Facial Restoration by Hidden Heroine Anna Coleman Ladd

Every war gives us horrific casualties and medical advances. In World War I, doctors were able to save many soldiers whose faces were permanently disfigured, which led to breakthroughs in plastic surgery pioneered by Dr. Harold Gillies. But plastic surgery was in its infancy, and most veterans with facial disfigurements and missing features couldn't get such reconstruction. Into the void stepped Anna Coleman Ladd. The renowned sculptor leveraged her physician husband's connections in the Red Cross in order to go to France to help soldiers who had lost noses, jaws, ears, and other facial features to the war.

Ladd opened her "Studio for Portrait-Masks" in Paris in 1917, where she custom-made meticulously fitted and painted masks for veterans to wear that gave them a more normal appearance. Many of these men were able to set foot out of their homes for the first time with their masks, and went on to re-integrate with their communities. Read Ladd's story and see some of her work at Danny Dutch. -via Strange Company