University of Pittsburgh and Hill House Association to Cohost World Premiere Screening of Freedom House Feb. 15

PITTSBURGH-In the early 1960s, Pittsburghers who needed emergency medical care were transported to hospitals in the backs of police wagons. Their medical treatment began at the hospital door. But that changed in 1967, with the establishment of the Hill District-based Freedom House Ambulance Service, whose members made history as the first ambulatory unit in the country trained in advanced emergency medical care, saving lives, and paving the way for a new professional-the paramedic.

Weaving the concept of mobile emergency care into a local antipoverty initiative, city leaders combed the streets of the Hill District and the Northside, recruiting unemployed, "unemployable," and largely uneducated Black men to serve as Freedom House drivers. They were trained under Peter Safar (1924-2003), a University of Pittsburgh anesthesiologist and medical visionary who had developed a method of cardiopulmonary resuscitation. The life-saving techniques performed on the street and in the ambulances became the model for emergency medical care nationwide. Then, as suddenly as this unlikely experiment began, it ended.

The story is told in "Freedom House," a one-hour documentary by Gene Starzenski of GenaStar Productions of Los Angeles.

Marking the 40th anniversary of the founding of Freedom House Ambulance Service, and in celebration of Black History Month, Pitt will sponsor the world-premiere screening of the film at 6:30 p.m. Feb.15 at the Twentieth Century Club, 4210 Bigelow Blvd., Oakland. The by-invitation-only event includes a prescreening reception, the premiere at 7:30 p.m., and an après reception at 8:45 p.m.

Chancellor Mark A. Nordenberg and Hill House Association President Evan S. Frazier will host the ceremony. Also attending will be former Freedom House employees, local dignitaries, and government and community leaders, along with Pitt faculty, staff, and students.

How the film came to be made is a story in itself.

Starzenski, once an attendant for a North Side-based ambulance company and an orderly in the South Side Hospital emergency room, witnessed the Freedom House attendants in action. He was awed by their level of medical training and the sophisticated equipment in their vehicles. In 1975, Starzenski landed a job in Los Angeles as a paramedic on film sets. But he did not forget Freedom House Ambulance Service. In 1984, he drafted a story about it and began showing it to producers and directors on movie lots. Buoyed by their enthusiasm but lacking financial backing, he began filming the documentary using his own funds in 2001. Many hurdles later, with the financial support of Pitt's Office of the Chancellor and the research help of the Office of Public Affairs, the paramedic/filmmaker finally will present this important story on the screen.

Freedom House Ambulance Service was first proposed by Philip Hallen, president of the Maurice Falk Medical Fund, now The Falk Foundation. He convinced leaders of the fledgling nonprofit corporation Freedom House Enterprises to run the operation. Morton Coleman, who worked in the office of then-Mayor Joseph Barr and taught in Pitt's School of Social Work, suggested combining the ambulance service with a city program that trained unemployed men and women.

Safar, known worldwide as the "Father of CPR," devised the training, which included 300 hours of classroom and clinical work in anatomy and physiology, first aid, resuscitation and medical ethics and legalities, as well as hands-on instruction in operating rooms, emergency rooms, maternity wards, and the morgue.

More than 50 people worked as Freedom House paramedics and dispatchers over the group's eight-year history. Freedom House members handled, all told, upwards of 45,000 emergency cases, ranging from burn victims to expectant mothers to drug-overdose casualties.

The cry "Send Freedom House!" became a familiar refrain throughout Pittsburgh in

those days, even among city police officers needing ambulances for their family members. But in 1975, the city launched its own modern ambulance system, and for most of the Freedom House staffers, their careers were over.

Starzenski says he brought the dramatic story to the screen so that this important episode in the history of Pittsburgh, the Hill District, the University of Pittsburgh, and of emergency medical care, is not forgotten.

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