[Intro]Frank Stasio [0:04] This is the State of Things. I'm Frank Stasio. Carol Quigless practically grew up in her father's clinic and Tarboro. He was a general practitioner, as well as a surgeon. Her brother and sister helped out too, and they both pursued medical careers. But Carol wanted to take a different route. Eventually, she moved to Los Angeles and became a dietician to the stars. So why did she move back to Tarboro and what led her to develop her own healing practice? On today's program, meet Carol Quigless. She was a country girl who took off from the bright lights of New York and LA, only to find herself right back where she started. While the turf was familiar, much had changed in her hometown. And of course, Carol Quigless had changed a lot too. Carol Quigless traces her alternative path to alternative healing, just ahead on the State of Things.[Part 1]Frank Stasio [0:00] From the American Tobacco Historic District, this is the State of Things. I'm Frank Stasio. Tarboro, a historic town in eastern North Carolina, dedicated to preserving its heritage in many, many ways. It's a charming downtown. It has a charming downtown district. And you will find their colonial architecture, a town commons, people still gather there in the Southern tradition, very traditional. So perhaps surprisingly, last year, Tarboro became home to a non traditional medical facility, the Quigless Natural Health Center. The center takes a holistic approach to healing. It offers services like therapeutic massage, nutritional food preparation and clinical aromatherapy. It's operated by Carol Quigless certified alternative therapist, who wanted to provide integrative medical options for the folks of Tarboro. A community where obesity, hypertension and diabetes are prevalent. Carol may be breaking traditions of Western medicine with her healing practices, but the site where the health center is located, houses a lot of personal history for her. Six decades ago, Carol's father, Dr. Milton Quigless, opened the first clinic in Tarboro that served the town's African American residents on that very spot. Carol learned a lot about curing a community from her father, and today she's continuing the family tradition in a non traditional way. Carol Quigless is my guest this hour on the State of Things. Welcome to the program.Carol Quigless [1:20] Thank you. I'm glad to be here.Frank Stasio [1:22] I want to find out a lot about your practice. But I do want you to take us back to your father. And the origins of the place where you now practice your father was one of the first African American doctors in Tarboro, opened the clinic in 1946. What brought him to eastern North Carolina? Carol Quigless [1:37] The beauty, straight up the beauty. He had during med school to put himself through med school, he was a Pullman Porter. And at one point, he also was a trombone trombone player in a minstrel show, the Rabbit Foot Minstrel Show and they traveled around, you know, Southern United States, and they went to Greensboro, North Carolina. And he just thought North Carolina was totally beautiful. So he vowed that one day he would come back and set up shop there, Frank Stasio [2:06] Originally from Mississippi. Carol Quigless [2:08] Port Gibson.Frank Stasio [2:09] And you talked about himself putting himself through med school, he worked very hard. He was dedicated, but not always a dedicated student in his earliest years in school.Carol Quigless [2:20] That is right. That is right. He was a fifth grade dropout, actually, early on, he was he was a puny one in the family. He had, you know, lots of brothers and sisters. And he was a puny one. And, you know, they just thought that, you know, he just wouldn't do well, physically.Frank Stasio [2:43] And there are actually news accounts of him and his career that have been taken together. And you now show of DVD at the clinic as part of the exhibit there. And there's a great quote that I want to play right now that talks about his decision to leave school at an early age.Dr. Milton Quigless [3:01] And they came and told me I didn't have to go to school unless I wanted to, what the hell, what they want to tell me that for? I went fishing every day, having a good time, everybody else in school, and I was laughing at the kids. School only went through the ninth grade. And five years later, I was at the graduation and each kid was graduating and I was supposed to be there with them. And all of a sudden, it occurred to me that I had messed up.Frank Stasio [3:31] That was Dr. Milton Quigless, the father of my guest today, Carol Quigless. I wonder when I saw that and heard that and then knew that he put himself through med school, I wonder how how much his realization about the importance of education came to him in that moment, unlike kids who may have just gone through and then met all the obstacles that African Americans would have in the 1940s, with a good education being told as they were by the rest of society. Thanks for your hard work, but we don't need you. How much do you think his determination came from that realization at that moment?Carol Quigless [4:06] Well, that moment of realization came from a combination of other realizations along the line. There's also he always said that early on, he wanted to be a doctor. There's a story that he tells in his upcoming autobiography that when he was very young, he went flying into the house or someone's house and they shoot him out of this room out of this bedroom. And this woman was having a baby childbirth at home, but he managed to poke his head in there anyway. And he saw these two twins, well, two, two, okay, he saw these twins being born, but one was stillborn. And the other one was alive. And from that moment, he he thought that was most incredible thing and he wanted to be a doctor. But then you know, as time went, went on, he you know, lost sight of that, and as you just heard, became the fifth grade dropout. And then I think, at that moment that memory plus