Daniel Hale Williams

Daniel Hale Williams (January 18, 1858 – August 4, 1931) was an American surgeon. He was the first African-American cardiologist,and performed one of the first successful open-heart surgeries in the United States. He also founded Provident Hospital, the first non-segregated hospital in the United States. Williams was among the first to have performed cardiac surgery. Earlier surgeries on the pericardium were performed by Francisco Romero in 1801, Dominique Jean Larrey prior to 1850, and by Henry Dalton in 1891. Also in 1891, he started the Provident Hospital and training school for nurses in Chicago, Illinois. This was established mostly for African-American citizens. In 1893 he repaired the torn pericardium of a knife wound patient,...