Dr. Joseph Clayton Gathe, Sr.
Dr. Joseph Clayton Gathe, Sr., was a native Houstonian. A talented student, he excelled at Xavier University in New Orleans. He was eager to attend medical school, but in 1949, faced limited options. With a little prodding from the nuns at Xavier, he was admitted to and became the first African American to enter the St. Louis University College of Medicine in 1949. For this achievement, he received the Urban League certificate of recognition for outstanding citizenship. Dr. Gathe later remembered that as the only African-American student he felt like “a roach in a glass of milk.”
After medical school, he trained at Homer G. Phillips Hospital in St. Louis and served in the U.S. Air Force, first in Korea and then as Chief of the Out-Patient Clinic in Sacramento, California. After his military service, he returned to Homer G. Phillips Hospital to complete his surgical residency.
In 1960, Dr. Gathe returned to Houston to open a surgical practice with Dr. Edison Banfield on Blodgett Street in the Third Ward. Initially, Dr. Gathe obtained privileges at St. Elizabeth Hospital and Riverside General Hospital, the only two Houston hospitals that included African-American physicians on their staffs at the time.
Dr. Gathe and Dr. Banfield were among the city’s leading surgeons. In 1964, they successfully performed a groundbreaking operation on an infant at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital. The child had a congenital atresia of the colon. Atresia is a complete obstruction of the intestines. Dr. Catherine Roett wrote with both Dr. Banfield and Dr. Gathe joined the infant’s pediatrician, Dr. Catherine Roett, in writing an article about the case that appeared in The American Surgeon.
As their surgical practice expanded and after several unsuccessful efforts to obtain privileges, Dr. Gathe took legal action against St. Joseph’s Hospital. After he won, he became the first African-American physician to join the medical staff there. Gathe eventually became the Vice Chief of Staff of the hospital. Traditionally, the vice chief at St. Joseph’s became the chief of staff the following year, however, the hospital’s board refused to extend Dr. Gathe this honor.
With greater integration in the 1960s, Dr. Gathe and Dr. Banfield soon joined the staffs of and performed surgery at Methodist Hospital, Citizens General Hospital, and Ben Taub Hospital.
Active in his community, Dr. Gathe served as president of Aid to Culturally Deprived Children and as a member of the Texas State Board of Education. He joined the Houston Medical Forum and the National Medical Association. Dr. Gathe also participated in an African-American flying club called the Bronze Eagles which was co-founded by Houston’s Dr. Herman Barnett. Having caddied as a child in Houston’s Hermann Park, Dr. Gathe remained an avid golf fan, as well as an accomplished businessman and successful investor.
Next Biography: Dr. J.G. Gathings
Return to: Opening Previously Closed Doors