Growing up as the daughter of a prominent dentist in Dallas, there was no doubt Pamela Jeffery Cunningham would become a doctor. But her father wanted her to become an obstetrician, believing that was a more appropriate profession for a woman. Instead, she became an anesthesiologist, a rare career choice for a Black woman and possibly a first for her hometown. “Pam had been a barrier-breaker from the beginning,” said her husband, West Palm Beach attorney F. Malcolm Cunningham Jr. Dr. Cunningham died last week after a nine-year battle with a rare form of salivary gland cancer that often attacks people in their 50s. She was 62.