Masseur Training at the Fort Worth YMCA School of Health Service (1944-1957?)
Description:
This black-and-white photograph shows veterans who are attending the Fort Worth YMCA School of Health Service in Texas under the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act (aka the G.I. Bill). The men, left to right, are R. B. Young (dean of health service school and director), Ray Edwards, E. C. Young, Fletcher Boyd, Thomas Psalms, Porter Ousley (instructor), and Harold Dunham. Willie Randie is lying on the first massage table; Ural Manning is on the second. The class is in session at the Central YMCA, 5th and Lamar Streets. They are practicing massage techniques. The Health Service course, which lasted one full year, was offered to not only to servicemen, but to any African American who qualified with two full years of high school work or longer. The health service course covered anatomy, physiology, physiology of exercises, pathology of massage, allied branches, professional ethics, personal records, professional practice and reports, and more. Those who complete the course can qualify as a masseur and apprentice masseur. According to a newspaper article that shows this photography, “YMCA’s in the Southwest Field [were] in dire need of prepared masseurs.”
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