In 1965, Brown physician sparked furor over the Pill
Gabriella Doob
Issue date: 2/5/07 Section: Features
When Toby Simon was in college in the 1960s, it was nearly impossible for an unmarried woman like her to get birth control pills. Undaunted, Simon bought a box of Cracker Jacks, put on the fake diamond ring she found inside and told her doctor she was getting married and wanted to go on the pill. It worked.
Simon, who became the University's first director of health education at Health Services in the 1980s and is now the director of the Bryant College Women's Center, was one of the many young women affected by the controversy that surrounded birth control in the 1960s. Concern about the pill centered around fears that it would promote promiscuity among women and lead to a surge in premarital sex and a nationwide decline in moral standards.
The controversy raged especially bitterly at Brown, which made international news on Sept. 28, 1965 when The Herald reported that Roswell Johnson, the University's director of Health Services, had prescribed birth control pills to two engaged but unmarried students at Pembroke College, the University's women's college that merged with Brown in 1971.
Though physicians at a handful of other colleges, including the University of Chicago and the University of Minnesota, had also prescribed birth control pills to students, Brown was the first to publicize the fact, Simon said. Newspapers and wire services across the country picked up the story, which broke just a few months after another story involving contraception made headlines - that June, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Connecticut's ban on contraceptives in Griswold v. Connecticut.
Johnson defended his decision, telling reporters then that both women involved were "mature people, already engaged, and they both had been referred to me by clergy" and that prescription of the pills was his own "private orientation" and not University policy. He also said he had thoroughly interviewed the women, who were both over 21, before he wrote the prescriptions. He also told reporters he would not have prescribed the pills without the consent of the students' parents and without "a great deal of soul searching."
Simon, who became the University's first director of health education at Health Services in the 1980s and is now the director of the Bryant College Women's Center, was one of the many young women affected by the controversy that surrounded birth control in the 1960s. Concern about the pill centered around fears that it would promote promiscuity among women and lead to a surge in premarital sex and a nationwide decline in moral standards.
The controversy raged especially bitterly at Brown, which made international news on Sept. 28, 1965 when The Herald reported that Roswell Johnson, the University's director of Health Services, had prescribed birth control pills to two engaged but unmarried students at Pembroke College, the University's women's college that merged with Brown in 1971.
Though physicians at a handful of other colleges, including the University of Chicago and the University of Minnesota, had also prescribed birth control pills to students, Brown was the first to publicize the fact, Simon said. Newspapers and wire services across the country picked up the story, which broke just a few months after another story involving contraception made headlines - that June, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Connecticut's ban on contraceptives in Griswold v. Connecticut.
Johnson defended his decision, telling reporters then that both women involved were "mature people, already engaged, and they both had been referred to me by clergy" and that prescription of the pills was his own "private orientation" and not University policy. He also said he had thoroughly interviewed the women, who were both over 21, before he wrote the prescriptions. He also told reporters he would not have prescribed the pills without the consent of the students' parents and without "a great deal of soul searching."