Black Men Created America’s First Paramedics. Freedom House’s Hidden History

In 1966, the Freedom House Ambulance Service was founded in Pittsburgh's predominantly Black Hill District, making its Black staff the first paramedics in the United States. This initiative arose from a critical need for advanced emergency medical care, which was virtually nonexistent, and a desire to create meaningful job opportunities for local Black residents facing systemic disenfranchisement.

The first paramedics in the United States, African-American, yes, founded in 1966 in Pittsburgh, the predominately Black Hill district... Freedom House was where all of this began... The world's first paramedics are going to be black men from the Hill District.

Before Freedom House, emergency medical services in the U.S. were severely lacking. Transport was often provided by funeral homes (hearses) or untrained police officers in paddy wagons, who offered no medical care en route. This resulted in high mortality rates, with a 1965 report stating one was more likely to survive a gunshot wound in Vietnam than in the U.S. due to the absence of trained medical personnel.

Depending on where you live, there are some cities where it might be a volunteer fire department. There's some places where it was a funeral home... In the city of Pittsburgh, what you had was a policeborne ambulance service... They had no equipment. They had no training. They had no ability to do anything but take you to the hospital... In 1965 a report was released that said you are more likely to survive a gunshot wound in Vietnam than you are in the US.

Dr. Peter Safar, the inventor of CPR, developed the first paramedic curriculum after his own daughter died from an asthma attack due to inadequate emergency response. The city of Pittsburgh initially resisted funding his paramedic program. The turning point came with the highly public death of former Mayor David Lawrence from a heart attack, where trained medical intervention was stopped by arriving police, highlighting the city's critical healthcare infrastructure deficit. This public tragedy forced the city to finally approve Safar's program.

Peter Saffer, who is the doctor who invented CPR. His own daughter died... he spent about a year developed what would become the first paramedic curriculum... David Lawrence... topples over with a heart attack, drops to the floor, not breathing, no heartbeat... The police born ambulance service arrives... They push nurse Maguire out of the way. So they immediately stop care... he was brain dead when he arrived at the hospital. This provides the catalyst that gets the city to finally say yes.

Freedom House paramedics quickly became a model of excellence, setting national standards for emergency care. Their medical director, Dr. Nancy Caroline, wrote the foundational textbook still used globally. They were the first to use Narcan to reverse opioid overdoses, a breakthrough that garnered significant public attention. However, this success, particularly in saving Black lives, sparked resentment among white residents and city officials who questioned why such advanced care was available in the Hill District but not elsewhere. This racial bias led the mayor to shut down Freedom House in 1975, replacing it with a new, less experienced, and predominantly white city-run service, deliberately excluding the highly trained Freedom House paramedics.

Freedom House was chosen to serve as a national standard. Their medical director, a doctor by the name of Nancy Caroline, wrote a textbook based on her work there. And that textbook is used to this day to train people all over the world... The Freedom House paramedics are the first people in the world to use Narcan to reverse a heroin overdose... People see, wait a minute, this incredible thing that's happening, but it's happening there and it's happening to them and it's not happening to me. Why? and they get very angry... he doesn't use Peter Sapper... He gets new doctors and they recruit all new people, none of whom have any experience whatsoever on an ambulance.

Despite the systemic efforts to erase their contributions, Freedom House paramedics established many practices that remain standard in emergency medicine worldwide, including ambulance design, comprehensive training protocols, and the role of a medical director. While many of the original paramedics were marginalized or quit due to hostile work environments, some persevered, like John Moon, who eventually became assistant chief and mentored the first female and Black EMS chief in Pittsburgh. Decades later, their story is finally gaining national recognition through books, documentaries, and official proclamations.

If you walk into any ambulance now that's exactly the way it looks... that's done in every paramedic program around the world today. The idea of a of a medical director... Nobody was doing that until Freedom House... John Moon... retired as the assistant chief, but before he left... he hired a woman by the name of Amera Gilchrist who would go on to become the first female chief of Pittsburgh EMS and the first black chief of Pittsburgh EMS... Just last year the city the mayor read a proclamation... several of them were invited to Congress for the State of the Union with President Biden.