realizing that he had quote unquote, messed up that He better get on it and do something in terms of you know, your statement a minute ago about Thank you, but we don't need you. They really need a doctor's so bad then I mean, just so badly then until there was a lot of that in itself was inspiration of, you know, knowing that it was it was service, it was just so badly needed. And also he did get encouragement from his family from that point.Frank Stasio [5:39] But, but of course, we're talking about a segregated south, so he was not allowed to practice at Edgecombe Hospital, which was the the predominantly the white hospital in Tarboro.Carol Quigless [5:49] Right, right, they had back then the colored ward, but the service wasn't very good. And he was not he was not granted, operating privileges there. So you know, that was sort of useless. So he did. We always I grew up with stories of him doing surgeries on kitchen tables, delivering babies, he lost a lot of people because there just wasn't the facility, you know, for surgery. He did a whole lot of house calls. And eventually he did soon after he got to Tarboro. The story is that he arrived with $7 in his pocket, and he gave five to the church. And then he kept two for himself. But he found lodging and he found help finally buying an old fish market that he converted with the help of some of his patients. He converted that into a day office. But still there are no you know, there was not a room that there was no place he could do surgery.Frank Stasio [6:49] And the situation for African Americans there was pretty serious because I think the last black doctor there had died, what six years early, right.Carol Quigless [6:56] Right, Dr. Porter, yeah.Frank Stasio [6:58] So tell us what happened. Then he gets to Tarboro. He's he's donated five of $7. And now he's got to get this fishmarket turn it into a clinic, how'd that go?Carol Quigless [7:08] Well, it went pretty well. At first it was, you know, we don't know you, where do you come from kind of thing. But then again, there was oh, we have a doctor here. So some people did rally to the cause and help him put what convert the fish market into his private practice office. Patients made curtains and you know, just helped him paint it and, and, you know, pull it all together. But over time, obviously, that wasn't good. You know, it just was not adequate. The need for a hospital was just right in your face. So I mean, in the making the house calls, you know, that was just pretty drastic to throughout, you know, my growing up, he still went out on household calls. But there now there was a clinic or a hospital for people to be hospitalized and, you know, to get the care.Frank Stasio [8:00] And that clinic was filled pretty much from the day-Carol Quigless [8:04] From day one.Frank Stasio [8:05] But what did he do for support nurses and other other kinds of support? Was he he was the only doctor?Carol Quigless [8:11] Wow, that was interesting, too. Back then, you could train the nurses have them pass the board. A lot of times, people you know, there might have been a nursing school in Raleigh. I forget the name of it right now, that African Americans could go to but a lot of the staff he trained himself down at the clinic. He trained the lady who carried out the pills from the dispensary. He trained the OR nurse, Mrs. Shirley Mays, who also did the lab work he had, he had to have all these things. I mean, just like a regular hospital, the lab, the X ray room, he trained someone else to do the X rays. You teach him how to take the boards. Then they're in. My mother had a lot to do with the training as well. She wasn't a nurse. She wasn't a doctor, but she had been a school teacher. So she knew how to drill it in your head. So a lot of that was on the job training immediately pull up your sleeves and get to work.Frank Stasio [9:21] And you, you and your brother and your sister had little on the job training to you work there a little bit.Carol Quigless [9:26] Yeah, we all worked there. I worked as a receptionist as soon as I was capable, I guess I was when I was about 12. And all of us took out turns down there.Frank Stasio [9:38] You saw quite a bit. You saw quite a bit down there.Carol Quigless [9:41] Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. One of my I was, you know, used to run it up and down the hallways and visiting patients, you know, cheering them up a little bit. They'd like to see a little person come in and act cheerful and I was happy to do that. And one of my earliest memories was crawling around the floor and I came up against this jar. Yeah, pretty very tall jar, and I couldn't figure out what it was. And then all of a sudden it dawned on me that it was a leg. And that was pretty weird. That was pretty weird. I don't remember what happened next. But I just remember just a shock of realizing that was a leg. And a lot of people today don't remember him doing surgery. But they remember him later on after he realized that, you know, at some point he wasn't gonna be surgery. He wasn't going to be able to do surgery and he became an expert in dermatology. But early on, he had to do a lot of surgery was cutting off legs, was doing cesarean sections, taking out tonsils, appendectomies, whatever, they were general practitioners back then, and you had to pretty much do a lot of everything.Frank Stasio [10:57] He had to do it all. Well, I want to find out how all of that track with you and what thoughts are going through your mind about your own futures. Our conversation continues. Today we're talking with Carol Quigless, daughter of the late Dr. Milton Quigless of Tarboro. Carol recently transformed her father's historic clinic into a center for alternative therapy and integrative medicine. Just ahead we'll learn about her decision to carry on the family's tradition of healing by an alternative route on the state of things from North Carolina Public Radio, its broadcast service at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Stay tuned.