Title
WBUR Oral History Project: Dr. Leslie Morse. Clip 2
Creator
Morse, Leslie (Interviewee)
Contributor
Guberman, Jayne (Interviewer)
O'Brien, Joanna Shea (Recordist)
McDonough, Ryan (Contributor)
O'Brien, Joanna Shea (Recordist)
McDonough, Ryan (Contributor)
Language
English
Date created
April 08, 2014
Type of resource
Sound recording
Genre
Interviews
Oral histories (document genres)
Oral histories (document genres)
Format
Sound Recording
Digital origin
born digital
Abstract/Description
Countless lives were affected by the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings and their
aftermath. The WBUR Oral History Project collects stories from individuals whose lives were
immediately and irrevocably changed by these events. Thanks to the generous sponsorship
of WBUR, our team of oral historians, and the participation of these interview subjects, Our
Marathon has tried to ensure that these stories are not forgotten. We believe that these
stories matter, and that they demonstrate the ways historical events transform the lives of
the people who lived through them. Oral historians Jayne K. Guberman, Ph.D., and Joanna Shea
O'Brien conducted the interviews for this project. Oral History Project Manager Kristi
Girdharry, Our Marathon Project Co-Director Jim McGrath, and Community Outreach Lead Joanne
DeCaro recorded the interviews and provided research assistance and post-interview processing.
McGrath and Our Marathon Audio Technician Ryan McDonough provided sound editing and processing
for all of the interviews and clips. The opinions and statements expressed in interviews and
related content featured in the WBUR Oral History Project do not necessarily reflect the
opinions of Our Marathon, WBUR, Northeastern University, or any employees or volunteers
affiliated with these institutions and projects. Our Marathon and The WBUR Oral History
project make no assertions about the veracity of statements made by participants in this
project. Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital played a critical role in the rehabilitation of
many of the most seriously injured survivors of the bombings, including 15 amputees (two of
whom were double amputees). They managed the opening of their new facility in the Boston Navy
Yard just days after the bombings with the admission and care for dozens of patients and
intense media attention, both of which continued for several months. Many of their staff were
personally affected as they were runners on the Spaulding marathon charity team or were
waiting near the finish line to support the team and witnessed the bombings. Our Marathon's
WBUR Oral History Project sought to collect a cross-section of interviews from Spaulding staff
to chronicle how the rehabilitative care of marathon bombing survivors was an integral part of
the city's response to violence and mass trauma. Dr. Leslie Morse grew up in mid-coast Maine,
the daughter of a lobsterman. Trained in osteopathic medicine, which emphasizes preventative
medicine, Dr. Morse focuses on interventions to prevent bone loss for spinal cord injury in
both her clinical practice and her research. At Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, she directs
the SCI Model System, dedicated to improving the lives of people with physical disabilities.
During the Boston Marathon 2013, Dr. Morse was working for the second year as part of the
medical committee overseeing the event for wheelchair athletes. In her interview, she
describes the volunteer medical briefing at 7:45 am at the John Hancock building, followed by
the wait for the first athletes to arrive in the medical tent. Assigned to the first pod just
inside the tent opening, she describes working with her podmate, Mitch, to hang a bag of
saline solution for an athlete when they heard the first explosion. When the second bomb went
off, she instinctively knew something bad was happening. Dr. Morse relates how the "MC"
directed medical personnel to move people to the back of the tent after the explosions to make
room for expected casualties. Within moments, Dr. Morse and her podmate were tending to the
first bombing victim, looking shocked but not badly injured, who was brought into the medical
tent by wheelchair. As more seriously injured survivors arrived, she describes the MC's
soothing reminders to the assembled doctors that they knew what to do and how to help. Moments
later, Dr. Morse responded to a call for all doctors to go to the finish line. She recalls
running towards and arriving at the blast site, as spectators streamed away in panic. She
vividly remembers the chaos and the scene of horror, strewn with blood and body parts, as
people tended to the injured. She joined with others trying to stop the bleeding of the
severely wounded and administering CPR, as well as getting the victims onto stretchers and
into ambulances. After the blast site was cleared, Dr. Morse, along with her husband, joined a
group of doctors headed for Boston Common to care for runners who ended up there. Throughout
the interview, Dr. Morse describes the intense emotional and psychological impact of the
bombings, from the early days when the events played a continuous loop in her mind to her
feelings, a year later, of having confronted pure evil. "I feel like I stood witness," she
said, "to a horrible act of cruelty." Noting that, as a doctor, her entire career is about
trying to do good, she feels that she will carry the scar forever of seeing firsthand the
results of this deliberate attempt to inflict devastating harm on fellow human beings. In this
clip, Dr. Morse describes the call for all physicians working within the medical tent to go to
the finish line and the scene that follows.
Notes
The opinions and statements expressed in interviews and related
content featured in the WBUR Oral History Project do not necessarily reflect the opinions of
Our Marathon, WBUR, Northeastern University, or any employees or volunteers affiliated with
these institutions and projects. Our Marathon and The WBUR Oral History project make no
assertions about the veracity of statements made by participants in this project.
Source note
The WBUR Oral History Project. Dr. Leslie Morse (Oral History),
Jayne Guberman (Oral Historian), Joanna Shea O'Brien (Recorder), Ryan McDonough (Sound Editing
and Processing)
Related item
Our Marathon The Boston Bombing Digital Archive
Subjects and keywords
Boston Marathon Bombing, Boston, Mass., 2013
Permanent URL
Location
Northeastern University Library
Use and reproduction
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Requests for permission to publish material should be addressed to Northeastern University Library's Digital Scholarship Group (dsg@neu.edu).