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About the Center's Namesakes
Dr. Catharine
Deaver Lealtad
The late Dr. Catharine Deaver Lealtad,
Macalester College’s first African American graduate, earned a double
major degree in chemistry and history in 1915 with highest honors.
After graduation, Dr. Lealtad taught for
a year in Columbus, Ohio, and then moved to New York City to work for the
YWCA and the Urban League. She was accepted into Cornell University’s
medical school, but left shortly after her arrival due to the racial prejudice
at Cornell. She went on to study medicine in Lyon, France, where she
received her medical degree from the University of Paris in 1933 specializing
in pediatrics.
When World War II began, Dr. Lealtad was
commissioned as a major in the U.S. Army and went to Germany in 1945 to
supervise medical services for children that had been displaced due to
the war. One year later, she went to China with the U.S. Public Health
Service to assist the Chinese doctors in fighting the cholera epidemic that
was sweeping through China at that time.
Upon returning to the U.S. at the close
of WWII, Dr. Lealtad worked at Sydenham Hospital, the first voluntarily
interracial hospital in New York. Although Dr. Lealtad retired in
1979, she continued in her efforts to serve those who had limited access
to medical care. She worked for two years at a mission hospital
in Puerto Rico and for seven years at a free clinic for the underprivileged
in Mexico City. In 1983, Dr. Lealtad created an endowed scholarship
at Macalester College.
The only person to receive two honorary
degrees from Macalester, Dr. Lealtad passed away in 1989.
Esther Torii
Suzuki
The late Esther Torii Suzuki came to Macalester
College in 1942 at the age of 16 from a Japanese detention camp in Portland,
Oregon, where she was released specifically because of her acceptance to
Macalester College. The first Japanese-American student at Macalester,
Ms. Suzuki graduated from Macalester in 1946 with an honors degree in sociology.
In the years following her graduation,
Ms. Suzuki played many roles: community leader, volunteer, activist, and
mentor. As a social worker for Ramsey County, Ms. Suzuki spent most
of her career participating in civil rights groups and developing programs
specifically to assist the Southeast Asian-American population. Later
in her life, Ms. Suzuki established herself as a storyteller and writer
and gave a voice to both the hardships and accomplishments she had encountered
as a Japanese-American.
Ms. Suzuki also served for six years on
the Alumni Board at Macalester and continued to volunteer both at
Macalester and in the St. Paul community. She contributed a chapter
to the book Reflections: Memoirs of Japanese American Women in Minnesota
and co-authored a play in 1991.
Awarded the Macalester College Alumni
Service Award in 1999, Ms. Suzuki passed away that same year.
Catharine Deaver Lealtad and Esther Torii Suzuki
received the Macalester College Board of Trustees Award for Meritorious
and Distinguished Service on September 13, 2002.
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