[Part 2]Frank Stasio [0:00] This is the State of Things broadcasting from the American Tobacco Historic District. I'm Frank Stasio. My guest today is Carol Quigless, founder of the Quigless Natural Health Center in Tarboro, North Carolina. And just before the break, we were talking about the history of that site where the Health Center is now it has been there for six decades. Carol's father, Dr. Milton Quigless, opened the first clinic to serve Tarboro's African American population. Carol and her siblings grew up in that clinic. And today, she's continuing the family tradition of healing. When you were 12 years old and scampering about the clinic and finding legs and jars, et cetera, et you considered for yourself a medical career we thinking about it that time?Carol Quigless [0:39] Oh, absolutely. It was always thought that I was going to be a surgeon. And when I was little, my sister and I had on nurses uniforms, and I remember, vaguely around the time where it was decided that I wasn't gonna be a nurse. I was going to be a doctor. And yeah, I thought I was going to be a doctor.Frank Stasio [0:59] Yeah. So first time, you said you said it was decided. And it was thought those are other people thinking about you. But you You also thought that?Carol Quigless [1:05] Yes, I was in agreement with. I was but and part of that was, you know, my dad would come home dinnertime and we talk about well, what happened at the hospital today. And, you know, my mom would talk about, you know, she was there too. And so we would all talk about what happened at the hospital that day. So it was all this enthusiasm, about, you know, the healing that was taking place out or the failures too, I mean, people died down there, too. He couldn't fix everything. So we just, you know, talked over the state of things down there, the Quigless Clinic at that point. But I think it was a, I'm pretty sure was about in when I was about 15 years old. I just started having different feelings about it, that I didn't want to be a doctor. I think a lot of it had to do with the just, you know, the aspect of a lot of people dying. And I had not come to grips with how to deal with that. And I think it's something that probably a lot of people who are doctors still have not come quite to grips with. But it's something very, very important that you've got to really consider when you have a medical career unless you become, you know, a dermatologist, for example, or other aspects of medicine. And I was in, I was in environment, I was off in boarding school, I had gotten a scholarship to go to boarding school in Vermont, the Putney School, where I was suddenly being exposed to so many different things that were unusual for me. Until I didn't certainly feel like everything was cut and dry anymore.Frank Stasio [2:47] What were some of the things then that caught your attention when you were in boarding school in Vermont?Carol Quigless [2:52] Oh, just for example, the literature I was being exposed to, the arts that I was being exposed to, the modern dance. Just the the world events that were being talked about. There was this just a whole new world opened up the music was incredible.Frank Stasio [3:14] So when you came home from boarding school and started talking about these new ideas, how did your father receive that? Carol Quigless [3:19] Oh, my goodness, oh, my goodness, no one wanted to hear about that. So we still talked about it, but in my heart. I just didn't have the enthusiasm that I had that I had had before.Frank Stasio [3:36] And your brother and sister were off in that direction. They were still they were beginning to pursue medical careers.Carol Quigless [3:41] No, not at all. My brother had was thinking that maybe he wanted to be a sculptor and a ski instructor. And my dad, just point blank, just put down his foot on that one just said, No, you're not going to do that. But my brother is glad about it. He enjoys being a surgeon very much. Yes, he very much enjoys it. But you can see that kind of influence. You know, he wanted to be a sculptor, he wanted to be a ski instructor, you know, he's going to lead a different life. And my sister was she wanted to be a dancer. But she came down with a severe with severe arthritis. And she couldn't do that. And in fact, she died about four years ago now, from complications from arthritis. Her case was so severe, but she did become a librarian. Instead, she also had she had a huge, huge love of literature. And she became a published poet. She was in various anthologies about maybe five anthologies, and one even after she had died, she was published in a nother anthology. And so we all were going in different directions.Frank Stasio [4:56] You all went to the same the same boarding school, right? It was Putney?Carol Quigless [4:59] Yeah, we all all got the same scholarship got went to the same boarding school.Frank Stasio [5:03] Was your father starting to think what did I do sending these children up north coming back with all these ideas?Carol Quigless [5:08] Well, I gotta tell you if they had known what was going on at that school we never would have gotten there believe me.Frank Stasio [5:14] So you, you do start to change your mind and what's the first thing then that you begin to pursue out of school?Carol Quigless [5:22] Well, at first I was interested in psychology, and I went to Barnard College for a while and then I dropped out of Barnard College. And then from there, I worked at Wall Street and then I you know, had various, just various jobs. SoFrank Stasio [5:35] How was it for you and boarding school? I'm trying to imagine you up in that school in Vermont, you kind of Tarboro is a small town and now you're up north. What did you feel out of place it all up there?Carol Quigless [5:45] Oh, totally. Yeah, it was a foreign country. Totally. Integration had just started. It was not in full swing at all. And suddenly, I was on top of the mountain top with a whole bunch of white people