You Gotta' Have Heart

On July 9, 1893, Dr. Daniel Hale Williams performed the first open-heart surgery.

Dr. Williams, an African American physician, performed the surgery in Provident Hospital in Chicago, Illinois. Williams founded this hospital in 1891 as the nation's first interracial hospital.

The surgery was successful, as Dr. Williams's patient lived for twenty years after the historic operation.

This photograph from the Smithsonian American Art Museum dates from about the same period and shows a less fortunate patient with a group of medical students.

Pictured: Gilbert's Studio, Medical School Class and Staff (with Cadaver), about 1900, silver print on paper mounted on paperboard, 10 5/8 x 15 7/8 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase from the Charles Isaacs Collection made possible in part by the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment.