Shadow Doctor

by Matt Peters

Content advisory: Strong language and brief depictions of criminal violence and traumatic injuries

In Shadow Doctor, writer Peter Calloway and artist Georges Jeanty tell the story of an early-career doctor in the 1930s whose entry into the medical profession took a perilous detour. Set in Prohibition-era Chicago, the graphic novel follows the early life of Peter Calloway’s real-life grandfather, Dr. Nathaniel Calloway. Dr. Calloway was a Black physician who was steered into a world of underground clinical care, serving one of Chicago’s most notorious gangs. Running a secret clinic in a downtown apartment, Dr. Calloway gave life-saving care to bootleggers and other criminals who were injured during violent clashes with rival gangs and law enforcement.

Dr. Calloway’s unusual line of work was a consequence of pervasive racial discrimination, which created barriers to conventional career pathways for Black medical professionals like himself. An early sequence in Shadow Doctor shows Dr. Calloway, fresh out of medical school, interviewing to be a physician at one of Chicago’s hospitals. “Son, there’s simply no way I can hire you,” the clinical manager tells him right away (page 13, panel 1). “Have you tried the colored hospital, down on the south side–?” the manager continues (page 13, panel 3).[1] Dr. Calloway replies that the southside hospital closed months ago.

Unable to find work in an established clinic, Dr. Calloway then tries to secure a business loan to open his own clinic. However, he finds that the banking sector harbors just as much systemic racism as the healthcare sector. A quick montage shows Dr. Calloway being rejected at one bank after another.

Up against a wall, it occurs to Dr. Calloway that his own social network could connect him to a large amount of cash—cash that circulates in a shadow, underworld economy of organized crime. Through a longtime friend, Dr. Calloway has a connection to none other than Al Capone, the leader of the Chicago Mafia whose notoriety had earned him the moniker “Scarface” in the press. Al Capone, a person with considerable cash assets and few rules to follow, could be the lender Dr. Calloway needs.

Although Dr. Calloway is willing to bend the rules of borrowing, his intention is still to provide honest, ethical healthcare. However, when he finally manages to introduce himself to Capone, those good intentions are quickly upended.

Upon meeting Dr. Calloway, Capone sees someone who has run out of options—and who could thus be manipulated into working for the Mafia. Through a series of carefully orchestrated moves—some seemingly generous and others coercive—Capone thrusts Dr. Calloway into a new role as an emergency care physician for the Mafia. Capone’s cronies frequently suffer gunshot wounds and other injuries—the occupational hazards of working for an organized crime syndicate. Capone gives Dr. Calloway a spare apartment and stocks it with stolen medical equipment. With that makeshift clinic set up, the Mafia has a place to get medical care—one that, unlike a hospital, won’t report gun-related injuries to the police.

Initially, Dr. Calloway is consumed by his work, focused on the immediate needs of his patients. Eventually, however, he starts to pause and question the situation he’s in. This questioning introduces the central tension of Shadow Doctor, as Dr. Calloway becomes increasingly aware that he’s caught in a criminal underworld where he doesn’t belong, practicing a form of medicine that is rife with contradiction: The people he heals will simply turn around and bring more death, injury, and destruction to the people of Chicago. He longs for a more normal life—and a medical career that is closer to his true calling, one that would benefit Chicago’s underserved Black community. However, the same culture of coercion that got Dr. Calloway to work for the Mafia also makes leaving the Mafia a dangerous prospect.

With that story setup, Peter Calloway and Georges Jeanty treat readers to a gripping work of historical fiction, one that uses tight pacing to evoke a sense of urgency and high stakes in the events that unfold. To complement that pacing, Jeanty uses a gritty drawing style reminiscent of detective noir and other pulp fiction. Those creative choices should resonate with readers who are drawn to true crime or crime fiction. However, readers who are interested in slower, more ruminative storytelling—the kind that can explore questions of racial justice, medical ethics, or other social issues—will be left somewhat short. In Shadow Doctor, moments of reflection are largely put aside in favor of action-driven storytelling.

