reputation had spread by word-of-mouth, and he was known as “The Saint.” Patients came to his clinic in Ashland from around the country.
| took the five-hour bus trip from New York to Ashland with my gigantic Webcor tape recorder. Dr. Spencer was the cheerful personification of an old-fashioned physician. He wore a red beret and used folksy expressions like “by golly.”. He had been performing abortions for 40 years. He started out charging $5, and never more than $100. He rarely used the word pregnant. Rather, he would say, “She was that way, and she came to me for help.”
Ashland was a small town, and Dr. Spencer's work was not merely tolerated; the community depended on it--the hotel, the restaurant, the dress shop—-all thrived on the extra business that came from his out-of- town patients. However, he built facilities at his clinic for African-American patients who weren't allowed to obtain overnight lodgings elsewhere. The walls of his office were decorated with those little wooden signs that tourists like to buy. A sign on the ceiling over his operating table said Keep Calm.
Here’ san excerpt from our dialogue:
Q. Do you have any idea about how many actual abortions you’ re
performed during all these years?
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