Tiny Stitches joins a growing roster of titles for young audiences that bring much-needed attention to accomplished heroes who were unjustifiably elided from history, predominantly because of the color of their skin.

Illustrator Colin Bootman, who brought his grand artistry to Glenda Armand’s Love Twelve Miles Long, enhances Hooks’ informative history with a quiet vibrancy on every page, carefully capturing Thomas’ tenacity in his silent expressions using muted watercolors that seem to reflect the control Thomas had to exert while working – and succeeding – in such challenging circumstances. Her endpapers provide additional information to inspire further research, surely a welcome resource for curious, inspired readers. That he never allowed racism – even the racism of the very people who should have championed his accomplishments – to prevent him from saving lives is testimony to his superior humanity.Īuthor Gwendolyn Hooks makes Thomas’ exceptional story available to young audiences, reclaiming significant medical history that was conspicuously overlooked for too many decades. Not until the 1970s was Thomas finally given his due: his portrait was hung across Blalock’s in John’s Hopkins Hospital, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by Johns Hopkins University, and appointed as an Instructor of Surgery. Shockingly, Thomas’ name was never mentioned. Helen Taussig, would receive international coverage and lauds for Thomas’ work, including a Nobel Prize nomination in 1947. Two white doctors, Blalock and pediatric cardiologist Dr. More than a quarter century would pass before Thomas was recognized for the tiny needles he created and the procedure he pioneered that would save the lives of “blue babies,” infants born with heart defects that restricted oxygen which caused the titular bluish skin.

Moving from Nashville to Baltimore was not an easy transition for Thomas and his family, but he “refused to let the prejudice of others interfere with his work.” What he accomplished – in spite of having only a formal high school education – was phenomenal. When Blalock was appointed Chief of Surgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital, he accepted under the condition that Thomas was hired, as well. Thomas’ work was stellar: he was quickly completing his own experiments, and then surgeries under Blalock’s supervision, and mastering medical textbooks loaned by another doctor. He got himself a job at Vanderbilt – an all-white university that “would never admit him as a student” – where he worked with Dr.

The stock market crash of 1928 wiped out Thomas’ savings, but nothing could touch his determination and dreams. From the age of 13, Vivien Thomas worked with his master carpenter father and began growing a bank account that might someday take him to college and eventually medical school.

Tiny Stitches by Gwendolyn Hooks