who were doing strange things as far as I was concerned,Frank Stasio [6:01] They call them the White Mountains in Vermont. Just in case you forgot who you were.Carol Quigless [6:10] And even the weather was different. It was a foreign country. It's snowed in the snow stayed there all winter, and people got on sticks and, and ski down mountains. You know, how weird was that?Frank Stasio [6:22] But your brother wanted to be a ski instructor. Yeah.Carol Quigless [6:25] Yeah, it was the exhilaration of the speed.Frank Stasio [6:29] So you decide then to stay in New York, as you say you you sort of overcome overcame some of that. That feeling of being?Carol Quigless [6:36] Oh, yes. Oh, yes, absolutely. As I said integration hadn't quite gotten on the way, but it was on its way. And the Putney environment was very sheltered in that respect. It was a small, very small school, there's only 200 children, 200 students there. SoFrank Stasio [6:57] Was he a little more progressive in his outlook, and in terms of how you were treated as an African American others were, there's the question of being a Southerner, coming from a small town, but then there's your race as well, a little more progressive up there, and not so much as the rest of the North?Carol Quigless [7:11] Very much so progressive, very much. So they're very, they tried to be very conscious of it. And then there was the other thing of in terms of the African American part of it. Some of the African American well the rest of the African American students either came from New York or urban setting, and I came from a little country setting. And that was a whole different thing. I remember being teased about my accent, and how I set see ment instead of cement, or Salomon instead of salmon. And that that was sort of strange sometimes, you know, but I think a lot of that had to do with the countryness and the southerness I was very unique there. Frank Stasio [7:50] Do you, I guess another unique part of the environment was the fact that they didn't even allow TV or radio up there, right?Carol Quigless [8:04] There was, that's right. There's no radio, there's no television, which, at first seems scandalous, absolutely scandalous. But the reason why was to eliminate distraction. They kept us totally busy. With activities of different sorts. And you're allowed to get newspapers, New York Times, which I couldn't understand a word where they were saying anyway, and that wasn't a New York native, so I didn't know what was happening. But no radio, no television, because they just thought this is not going to contribute to learning and expansion.Frank Stasio [8:45] They were wrong about radio, but they got the TV. So how does that are you coming back home, I'm still gonna stay at Putney for a while while you're at the boarding school. And now you're coming home to visit coming back to Tarboro? By the time you're a senior, are you feeling the distance between is Tarboro a lot different place for you? Is it hard to navigate home? After four years up there?Carol Quigless [9:11] Yes. Because of all the exposure I'd had, by that time, I basically had gotten a scholarship to go to Europe. So I saw a whole different other culture. I'd heard about other different places, firsthand from students that were from foreign countries, and also from students that were from different parts of the country, as well. So my sights were not on returning back to Tarboro at that point, I was gung ho about exploring the rest of the world, the rest of the country, the rest of you know, other things that I could possibly do with my life.Frank Stasio [9:49] So you decided to go to Barnard and tell us about that. You decided to go but you didn't stay?Carol Quigless [9:56] No, I didn't stay. Part of it was you No, I'm a little bit like my dad. But probably he really didn't realize it sort of like the chip off the old block wanting to like, take off from school, it wasn't because I was ill or anything, it's just because there's just so much out there. And at that point, you have to realize the quote, unquote, revolution was happening. Student arrest a student, you know, all the sit ins at Columbia and I was right there. And it was a great big world out there for the taking. You got to realize students back then were very courageous, brave, in some respects, almost foolhardy with, you know, what we thought we could do. But very, very good at heart in terms of wanting to change the world. So from there, I went to work. And New York's a very exciting place. So my first job was as a mail clerk at Shell Chemical places of all places. And then from there, you know, I ended up working on Wall Street in the research department Frank Stasio [11:04] That was hardly your, your, your bid to change the world. It was not part of the revolution. I don't think. Carol Quigless [11:11] It was not part of the revolution, but it was finding out about the world. Because it was there. I learned so much at that job in terms of trade going on with Russia during the Cold War. I learned about how, right then that was the advent of Tylenol, where they already knew that it was toxic to the liver. So I was not, it was not the revolution that I dreamed of but or not even dreamed of, but you know, I was a part of, but I was still learning a lot and still finding out about the world and still going back until people that I knew that hey, you know that Tylenol is really not good for your liver at all. So it's sort of worked with that notion in any case.Frank Stasio [11:58] Then you get yourself out to LA what what brought you to Los Angeles?Carol Quigless [12:03] Well, just like what brought my father to Greensboro, it's the same thing with Los Angeles. What it was beautiful, it was beautiful, it was the palm trees, it was the ocean. And I thought I could go skiing and the mountain people told me that I could go skiing in the mountains in the morning and come down and swim. By the afternoon. I didn't do either one of them. The LA, all the beaches