This is an excerpt from the book, Mother of Courage, an inspirational true story about Margaret Chanin, who despite the loss of both arms earned her dental degree, married and raised two boys, taught preventive dentistry for more than 20 years, and became nationally known for her advocacy of people with disabilities. Her journey through physical challenges and adversity is a testament to the power of determination, resilience, and faith.
Photo: Margaret and her boys. Photo by Wilbur Curtis for the Memphis Press-Scimitar, 1957.
In the winter of 1952, the family moved back to Ann Arbor. Margaret Chanin was now the mother of two young boys – Robert was born in 1950 – and Marty commuted by train to his job teaching chemistry at the Detroit Institute of Technology.
When she could not find a nanny, this true mother of invention improvised, and encouraged her children to help. “When they were really small,” her mother recalled years later, “she would lean over their cribs and tell them to put their arms around her neck so she could lift them up.”
By the age of 3, they were making their beds, emptying the wastebaskets in their rooms—even dusting the dining room furniture. As Philip grew older, he was put in charge of ironing.
Margaret Chanin taught her boys there’s no difference between “men’s work” and “women’s work.” Work is work. Years later she’d laugh when Philip would say, “All boys ought to have armless mothers until they’re grown.”
Shortly after their return to Ann Arbor, Eugene Murphy, who worked for the Prosthetic and Sensory Aids Service at the Veterans Administration in New York City, paid Margaret Chanin a visit. He was attending a meeting in Chicago and heard about her from one of Marty’s classmates at the University of Michigan.
“This is amazing,” Murphy marveled when he saw the prosthetic arm that Marty had built for her. “It looks like it was made by a prisoner-of-war who had heard that there was such a thing as an artificial arm but had never seen one.”
Murphy told her about a program at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) prosthetics program. “They’re looking for ‘experimental amputees’ to help them design better prosthetics,” he said. “I believe they could design a better arm for you.”
When Marty came home from work that evening, Margaret Chanin told him about Murphy’s visit and about the opportunity to go to UCLA. But she said she didn’t want to go because they’d have to move across the country, and he would have to find another job.
Marty stopped her there. “Margaret,” he said firmly, “I’ll dig ditches if I have to, to make you more independent.”