Here’s an excerpt from a recent story in the Winston-Salem Journal by Janice Gaston (you can read the entire article by clicking here):

Anne Higgins, the mother of Margaret Sanger, died of tuberculosis at the age of 50. Sanger, a pioneer in reproductive issues, believed that the punishment her mother’s body took during 18 pregnancies sapped her strength and contributed to Higgins’ death.

Eleven of Higgins’ children survived. Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, was the sixth. She bore just three of her own. Trained as a nurse, she spent much of her life educating women about contraception and advocating the development and use of birth control.

Her grandson, Alexander Sanger of New York, took up the issue of reproductive rights during the Reagan administration. In 1984, Reagan signed an executive order that prohibited the United States from giving money to organizations overseas that promoted or performed abortions.

“As the son of two doctors, as well as the grandson of Margaret Sanger, I thought that was an outrage,” Sanger said.