in LA they always they closed them down in the summertime at some point because they're all polluted. And, you know, I found out differently once I started living there.Frank Stasio [12:39] Yeah, it takes hours to drive in either direction anyway, even though they're only 20 minutes away. Yeah. That part, so So what are you doing in LA now talk about your work there.Carol Quigless [12:50] I first started out working at a well I won't go through all the dreary details. But the main job that I had there was as an office manager for entertainment entertainment law firm in Beverly Hills [Inaudible]. And that was an interesting job. For sure, it was high pressure. But it was interesting, again, meeting the different people that I met there. It was entertainment. So I would meet people who are involved in classical music. You know, Rick James. Liberace, I mean, it's just like a whole gamut of different people that we represented, Chick Corea. So it definitely kept me more than occupied because I was extremely busy.Frank Stasio [13:42] And the attorney as I understand it, who you work for was pretty difficult guy to get along with and had kind of a high turnover rate your your survival there or your willingness to stay is a badge of something.Carol Quigless [13:53] I don't know what is a bad job. But Joel Stroud was a A-Type, and still is a A-Type we get. We talk on the phone every once in a while still. But he could turn out the work of three attorneys. And he was spitting out assistance like crazy, but I managed to hang in there with them. I really did. And what's also funny is that on my resume, I put down that I had gone to Barnard and put down the years. And I never said I graduated or finished Barnard or anything and he just saw Barnard and said you're hired, you're hired you know after talking to me for a few minutes. And it was very funny about two years later, we're talking in a staff meeting and someone said something about Barnard College and I said something about how having never finished it and he just like nearly having nearly had a heart attack on the spot. You know, you never finish what I've heard you and you know, you never finish. And I said no. Well, I never told you that this is theFrank Stasio [14:58] But it didn't bother you, you went to work after all this time, you could go back and say, I guess it didn't matter if you're doing the work.Carol Quigless [15:04] Oh, yeah. Oh, no, there was no question that I was, you know that that did not jeopardize my job.Frank Stasio [15:10] So you go to LA because of the swaying palm trees in the sound of the ocean and the waves on the end, it turns out that this is the most high stress, probably situation you find yourself in. And you're actually beginning to have some health related problems with this stress related problems, right?Carol Quigless [15:24] Oh, yes. I was definitely getting stressed out. And I wasn't eating right. I would be I would stay late at work or coming on weekends, there was a place called fat burgers on the way home. Yeah, fat burgers. You get the picture. Yeah, it was easy, you know, and I would stop at fat burgers for that. And then there was the jazz scene at night, I stay up late, you know, go into the jazz clubs, and whatever. So I was wearing myself out didn't realize it. And the nutritional aspect was just like, atrocious. And I started having heart palpitations and scared the daylights out of me. Because my mother's side of the family has a really bad history of heart disease. And so I just knew I was on death's doorstep. But I was terrified of going to a doctor because I didn't want to hear it. And so a friend of mine convinced me to go to a nutritionist. And I went, and so she said, Well, you you don't have enough minerals. And she put me on some supplements, and sort of an emergency course treatment of supplements with lots of minerals. And in two weeks, I didn't have heart palpitations anymore. Frank Stasio [16:44] And what year is this?Carol Quigless [16:46] That was back in 80. We're talking about somewhere around 84.Frank Stasio [16:51] Okay, so So we're aware of, of nutrition at the time. And the idea is pretty important to pretty important to health just generally we know this, but and you become more and more involved in this, it becomes interesting to you.Carol Quigless [17:07] Yes, yes. Well, I was very impressed with that. And about the same time, I decided to leave the law firm. And I took the money from the pension and opened up a meal service for people who are too busy to cook because I figured if I was having that problem, then there had to be other people too. I was one of the first to do that in Los Angeles. And so I rented a space in a commercial kitchen,Frank Stasio [17:36] Because you're not cooking just fat burgers. Now. I mean, you're going out and figuring out what a good nutritional or good balance is going to be. It's more than just cooking.Carol Quigless [17:43] Right? Well, the same nutrition started sending me her clients. And then other nutrition started finding out about it. And so that's where I had to start educating myself and getting being educated by them. In terms of what is good nutrition.Frank Stasio [17:58] Where were you getting your information, some of it is coming from from clients, but where else?Carol Quigless [18:02] No, it was coming from the nutritionist, okay. And then they gave me books to read as well.Frank Stasio [18:07] So now we know what should be in the diet. But then there's the question of making the food taste right.Carol Quigless [18:11] Right. Right, exactly. Right. Frank Stasio [18:15] Where'd that come from? Carol Quigless [18:17] Well, that was my own idea. Those were my own ideas, my own creativity, because there weren't the cookbooks out there now. I mean, then that are out there now. So I had to come up with my own cooking styles and methods and, and recipes. And it worked.Frank Stasio [18:35] Were you delivering these meals and who are your clients?Carol Quigless [18:38] I was delivering the meals and I had you know hire people just to deliver them on a weekly basis and they were sealed in airtight packaging, vacuum packaging. I got all that equipment and everything.Frank Stasio [18:52] I was gonna ask you how you developed even the idea for I mean, how many meals Could you turn out? Were you doing all the cooking?Carol Quigless [18:57] I had a staff I hired people to help me. There was no way whenever I do anything, it's never I have to just go wild with the idea. So the menu always included soups, salads, fish, chicken or poultry dishes, vegetarian dishes, desserts, snacks, treats, whatever.Frank Stasio [19:18] I want to talk to you about that and some of your clients when our conversation continues with Carol Quigless, founder of the Quigless Natural Health Center in Tarboro, North Carolina on the State of Things, stay with us.