever skill they need to have. It's curiosity, I think, if it was a character. Yeah. Curiosity must be one. I guess so. Being open minded must be another one that you're, accepting of all these different types of fields and, you know, and And sort of admirable belligerence to just believe that you can do it. Yes! More of that, please. I'd love some of self confidence. Yes! And Yeah, just faith, isn't it? It's unwavering faith in yourself. And maybe it's not being by disappointed because I think a lot of these people that we spoke about didn't seek out fame. Like they're just genuinely trying to help people. They're not trying to be the next big thing. That's what it sounds like. Like with Alice and the Olympics that we spoke about, she genuinely just wanted women in the Olympics. She couldn't care less and Irina was another one, wasn't it? She went into hiding for another 50 years with the, saving of the children in world war two. And one of the episodes we did, you know, she just, It wasn't about her, was it? It's a real selflessness. Yes, that's a much better summary. Selflessness. Yeah, absolutely. So after a sort of retirement from her consulting, she got really involved in organizations like the NAACP, Virginia Women in History, and advocated a lot and really focused on empowering individuals with disabilities and promoting this idea of self advocacy and resilience. She really focused on the individual and still saw the potential there. She didn't see them as a cripple. That's in her words. Um, famously stated, you're not crippled. You're only crippled in your mind. You just need to change your mindset. And she would have thrived in today's society. Yeah, she would have loved it. And she dedicated a lot of her efforts to children, veterans and women. She had this really sort of multifaceted approach to social change, in that she was asked to donate her inventions to museums that celebrated achievements by African Americans, which on the surface you think brilliant, send it to the museum, but she refused that, in having it in a museum, saying, why should I donate things that I made when they'll then charge students to go and see them? No. Okay. So instead she took her inventions and took them around to schools where the kids could see them and touch them and be hands on. It wasn't behind, it wasn't sort of excluded behind some glass, She wanted to go in there and tell her story and so that they could see her determination, they could touch these inventions, Yeah, a lot more inspiring that way I imagine. That's it. And she would tell the kids, You're a part of history. Oh,

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Oh, I see. All right.

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Just this idea that

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you

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can make a difference. And you might not get the fame or something, but you can be even a small sort of footnote in the history of this and part of this gradual incremental improvement in people's lives and society. In 2008, she hopped on a bus on her own, at the age of 93, and traveled back to her hometown in Virginia. Okay. Where she found the remains of her primary school, which had burned down years earlier. And she wanted to build a museum and library to commemorate the contributions of those who'd studied there. She was 93 at the time, but had no intention of dying. Wow, who does? She told local paper, the pilot. I'm going to live just for spite because my work is not done. Unfortunately, she died just over a year later, at the age of 95, before her museum was complete. Uh, but the advocacy that she did, um, and the amount that she traveled around doing, she became an ardent public speaker. So she would travel to so many events and spoke to thousands of people, um, about the change that they can make and sort of the ability that they have. if they apply themselves, um, to illustrate this transformative power of perseverance and compassion that she showed in equal measure.

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this is Not that sexy a story. I know. She invented a feeding tube. Well, it's like, there's no sort of massive globetrotting or fighting bears. Oh, I see. Or incest, sleeping with your adopted son. You know, there's no Ah, well, you know, you get drawn to certain things, I get drawn to certain things. There's a theme in yours. She invented a feeding tube and a paper bowl to be sick in. But it's It's touched so many people though, right? This is it. She changed history. That's, that's, that's it, right? That's what she did. Absolutely. And I just, I, I'd love for everyone to be a bit more Bessie and this idea of, small but meaningful incremental changes, even if they're not going to get you the fame or money, just helping a sort of a niche group and this incremental progress that we make. Um, I just, I love her attitude and her enthusiasm. And like, she seemed to have this determination from when she was in sixth grade. all the way through to her death. Oh my gosh. And you painted such a colorful picture of her as well. You've really made her like come alive in the story of all these, like people knew she was ferocious and she wasn't meant to be messed with and she didn't take no for an answer. Like it was in the wards where it's about your, it's not just about now, it's about your future. And, you know, that was definitely a theme. Wasn't it? Yeah. Through her life. She really wanted to prove you can buck expectation. Mm-Hmm. When you give, you receive. Right. That's what, that's it. That's what it is. Yeah. Yeah. God, we're so deep on this podcast. Aren't if you give, that's you receive. Incredible. Yeah. Oh my God. It really heartfelt into the humor. Psyche And honestly, I'd never have heard of that. Like, I haven't heard of her before, or anything, and yet she's definitely touched our lives, hasn't she, and that's pretty amazing. Bessie Blount. Aww, well thank you, thanks so much. What do you, how do you want to be a bit more Bessie? I just, I love the, uh, of course I can do it, She just saw a need and got on and did something about it. And maybe someone with a, like a, um, a degree in product design would have done it more quickly or made something that looked a bit less steampunk, uh, but she did it. She put herself out there. Came up with a solution and for seemingly all the right reasons and that she just wanted to help help these people It definitely lives on, kind of, today, Aww, yeah. Well I learnt a lot, thank you. I was a little bit nervous about this one. Well, just because it's a bit more low key. Oh my gosh, please don't worry about that. No, I love it. And it's these little stories that I, I really love and I hope we get, um, like, please leave comments. Down below, there's no change in, my mind, there's no change too small, to be noteworthy. And yeah, for sure. If everyone makes a little difference that they can, that really adds up. And I'd love to hear more, more listeners stories. Yeah, so we have the email now, which is shechangedhistoryatgmail. com, please send your stories to that. We've also set up a Facebook group, which we probably should have said at the top of the episodes, but please, please, please search She Changed History on Facebook and join, because the more the merrier. And we post women on there a lot. And there's something else, isn't there? Oh, could you please rate, review and subscribe to the podcast, particularly if you're on Apple, or any Apple is the king of podcasts. So please, please, if you're on Apple, please do that. every little helps, but yeah, no, thank you. Okay. Thanks for listening. Uh, I'm Simon. I'm Vicky. And we'll see you next time. Thank you. See you next time.