Last week, I featured a few of occupational therapy's Black "elders," whose leadership, education, and scholarship were like stories that illumined paths that, if taken, would make occupational therapy stronger. Paths, for example, toward desegregation and attending to diversity and health disparities; paths toward addressing community health and wellness through occupation, generating robust evidence and theory supporting the effects of occupation on health.
This week, I invite you to go deeper and get to know some of these path-makers more personally by listening to their whole stories in their own words. Some of the people I featured last week and others have been interviewed or remembered by their colleagues (and some by OT students!) as part of the Occupational Therapy Leaders and Legacies Society – History Preservation Project (OTLLS). The audio quality varies, but I think you'll find the stories fascinating regarding these inspiring leaders' professional and personal contexts. In the next edition of nOTes, we will explore how to partner with OTLLS to preserve occupational therapy's Black History.
- Jerry Bentley, MS, OTR, FAOTA – Jerry Bentley Transcript* (Part 1) and Audio Recording (Part 2) (Interviewed by Janet DeLany) *Due to audio quality, the first part of Jerry's interview is posted as a written transcript, and the remainder of the interview is posted as the audio file
- Shirley Jackson-Jackson, PhD, OT/L, FAOTA
- Panelpha (Penny) L. Kyler, ScD, OT, FAOTA
- Lela Llorens, PhD, OTR, FAOTA
- Marie Moore Lyles, MS, OTR: OT Archive Oral History. Ms. Marie Moore Lyles is the founding program director of the occupational therapy program at Tuskegee University. See also.
- Colonel Eloise Strand – Her colleagues share memories of Colonel Strand’s unprecedented rise in the military as a Black woman, her exemplary servant leadership to the AOTA, DCOTA, Howard University, and the Black OT Caucus, and her indomitable spirit and matchless Joie de vie as a gift to the profession.
- Shirley A. Wells, DrPH, OTR, FAOTA