Walk past the northeast corner of Central Park today and you'll see a conspicuous empty space. For over a century, a bronze man stood there in a long frock coat, looking dignified and scholarly. That was the J. Marion Sims statue, a monument to the so-called "father of modern gynecology."
But in April 2018, the bronze came down.
It wasn't just a random act of "cancel culture" or a spur-of-the-moment decision. Honestly, the fight to remove it had been brewing for decades. Why? Because the "medical breakthroughs" Sims is credited with—like the speculum and the surgery for vesicovaginal fistulas—were bought with the blood and agonizing pain of enslaved Black women who never had a choice in the matter.
The Dark History Behind the Bronze
To understand why the J. Marion Sims statue became such a lightning rod, you have to go back to 1845 Alabama. Sims was a young doctor who became obsessed with fixing a condition called vesicovaginal fistula. It's a horrific injury from childbirth that leaves women leaking urine constantly. In the 19th century, it made you a social pariah.
📖 Related: Shampoo para la caspa para mujer: por qué lo que compras en el súper no siempre funciona
Sims wanted to fix it. He built a small hospital in his backyard.
Then he filled it with enslaved women.
He didn't just "treat" them. He experimented on them. We know the names of three: Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy. Anarcha was just a teenager when he started. Over four years, Sims performed 30 surgeries on her alone. Thirty. All without anesthesia.
Pain and Power
People often argue that anesthesia wasn't "standard" back then. It's a weak excuse. Ether was successfully demonstrated in 1846, right in the middle of Sims' experiments. He chose not to use it.
He claimed the surgery wasn't "painful enough" to justify the risk.
Yet, in his own notes, he described Lucy’s "extreme agony" during an operation that lasted an hour. He had to stop because he thought she might actually die on the table. When he later moved to New York and opened the Woman’s Hospital, he suddenly found anesthesia much more necessary for his white, paying patients.
Basically, he believed a racist myth of the time: that Black people didn't feel pain the same way white people did. It’s a lie that, frankly, still haunts the medical system today.
Why the J. Marion Sims Statue Was Taken Down
By the time 2017 rolled around, the statue was a target. Activists, led by groups like Black Youth Project 100, staged protests where they wore hospital gowns stained with red paint. It was visceral. It was a visual reminder of what happened in that Alabama backyard.
The push for removal wasn't just about the past; it was about the present.
East Harlem, where the statue stood, is a neighborhood primarily of color. Imagine walking your kids past a monument every day that honors a man who used people who looked like you as lab rats. It’s not exactly "inspiring."
The Final Decision
Mayor Bill de Blasio eventually convened a commission to review "symbols of hate" on city property. While some monuments (like Christopher Columbus) were spared with "added context," the commission voted unanimously to yank Sims.
💡 You might also like: Monthly Observances October: Why This Month Is More Than Just Halloween
- April 16, 2018: The NYC Public Design Commission makes the call.
- April 17, 2018: The statue is physically removed from its pedestal.
- The Destination: It was moved to Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, where Sims is buried.
They didn't melt it down. It’s still there, but now it’s in a cemetery—a place for history and reflection—rather than a place of public honor. They also planned to add signage that actually tells the truth about Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy.
What Most People Get Wrong About the Controversy
You'll hear people say, "He saved millions of lives! You can't judge him by today's standards!"
It’s more complicated than that.
First, even some of his peers back then thought his repeated surgeries on the same women were borderline "monstrous." Second, the "standards" of 1845 still included the idea that people are property. If we use "the standards of the time" to excuse everything, we'd still have statues of every person who ever did something "great" while committing atrocities.
History isn't just about what happened; it's about who we choose to put on a pedestal.
Statues are meant to reflect a society's values. By 2018, New York City decided that "medical progress at the expense of human rights" was no longer a value worth a bronze monument in Central Park.
The Shift Toward the "Mothers of Gynecology"
The real story isn't just about a doctor. It’s about the women.
There is a growing movement to recognize Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy as the Mothers of Modern Gynecology. Without their bodies—their forced "cooperation," their endurance through thirty surgeries, their roles as nurses helping Sims with other patients—the field of gynecology wouldn't exist as it does.
They were the ones who actually did the work.
In Montgomery, Alabama, artist Michelle Browder created a massive monument called "The Mothers of Gynecology." It’s made of discarded metal and scrap—a metaphor for how these women were treated as disposable. It stands as a direct counter-narrative to the old way of thinking.
Actionable Insights for the Curious
If you’re interested in the history of medical ethics or just want to understand the context of the J. Marion Sims statue better, here are a few ways to dig deeper:
✨ Don't miss: Time in Page Arizona: Why Your Phone and Your Brain Are Always Confused
- Read "Medical Apartheid": Harriet A. Washington’s book is the definitive source on how the American medical system has historically used Black bodies for experimentation. It changed the entire conversation around Sims.
- Visit the Empty Pedestal: If you're in NYC, go to 5th Avenue and 103rd Street. Seeing the absence of the statue is often more powerful than seeing the statue itself.
- Support Reproductive Justice: Look into organizations like SisterSong or local groups in East Harlem that work on maternal health for women of color. The disparities Sims helped create still result in higher mortality rates for Black mothers today.
- Check out Michelle Browder’s Work: Look up the "Mothers of Gynecology" monument in Montgomery. It’s a masterclass in how to tell a story through art that centers the victims rather than the "hero."
The removal of the statue wasn't an attempt to erase history. It was an attempt to finally tell the whole history. Knowing the name J. Marion Sims is one thing; knowing the names Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy is what actually matters now.