Dr. James Barry, Miracle Man

With the unfolding of the horrific abortion ban in Texas, there has been immense discussion around reproductive rights and bodily autonomy. Two notable themes have emerged for me — both the paternal sense of ownership that leads to the desire to control female bodies, and the insistence that those female bodies can only ever belong to women.

Trans people have always been here. Transmasculine and nonbinary people must be included in discussions of reproductive health, both because our lived experiences are valuable and because systematic medical exclusion of these groups is deadly, particularly when it comes to reproductive healthcare.

This is not a new thought, nor a new practice. To show you what I mean, I want to tell you a story. As with all of these articles, I will not misgender the dead, even if many sources about them often do.

Dr. James Barry was born a girl to a poor grocer in County Cork, Ireland in around 1790. At the time of his death in 1865, he would be an internationally recognized medical innovator, public health advocate, and forerunner in the emerging field of sanitation science.

Barry had always shown an aptitude for learning, but with limited funds (and an older brother who the family pinned their future hopes on), education was out of reach for much of his childhood. When his brother vanished and his father was sent to debtor’s prison, Barry and his mother were in dire straights until Barry’s uncle, also known as James Barry, died. The elder James Barry had been a…