Local farm family to compile oral histories

~  via The Charlotte News (Lydia Clemmons)

The University of Vermont and the University of Wisconsin are partnering with the Clemmons Family Farm to compile the oral histories of Dr. Jack Clemmons, a pediatric pathologist, and Mrs. Lydia Clemmons, a registered nurse and nurse anesthetist.

Two UVM graduate students in history, Perri Meldon and Franco Paz, will work with the Clemmonses, whose 70-year careers in medicine and nursing began in the early 1940s and span work in the United States, Sweden and Africa. Both Jack and Lydia worked at the University of Vermont Medical Center, where Jack was the second African-American on the faculty and worked in the department of pathology for more than 30 years. Lydia was the first African-American nurse anesthetist and worked in the operating rooms at the DeGosbriand Unit and Fletcher Allen.

Meldon and Paz will be trained by Dr. Troy Reeves, head of the oral history program of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.