In March 1964, the Group Health Cooperative magazine, View, publishes a letter from a member asking that smoking be banned in clinic waiting areas. This letter, from Mrs. Millard Petersky, is the first shot fired on a new public health front.
The magazine's next issue drew more letters, including one commenting that while limiting smoking was a matter of courtesy, "nobody should be asked to give up smoking."
It should be noted that Dr. John A. Kahl, Group Health's dynamic Executive Director from 1955 to 1965, was never seen without a cigarette hanging from his mouth.
Sources:
Walt Crowley, To Serve the Greatest Number: A History of Group Health Cooperative of Seattle (Seattle: GHC/University of Washington Press, 1995), 118.
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