Personal Name: William Earl Badger, M.D.

Personal Dates: 1909-1992
Interviewed by: Jake Spidle, Ph.D.
Recorded Date: 1983

Call Number: FL 802
Oral History Title: Interview with Demarious Cornell Badger, M.D., and William Earl Badger, M.D. Physical Description: 2 sound cassettes (110 min.) + 1 transcript (25 p.)

Biographical Note:
Dr. William Earl Badger was born in the oil town of Findlay, Ohio, in 1909. Though many relatives were engineers, he knew early on that he wanted to be a doctor, and this desire grew his junior year of high school when his father died after a long illness. Though Dr. Badger matriculated at Dartmouth, he enrolled at the University of Michigan in 1927 to be closer to his mother. He continued on to the University of Michigan Medical School, receiving his M.D. in 1934. The day after graduation, he married fellow classmate Dr. Demarious Cornell Badger, who he met while a junior in college. Like his wife, he did an internship and residency at University Hospital in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In 1937, Dr. Badger was diagnosed with tuberculosis, and the couple moved to Hobbs, New Mexico, to set up a private practice. Dr. Badger was board certified in surgery in 1952 and served as president of the New Mexico Medical Society in 1961-1962. The couple retired to Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1980. Dr. Badger died in at the age of 82 in 1992.

Content:
This joint interview with Drs. Demarious C. and William E. Badger summarizes their more than 40 years' practice of medicine in Hobbs, New Mexico. The interview contains information about their personal and professional backgrounds, including interesting information from Dr. Demarious Badger regarding discrimination against women in medical school; the difficult conditions in oil-town Hobbs; the nature and focuses of their medical practices; the special medical problems encountered in Hobbs; and much else. Among the subjects discussed at varying length are public health work in Lea County; referral practices and patterns from Hobbs; hospitals in Lea County; physicians of the county; the impact of World War II on medical care in their county; school board service and accomplishments in Hobbs (Dr. Demarious Badger); the advent of modern drugs; racial and gender attitudes and prejudices in Lea County; the battle against state medicine; and much else.

Location: Lea County
Occupation: Physician, Medical-Surgery
Link to Library Catalog: http://hestia.unm.edu/search/a?SEARCH=badger+william 
Full text transcript: PDF  (5389k)