Shadow Doctor includes a one-page introduction by Peter Calloway, as well as several pages of back matter that provide additional background information about the story. What is left unclear, even with that additional text, is which parts of the story are based on real events and which parts are products of artistic license. A few months before Shadow Doctor was released,[2] a writer for Amherst Magazine interviewed Peter Calloway about the project.[3] In the interview, Calloway stated that the graphic novel is based on family lore, some of which may have been embellished over time. An issue of chronology arises when comparing Shadow Doctor to historical records, namely that Dr. Nathaniel Calloway didn’t receive his medical degree from the University of Illinois until 1943, several years after the events of Shadow Doctor.

While specific plot details in Shadow Doctor might lack substantiation, there are background elements of the story that certainly carry weight. Prior to the Civil Rights Act, the U.S. medical establishment had a long history of discriminating against Black medical professionals. For decades, Black physicians were denied membership in the American Medical Association, which greatly reduced their professional opportunities. Professional training was another barrier, as many medical colleges barred Black students from admissions. The result was a considerable underrepresentation of Black professionals in the healthcare workforce. In 1940, for example, only 2.8 percent of U.S. physicians were Black, even though Black Americans represented nearly 10 percent of the U.S. population.[4]

Similarly, discriminatory banking was common before the Civil Rights Act. Black borrowers faced systematic denial of financial credit, leading to the creation of Black-owned alternative lenders like Atlanta’s Citizens Trust Bank. A major theme in Shadow Doctor, the use of outlaw clinicians by organized crime rings, is likewise rooted in historical fact.

As for Dr. Nathaniel Calloway, even if the events of Shadow Doctor turn out to be mostly legend, he still led a remarkable life. He earned a PhD in organic chemistry from Iowa State University in 1933, making him the first Black American to receive a doctoral degree from a university west of the Mississippi River. He is credited with widely cited work in the field of organic chemistry. After completing medical school in Chicago in 1943, Dr. Calloway became a prominent scholar of post-operative care, gerontology, and geriatrics. Beyond his personal achievements, he supported the success and wellbeing of others, both as a university instructor and as a civil rights activist.

Notes

[1] Shadow Doctor is unpaginated, so page citations are based on a manual count starting from the first page of graphic storytelling.

[2] Shadow Doctor was first published as a five-issue limited series that premiered in February 2021. The publication mentioned here refers to the graphic novel in which those five issues were reprinted.

[3] Amherst Magazine is an alumni publication of Amherst College, where Peter Calloway studied history and philosophy.

[4] Discrimination against Black patients was likewise pervasive before the Civil Rights Act. See, for example, Dr. Emily Largent’s 2018 article in Public Health Reports, “Public Health, Racism, and the Lasting Impact of Hospital Segregation.” For graphic medicine that addresses the topic of discrimination against Black patients, see Dr. Werthless, a graphic novel by Harold Schechter (writer) and Eric Powell (writer-artist) about Dr. Fredric Wertham (1895-1981), a psychiatrist who sought to give Black Americans equal access to mental healthcare (but whose legacy was tainted by his vehement campaign to censor comic books, a medium he blamed for corrupting youth and creating a host of public health problems). See also Crownsville, a limited series by Rodney Barnes (writer) and Elia Bonetti (artist) that uses supernatural horror tropes to explore the legacy of Maryland’s infamous Crownsville State Hospital. Crownsville was a segregated psychiatric hospital that was notorious for its abuse and neglect of Black patients. It was founded in 1910, desegregated in 1964, and closed in 2004.

Matt Peters is a program manager at Health Sciences Design, an interdisciplinary health innovation program at the University of Arizona Mel & Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health. He is also a longtime comic book reader and collector who can be found from time to time at his local comic book shops. Views expressed are his own.