Before Roe, terminating a pregnancy meant confronting a nightmare of quacks and butchers, knitting needles and wire coat hangers. The exceptions were people like Dr. X, “the stars of the underground abortion circuit.”
Originally published August 18, 1966
“The public image of an abortionist was of an evil, leering, drunken, perverted butcher at worst, and a cold, mysterious, money-hungry Park Avenue price-gouger at best. And then there was Dr. Spencer with his clinic on the main street of a small American town, who believed in abortions, and who was kind”
Originally published January 30, 1969
Plus: 'A Diary of Living With AIDS' and 'Remembering Robert — Seven Writers Commemorate a Colleague and Friend'
April 28, 2020
“Let me tell you about the first time I got high. It was 1966, and I was a young reporter… There, sitting on the floor, were Creedence Clearwater Revival and Big Brother and the Holding Company. A huge spliff was passed around… ‘We shouldn’t be doing interviews,’ I shouted. ‘We should be friends.’ ”
Originally published June 22, 1993
"On a freezing Friday night I visit Kings County Hospital. Depression hits as soon as I walk through the front doors"
Originally published February 21, 1977
"Memorials. A new way to be unhappy in a group. I visit a friend who can no longer speak. A few days later he's dead. If you ask after people you haven't seen for a while, be prepared"
Originally published January 2, 1990
‘Two years ago, abortion was almost always discussed in feminist terms — as a political issue affecting the condition of women. Since then, the grounds of the debate have shifted drastically.’
Originally published March 5, 1979
‘I have chosen to fight, to raise a big and hideous and ungovernable howl for the girl I was and the girls who have yet to be’
Originally published July 27, 2018
The deaths of Prince, Tom Petty, Heath Ledger, and Michelle McNamara haven’t galvanized attention to the prescription drug crisis
July 17, 2018