“Emma Dupree, Pitt County Herbalist” Lecture on Monday, February 24

As part of the Ruth and John Moskop History of Medicine Lecture Series, the Medical History Interest Group invites you to attend Emma Dupree, Pitt County Herbalist on February 24th. This lecture, presented by Alex Albright, MFA, English (retired), begins at 4:30p.m. in the Evelyn Fike Laupus Gallery, fourth floor Laupus Library.

The Topic:

Albright will provide an overview of the life and work of Emma Dupree, who was the subject of the 1979 ECU film “Little Medicine Thing: Emma Dupree Herbalist”. Born in 1897 along the Tar River, Dupree was known as “that little medicine thing” because of her understanding of herbs at an early age. As an elderly woman, she shared much of her knowledge of the medicinal properties of native plants with physicians and medical anthropologists. Dupree received the Brown-Hudson Award from the North Carolina Folklore Society in 1984 and the North Carolina Heritage Award in 1992. She died just shy of her 100th birthday, in 1996.

The Speaker:

Alex Albright retired in 2018, after 37 years teaching in the ECU English department. He and his wife, Elizabeth, are proprietors of Fountain General Store, in Fountain, North Carolina, where they have lived for nearly 20 years. Alex’s 2013 book, The Forgotten First: B-1 and the Integration of the Modern Navy, was a finalist for the Montaigne Prize. Among his most recent articles is “Langston Hughes in Reno,” published in Nevada History in 2019.

More Information:

This event is free and open to the public. Refreshments will be provided.

The lecture will also feature a pop-up display.

Directions and parking information.

If you’d like to travel by bus from Main Campus, take bus 302 from the Main Campus Student Center to the Allied Health Sciences Building. Click here for the 302 bus schedule.

Lectures may be video recorded.

Learn more about the MHIG lectures and view an archive of previous recordings.