Hopkins Denies Thomas Credit

It’s nearly impossible to envision that first 1944 blue baby surgery. At the segregated Hopkins, no one ever expected to see a Black person in the operating room giving advice to the white Chief of Surgery.  Yet Dr. Blalock knew that he needed Vivien Thomas to guide him through the surgery. Before he started, he paged Mr. Thomas and put the tall man on a step stool to his left so Thomas could walk the surgeon through the operation. He used his Black lab tech with a high school diploma to coach him through at least the first hundred operations.

The surgery was an incredible gamble for Dr. Blalock. It was extraordinary to operate on a baby—and outside its heart, too—but the surgery chief decided to take this risk to save a dying baby. When the successful surgery was finally announced in 1945, its miraculous news made headlines throughout the world. All credit, though, went to Blalock and Taussig and none to the person who figured out how to successfully operate on the blue babies: it is known as the “Blalock-Taussig shunt.” Vivien Thomas did not receive any recognition for his groundbreaking surgery and continued to be paid a salary that put his family of four below the poverty line.

This 1947 photograph is the first that Hopkins released of the blue baby operation. Vivien Thomas can be seen behind Dr. Blalock but his face is partly hidden. In fact, everyone present were identified by name except for Mr. Thomas.