Early life (1920–1940)
Henrietta Lacks, originally born as Loretta Pleasant, on August 18, 1920 in
Roanoke, Virginia to Eliza and John Randall Pleasant . Her family is uncertain
how her name changed from Loretta to Henrietta; with Hennie as a nickname.
Henrietta’s mother died giving birth to her tenth child in 1924.
Sometime after Eliza Pleasant died, John Pleasant took the children back to where
their relatives lived, and they were raised by their mother's relatives. Henrietta
ended up with her grandfather in Clover, Virginia. John worked as a brakeman on
the railroad.
Henrietta Lacks pictured with David Lacks (Date not known)
Later In Life (1941–1950)
Henrietta married her first cousin, David "Day" Lacks in Halifax County, Virginia.
David had already been living with Henrietta's grandfather when she moved there
at age 4. Their marriage in 1941, after their first two children were born, (the first
when Henrietta was just 14) surprised many in the family as they had been raised
like brother and sister.
David went north to search for work, Henrietta followed in 1943, bringing their
children with her. David found work at the Sparrow's Point shipyards and found a
house for them on New Pittsburgh Avenue in Turners Station, now a part of
Dundalk, Baltimore County, Maryland
Day and Henrietta had five children together: Lawrence (1935), Elsie (1939),
David "Sonny" Jr. (1947), Deborah (1949), and Joseph (b. 1950, later changed
name to Zakariyya Bari Abdul Rahman). Joseph Lacks, Henrietta's last child, was
born at Johns Hopkins Hospital in November 1950, just four and a half months
before Henrietta was diagnosed with cancer. Elsie was described by the family as
"different", "deaf and dumb" and eventually died in the Crownsville State Hospital
in 1955.
Lawrence Lacks (left), 75, and David "Sonny" Lacks, 62, both of Baltimore, plan to place a
headstone on their mother Henrietta's unmarked grave in Clover.
Diagnoses and Death (1951)
On February 1, 1951, Lacks visited Johns Hopkins because of a painful "knot" in
her cervix and a bloody vaginal discharge. After a biopsy, she was diagnosed with
cervical cancer. The appearance of the tumor was unlike anything that had ever
been seen by the examining gynecologist Dr. Howard Jones.
Prior to receiving treatment for the tumor, cells from the carcinoma (malignant
tumor) were removed for research purposes without her knowledge or permission,
which was standard procedure at that time. During her second visit eight days later,
Dr. George Otto Gey obtained another sample of her tumor. These cells would
eventually become the HeLa immortal cell line, a commonly used cell line in
biomedical research.[1]
Lacks was treated with radium tube inserts, which were sown in place, a common
treatment for these types of cancers in 1951. After several days in place, the tubes
were removed and she was released from Johns Hopkins with instructions to return
for X-ray treatments as a follow up. Lacks returned for the X-ray treatments.
However, her condition worsened and the Hopkins doctors treated her with
antibiotics, thinking that her problem might be complicated by an underlying
venereal disease (she had neurosyphilis and presented with acute gonorrhea at one
point as well).
In significant pain and without improvement, Lacks returned to Hopkins
demanding to be admitted on August 8 and remained until her death. Though she
received treatment and blood transfusions, she died of uremic poisoning on
October 4, 1951 at the age of thirty-one. A subsequent partial autopsy showed that
the cancer had metastasized throughout her body.
Henrietta Lacks was buried without a tombstone in a family cemetery in
Lackstown, a part of Clover in Halifax County, Virginia. Her exact burial location
is not known, although the family believes it is within feet of her mother's
gravesite.
Henrietta's husband, David Lacks, was told little following her death on
October 4, 1951. For their part, members of the Lacks family were kept in
the dark about the existence of the tissue line, and when its existence was
revealed in a article by Michael Rogers, family members were confused
about how Henrietta's cells could have been taken without consent and how
they could still be alive 50 years after her death.