I learned SO much about tuberculosis (had NO idea how devastating it had been) and the Black nurses at Seaview Hospital in Staten Island who were at the forefront of treating the worst of the patients at the hot white center of the cure. As white nurses started quitting in droves during WWI and WWII because they didn't want to risk their own lives in tuberculosis sanatoriums (and demand abroad), Black nurses looking for better futures, especially out the the Jim Crow South, were going to the extremely limited educational institutions and fighting equality battles in the hospitals that were treating the most infectious and deadly disease in the world. These women truly were Black Angels, nursing those with hopeless cases and staring death in the face every day despite not being treated with respect and provided the opportunities they so obviously deserved. Smilios tracks the progression of Seaview Hospital from the late 1920's/early 1930's all the way to 1961 when the last tuberculosis patient left the hospital and the sanatorium was shut down. These women are elite few who did some of the hardest jobs imaginable for a nurse and were there when the cure was finally found, turning the tide on a global pandemic. And who knew it all happened right there in Staten Island. Nonfiction, infectious disease, adversity amongst already dire straight - this is a triumph story. Seaview Hospital is now a crumbling abandoned ghost of a hospital...super creepy but SO important in its day.