In May of 1946, The Fultz Sisters or Fultz Quads, became the first identical Black-American quadruplets on record. The Doctor named them and also put them on display for curious onlookers.The Fultz Quadruplets were born May 23, 1946 at 3 pounds each. Dr. Klenner took the responsibility of naming the children upon himself since the parents could not read. He decided to name them all Mary followed by the names of the women in the Klenner family.
Dr. Klenner also experimented with Mrs. Fultz by putting her on a high dosage of vitamin C in the later parts of her pregnancy. Neither Pete nor Annie Mae could read which Klenner exploited. They were named: Mary Louise, Mary Ann, Mary Alice and Mary Catherine.
Seeking Fame, Dr Klenner put them on display by setting visitations at the Fultz home for curious strangers who wanted to see black quadruplets. The girls were put on display in a glass-enclosed nursery. The low chances of conceiving quadruplets in the 1940s, decades before the availability of fertility treatments, and the fact that the family was poor and black made the sisters' birth a sensational story that garnered national media attention.The sisters' parents were Pete Fultz and Annie Mae Fultz. The father was a sharecropper and the mother was deaf and mute. They lived on a farm with their 6 other children and it was financially difficult.
Pet Milk wanted to reach the Black American market and thought the best way to do it was through the quadruplets so the doctor negotiated a deal between the family and the company. They took the children off of breastmilk and required them to be fed their product. They also promised a nurse, farm for the family and a new home.From 1947 to 1968, the girls traveled the country, promoting Pet, They modelled for magazines and appeared in parades. They met presidents Truman and Kennedy, tennis player Althea Gibson and boxer Floyd Patterson. Their fifth birthday party was even broadcasted on TV.
Dr. Klenner also used the girls for his “Vitamin C therapy” that he claimed made the girls healthy along with the PET milk formula. He injected them with dangerously high levels of vitamin C. PET had promised the family a nurse, farm for the kids, a new home (on a hilly, barren land yet they were sharecroppers) and compensation of $350 a month (which they stopped after a few months)
In 1952, the quadruplets were legally adopted by Alma (the nurse) and Charles Saylor since caring for quadruplets and six other children was too much for their parents.
So they decided to let the Saylors, who had lost a child to polio, adopt the four girls. The quadruplets grew up and ended up at Bethune–Cookman University to study music on scholarship but only studied for 2 years and due to medical reasons they had to drop out. Later, they all became nurses' aides.
Mary Louise died in 1991 at age 45, Mary Ann died in 1995 at age 49, Mary Alice died in 2001 at 55, and Mary Catherine in 2018 at 72. Their deaths were all caused by the same disease: Breast Cancer.