[Part 3]Frank Stasio [0:00] This is the State of Things, I'm Frank Stasio. And my guest this hour is Carol Quigless, founder of the Quigless Natural Health Center in Tarboro, North Carolina, and we were talking about your meals service in Los Angeles. And that's going pretty well now for a while. And then you become a personal chef to the stars. Tell us about that.Carol Quigless [0:18] Well, that was fun. But that was a necessity. There was a recession in California that necessitated me closing the doors on the meal service, it was Home Dining Delight. And so I went to an agency that specialized in high end chefs, and got myself a job with Magic Johnson.Frank Stasio [0:40] How about that? Tell me about that. There's an audition process for this, though. Tell me about that.Carol Quigless [0:46] Well, first you go and you talk. And I remember the day I went to their house, driving up and I stopped at this house and this person came out. And I chatted and they said, Where are you going? And I said, Well, isn't this Magic Johnson's house? The guard house looked like a mansion to me. What did I know? And so I got to their house, and they open the door. And first year was Cookie, at my level, at my eye level. Yeah. And then I had to look way up to see Magic Johnson. And they were both smiling. It was just like one of those wow moments. Yeah. So we talked and then I had to come back within a couple of days and do a cooking audition for them. And that's when I got hired on the spot.Frank Stasio [1:32] And but you do start with a kind of a talent agency, right? There's a there's a company that actually screens first. So then they send you over. So I'm just trying to imagine this this entire business with agencies that screen personal chefs?Carol Quigless [1:47] Yes, they did. The agency that I went to, I went to one of the one of the best. And you walk in and they start talking to you, did you go to chef school? No. Had my own meal service and blah, blah, blah, and et cetera? And they said, Well, give us a menu, you're having 200 people for a party and you and it's this holiday, and what are you going to serve, and you just have to rattle off a menu on the spot. Oh, and just do that. And they check your references, and then they decide whether or not they're going to who they decide who they're going to send you off to.Frank Stasio [2:23] So you go see the Johnsons, and you talk to him, what do they want to know? What did they want to know from you when you first showed up?Carol Quigless [2:29] Well, first of all, I think it's very important, and rightfully so for families to get someone who they think will be compatible in their household. And I know that he was drawn to the fact that I knew something about nutrition and that my my service was focused on nutrition and health. Frank Stasio [2:49] Had he been diagnosed at that point?Carol Quigless [2:50] Yes, he had, he had just before. And now so he was HIV positive that he tested positive, positive. So that was very important to them. And as I said personality had to match. And then all they could do next was had me come in do a food audition.Frank Stasio [3:09] How'd that go what'd you cook?Carol Quigless [3:10] Oh, let's see. I cooked gumbo was one of my favorite things to cook because the textures and the flavors change throughout the cooking process. I know I cooked gumbo and I think I cooked oven fried chicken. Collard greens. Oh gosh, I can't remember now. I think it was corn pudding, non dairy, corn pudding and string beans and I don't know what else but I know at the end it was just that was the sugar free, non-dairy sweet potato pie. That just took it right over the topFrank Stasio [3:47] Girl you best not come home to Tarboro with your oven fried chicken and your sugar free sweet potato pie. But they liked it. Carol Quigless [3:56] Yes. Frank Stasio [3:57] Wow. And so. And where did you learn to cook?Carol Quigless [4:02] Well, as I said it was on the job training.Frank Stasio [4:05] So you were growing up around the house then you you was your mom good cook. Did you pick up anything?Carol Quigless [4:09] Oh yeah, my mom was a good cook. And then we had a housekeeper because my mother worked at the clinic too. And all of this. And this woman also cooked down at the clinic. Her name was Miss Lena, Miss Lena Mayo and she was a killer cook. She just was without a doubt. So I had exposure to good cooking.Frank Stasio [4:29] So you're working for them now. How about you're working in the kitchen? So are you working with Magic Johnson's wife, does Cookie cook with you or does she just leave that to you?Carol Quigless [4:40] Oh, no, no, that was just totally left up to me. And I was pretty much after I found out after I understood what their tastes were. I did all the menus and the shopping and everything and they would find something that they liked and they wouldn't want to let it go. You know, they say oh no, do that again and over and over and over again. So I have to dislike not asking just throwing something new. And I knew pretty much if they would like something or not.Frank Stasio [5:07] And you also worked