"Arthur Courtney Logan (September 8,1909-November 25 1973)

Physician,surgeon, and civil rights, activist,was born on the campus of Tuskegee University in Alabama, one of five children born to Warren & Adelle Logan.Warren Logan, treasurer of TUskegee University,had begun working as an educator at the University when it was established in 1882. Arthur rembered and early childhood in bucolic surroundings where hesometimes spent summer days at the side of Booker T.Washington,the founder of Tuskegee University.

At age of ten he was sent to New York City to live in Harlem with an older sister and attend the Ethical Culture School on a scholarship.In the 1920s New York City offered African Americans a broader spectrum of opportunities than possible in Alabama.The Ethical Culture School,was founded by Felix Adler in 1878,was open to children of all races and religions.Felix was a social activist who promoted the concepts of equality,justice,and intellectual freedom.At Ethical, he Arthur was exposed to children from many diffirent cultures and socioeconomic backgrounds.

Although the school had originally been founded to reach out to the children of the poor,many of New York's wealthiest citizens paid to send their children there as well.

He went to Williams College in Massachusetts,and in 1930 graduated in Phi Beta Kappa.Arhur then studied medicine at Columbia University,where he Felix held the chair for political and social ethiics.When Arthur graduated as one of the first African American students from Columbia's College Physicians and Surgeons in 1934,he took with him a commitment to social 

activism he had learned from years of study in institutions influenced by Felix's progressive ideas.Although he had other opportunities, Arthur chose to complete his internship at Harlem Hospital.It was in Harlem that he began his lifelong effort to provide quality medical care for poor and disenfranchised citizens in New York City.

After twelve years in private practice, Arthur, along with a small group of other Doctors, founded the Upper Manhattan Medical Group in Harlem to 

serve the poorest residents of the city.Founders of one of the nation's first health maintenance organizations,the group served more than thirty thousand subcribers,most of them African Americans.These prepaid subscribers received quality health services that otherwise would have been unavailable to them.Arthur remained a partner in the Manhattan Group and served as director of its surgical department until his death.

His life was marked by unusual privilege,he was committed to helping those who could not help themselves. The Manhattan group was just one of many projects he took on in order to support the African American community.While serving on the surgical staff of several New York hospitals, including Harlem Hospital,Sydenham Hospital,and Knickerbocker Hospital, he dedicated much of his time to organizations like Citizens Organized Against Drug Abuse,which he served as chairman of the board for many years; the New York City Council Against Poverty,in 1965; and United Neighborhood Houses of New York from 1966 until his death.He also worked with the city to develop and implement public projects such as the Manhattanville Heath Park, a plan to incorporate health facilities, job training facilities, parks, and low-income housing within civic and commercial areas.

His first marriage to Wenorah Bond ended in divorce in 1947. They had one daughter,Adele. He met his second wife,Marion Taylor of Philadelphia,Pennsylvania.when he was called in to treat her after she became ill at the Apollo Theater where she sang under the name of Marian Bruce. They were married in 1958. Their only child, a son was named Warren in honor of Arthur's daddy.

In the next decade Arthur turned his attention to the civil rights movement.In 1960 he became the director of the Urban League of Greater New York and in 1962 the director of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational fund.His membership in New York's progressive elite society allowed him to work behind the scenes along with his wife,who was the only northern-based member on the board of directors of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC).Together they opened their fashionable brownstone on West Eighty-eight Street to raise money to support the movement.Counted among their guests and associates were some of the most important names in civil rights history:Martin Luther King Jr., Roy Watkins, the Reverend Ralph Abernathy,Eleanor Holmes Norton,Vernon Jordan,Charles Rangel, and Shirley Chisholm. On a single night in April of 1965 the Logans raised eleven thousand dollars at a reception for Martin.

Five weeks after Martin's assassination on April 4th 1968 Arthur organized and led a team of medical workers to Washington to care for the three thousand demonstrators,mostly African Americans,who were camped on the Mall for Martin's planned Poor People's March on Washington. The Tent housing,enmeshed in mud and dubbed "Resurrection City," covered the Mall from May 14 until the federal government razed it on June 24 1968.

Housing concerns were second only to Arthur's dedication to providing adequate quality health care to everyone who needed it. His last undertaking before his death was the Manhattanville project, which along with an array of housing and other civic development.It was the construction site for this project where Arthur's body was found. It is believed that he fell from a viaduct on the Henry Hudson Parkway overlooking the site. Knickerbocker Hospital was renamed the Arthur C. Logan Memorial Hospital after his untimely death at the age of sixty-four.