Thomas and Blalock Live in Different Worlds

“The two men lived in different worlds,” observed Thomas’s son-in-law about the relationship between Vivien Thomas and Alfred Blalock, as shown in these two photos. When Vivien Thomas decided to follow Alfred Blalock to Hopkins, he and his wife had no idea that Baltimore, which was more than 700 miles northeast of Nashville, was so harshly segregated. The city confined Black residents to inferior living quarters that were in short supply as well as expensive. When the Thomases moved from their comfortable house in Nashville to their first Baltimore apartment, their new area was so different that Mrs. Thomas was afraid to leave the apartment by herself. Mr. Thomas soon found a slightly better place to live, which he could afford only because he agreed to take a second job working as the building’s handyman during the weekends and at night. His pay at Hopkins was so low that he soon had a third job as the bartender for Dr. Blalock’s parties and those of the other surgeons. This photo shows a typical street in a Black Baltimore neighborhood in the 1940s.

When he moved to Baltimore in 1941, Alfred Blalock, shown in the photo’s insert, bought this spacious house located in an imposing Baltimore neighborhood where he nestled his family of four. At the time, Baltimore forbade Black families from living in such segregated white neighborhoods as this one, in Guilford. Once settled, the Blalocks hired a live-in couple to help manage their new household.