for Samuel L. Jackson. Carol Quigless [5:10] Yes. Frank Stasio [5:11] And you made a comparison there. You talked about his wife being able to go, she could cookCarol Quigless [5:14] Oh LaTanya could burn. Absolutely burn.Frank Stasio [5:18] And that's a good thing in cooking I guess? Carol Quigless [5:20] Yes that's a good thing. Oh yeah.Frank Stasio [5:24] So she was good. And we were she used to trade we're trading tips back and forth. Or how did that go?Carol Quigless [5:29] Well, we never really traded tips because she cooked but hers was the unhealthy style. So it was me really informing her what could be done, but I will tell you that I had Christmas with them one Christmas. And she was just like, totally overwhelmed and stuff. So I just just jumped right in the kitchen and started helping out. And, and I was revising things to make them healthy. And she said, Oh, go for it. Just go for it.Frank Stasio [6:00] So are you working for one person at this time? Or do you have a list of clients then that you're?Carol Quigless [6:04] Well for Magic Johnson, I worked for him for about seven years. And then I wanted to, you know, expand it or do other things. I was doing catering at the same time, too. So I left there, and I just started, you know, doing, going from house to house. Frank Stasio [6:21] So who else is on your list that I might know?Carol Quigless [6:24] Janet Jackson. I did the engagement party for David Bowie and Iman. And that was gorgeous. Frank Stasio [6:32] What did you have? Carol Quigless [6:34] Oh, see if I can remember way back then. So I'll tell you real quick. It was quail, boneless quail. Why I said I was making menus on the spot again. And I said boneless quail. Iman said why did you say boneless? You know how long is long it takes to de-bone a little teeny bird like that. Frank Stasio [6:50] And you got you're making more than one I'm guessing.Carol Quigless [6:52] Oh, yeah. Quite a few. Yes. I feel Yeah. Carol Burnett, I did work for her during the meal service. And justFrank Stasio [7:03] So through all of this, are you ever expecting to come back to Tarboro?Carol Quigless [7:07] Never, never, never never. It just had not even ever occurred to me. But as my father became very ill. And as my mother, my sister became very ill it was the thought definitely came into my mind that this is something that I needed to do.Frank Stasio [7:26] And we should point out that by then the clinic itself had closed because of changes in the regulations. Jim Crow had passed and along with that there were changes in regulations and what it took to be a clinic and so he had to close and he ended up working at Edgecombe Hospital.Carol Quigless [7:42] He did because of the Heal Burden Act, which said that if hospital wanted funding, they had to have a African American on staff. And it worked out perfectly because as you said the regulations changed about what about the structure of a hospital and the Quigless Clinic building no longer fit that. And so he was able to go and do surgeries over the Edgecombe General, which was like, an amazing moment for him in his life. Just amazing. He was welcomed there.Frank Stasio [8:13] What did he say about that to you?Carol Quigless [8:16] He just the feeling was it he thought it was something that early on, he thought would just never happen. And you know, all the civil rights movement and everything, it was just such a tremendous historical change in until it was just, you know, it was just really, it just was amazing to him. That's the best way I can put it.Frank Stasio [8:44] And so as you said, your mother and your sister became ill, and you started to think about when did you start coming back to Tarboro then?Carol Quigless [8:50] Well, I had been coming back to visit anyway. You know, on holidays or visits or whatever. And later on, after my father died, I'd make surprise visits, and just like sneak up on see what was really going on?Frank Stasio [9:06] Did you get a sense from them about how they felt about your decisions and your living there? Did you ever get a sense that they were wanting you to come back? Or how did they feel about you living out in LA and doing what you were doing?Carol Quigless [9:18] Well, they felt happy for me for what I was doing and the success I had out there but and for that reason they were very unselfish. They did not want me to come back you know and I kept saying I think I better come back and help out. No, no, no, no, no at this point. I was in massage school. No, you finish your massage school there and then you stay there and you need to do this and that and but finally I realized I really did have to come back and the last time I asked them they finally said yes.Frank Stasio [9:47] And so what were you doing then when you came back?Carol Quigless [9:51] At that point, I was still doing catering but not as much. No private chef work. I was in massage school. I just finished massage school and I embarked on massage therapy and clinical aromatherapy by that time, andFrank Stasio [10:07] Toward the thoughts about nutrition and its impact on health. You were beginning to see more broadly these what we call now I guess, alternative therapies and alternative medicine?Carol Quigless [10:17] Yes, yes, I started seeing an acupuncturist and had been exposed to all kinds of alternative therapies.Frank Stasio [10:24] In the meantime, your mother and sister managed to get the site of your father's clinic designated historic landmark. What did that mean for the facility in Tarboro?Carol Quigless [10:35] It meant that no one could tear it down. And and that it was, it was the it was an honor that was due.Frank Stasio [10:47] Not long after you lost your sister, your mother also passed away. And then you found yourself alone in Tarboro, you'd come back. And you lived in the big city for most of your life, you could have left then but you decided to stay why?Carol Quigless [11:02] Well, my city days were over. In fact, at the last the last few years, I was living in Los Angeles, I was very conscious of the thought that I don't want to live in a city for the rest of my life, it's time for me to move on, but you know, you get stuck. Yeah. So that was part of the decision. Tarboro is a very beautiful town. It's very quaint. Whenever I have visitors, they just like fall in love with it. There are good people there. And I just figured it was a good place, or probably even a better place than most for me to land in.Frank Stasio [11:40] What made you decide to open the natural health center?Carol Quigless [11:44] Well, if I was going to live in tar, where I had to bring my life there. And my life was centered around natural health in all in alternative therapies it just was and there's no place around Tarboro that, that provides that kind of modality, those modalities that I depend on in my life so much. So that was another one part of the reason selfish, I needed my life there. And the other reason was that people there seemed to be very ill when the caregivers from my mother, my sister, they were sick, they had height, they had hypertension, they were young people they are in their 30s and 40s. And yet they were huffing and puffing going up the stairs, and they're always talking about their blood pressure medicine. And they always seem like, you know, they had one foot in the grave and another foot on the banana peel. You know, it was just like, What is going on here. And it seems to be prevalent. Whereas in Los Angeles, if people aren't healthy, they look healthy. But whereas in Tarboro, it had a different feel to it, you have this pretty town, and it felt like there are so many people in need physically. And that was the other part that felt like I could help.Frank Stasio [13:00] Well, what are the treatments then that you offer?Carol Quigless [13:04] Well, right now, massage therapy. I was trained by Russians in Los Angeles. So it's the Russian therapeutic massage. I do. I'm a Reiki Master, which is totally fine inTarboro. Frank Stasio [13:10] And what is that is totally foreign to me.Carol Quigless [13:18] Okay, it's an energy treatment is an energy transference that anybody can learn to do, but you just have to take the time to be trained in it. Typically, during a session, you'll feel my hands heat up, and that's the energy transfer and when it's finished, my hands will cool down. It's pretty weird, but it really happens and it really worksFrank Stasio [13:37] well in all of the sounds like it's it would really sell in Los Angeles, how does it do in Tarboro?Carol Quigless [13:43] Well, it's kind of slow, but you know, people get desperate enough they come in for a treatment. If it works. Hey, they're right there with me. So a lot of people are in pain. As I said this hypertension is off the chart diabetes is 28% greater in eastern North Carolina compared to nationwide. Edgecombe County has a highest rate of kidney disease due to hypertension in the state. A lot of the people there are a factory workers, so they have a lot of aches and pains. And a lot of is because my father, people take a chance just because I'm Dr. Quigless's daughter. They'll take a chance on that.Frank Stasio [14:25] Do your therapies address some of those things? Can they address hypertension and kidney disease and diabetes?Carol Quigless [14:31] Yes, because what I present at the clinic is also how to make lifestyle change. The massage takes care of a lot of the pain also do something called the results system. I do applied kinesiology, which addresses physical and emotional health. I have a weight loss clinic. I have nutritional supplements. In the weight loss clinic I address not only diet and exercise, but I address stress as well, so. And stress is a trigger for diabetes, for hypertension, for obesity. So yes.Frank Stasio [15:10] How do you think your father would feel about the kind of medicine you're practicing? What would you say about? Carol Quigless [15:14] Well, first of all, I can't say I'm not practicing medicine. But in terms of what I present down there, I think before he died, we talked about acupuncture a little bit. He just thought it was just like, just totally ridiculous. But he will be pleased with the results. I'm getting very pleased.Frank Stasio [15:34] Are you surprised you're back there? And was your father surprised to see you come back?Carol Quigless [15:38] I was totally surprised. But as I said, the need was there. And I'm surprised that as well. My friends in LA is still surprised that I'm still hanging in there still waiting for me to come back. But my dad was sick. He was in the hospital. And I was helping him get into bed. He was, you know, he was just not well, and he was having a hard time. And I said, Come on, get in bed, just like that. And he just looked at me. He started grinning. And so what are you grinning about? He said, Carol? Not in a million years did I ever figure that you would be the one who would be putting me to bed when I got old.Frank Stasio [16:17] You both had pretty similar paths too.Carol Quigless [16:19] Isn't that interesting? Frank Stasio [16:21] It is indeed. And I'm glad you shared at least yours with us today. And we learned a bit about your father as well. Thank you, Carol.Carol Quigless [16:26] Thank you for letting me be here.Frank Stasio [16:28] Carol Quigless operates the Quigless Natural Health Center in Tarboro, North Carolina you can find out more information about the facility at Quigless natural health dot O R G. That's our program for today. Thanks for listening. If you have a comment or want to hear the archived edition you go to the state of things dot O R G website. Our program program was produced by Lindsay Thomas and Olympia Stone. Robin Copley's the Technical Director, managing editors, Katie Baron, Susan Davis is the Senior Producer, the theme music written by Django Haskins. This is North Carolina Public Radio. It's a broadcast service of the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. I'm Frank Stasio.