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The Polio Crusade
In the mid-twentieth century, the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis (the predecessor to today's March of Dimes) pioneered a new approach to philanthropy, raising money a dime at a time from millions of small donors. The nonprofit enlisted poster children, celebrities, presidents, and other partners in their high-profile campaigns.
By 1954, the National Foundation was the nation's leading health charity, capturing nearly half of all charitable donations to those causes. However, with 100,000 cases per year, polio was a smaller public health threat than tuberculosis, heart disease, cancer, cerebal palsy, or muscular dystrophy.
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Stricken with polio himself, Franklin D. Roosevelt founded the nonprofit Georgia Warm Springs Foundation where patients like Mary Frances Jasper could benefit from the therapeutic effects of natural springs. (1932)
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
A volunteer collects a donation from a bus driver, 1952. The National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, as it was then known, initiated the first March of Dimes campaign in 1938.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
A man helps his child mail their donation of dimes. Playing on a popular newsreel called "The March of Time," celebrity comedian Eddie Cantor coined the phrase "March of Dimes" on his radio program, asking Americans to send dimes to the White House to support the fight against polio.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
President Franklin Roosevelt and his former law partner Basil O'Connor founded the March of Dimes in 1938. In this publicity photo, they count dimes sent to the White House by ordinary Americans.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
Two patients are treated in full-body respirators called iron lungs. This was an essential treatment for patients whose respiratory muscles became paralyzed. The March of Dimes used photos like this one to show the public the difficult lives of many who contracted polio.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
A young polio-stricken boy examines his reflection as he learns to walk on crutches. Between 1952 and 1953, a record 93,000 cases of polio were reported and "polio hysteria" gripped the country.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
Many Americans believed incorrectly that African Americans were less susceptible to polio than Caucasians. Though the March of Dimes sponsored a large polio unit at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama "for the colored race," African Americans elsewhere – including in the segregated South – sometimes had to travel far for adequate care.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
March of Dimes poster child Linda Brown in a 1949 ad campaign. The non-profit kept images of polio's victims – and their successes in treatment – in the public eye.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
Actress Grace Kelly distributes materials to Philadelphia Mothers' March leaders. In the early Fifties, Mothers' Marches raised $250 million with door-to-door collections organized by local women. Citizens interested in donating were asked to turn on their porch lights at 7 pm.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
Hollywood star Joan Crawford holds a poster of the polio-stricken President Roosevelt. The March of Dimes deployed celebrities like Crawford, and continued to use the image of Franklin Roosevelt after his death to raise awareness and funds.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
In 1952, during the Korean War, the March of Dimes aimed their pitch at American patriotism. Fundraisers used military metaphors: people could relate to language like "war," "fight," and "struggle."
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
The March of Dimes used promotional tools like this "flying air lung model" to get Americans to donate. This particular replica was launched on a 10,000-mile air tour of the US, raising money in 20 cities in 1953.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
A 1954 March of Dimes poster shows everybody joining the effort to fight polio, including cartoon characters Popeye and Snuffy Smith.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
In Wichita, Kansas, Boeing employees attach a dollar bill to the body of their 1,000th B-47 Stratojet, publicizing the fight against polio.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
The annual President's Birthday Ball – celebrated on President Roosevelt's birthday – was a major polio research fundraiser that usually included President Roosevelt and a variety of celebrities. In this picture Eleanor cuts the cake while Lucille Ball and comedian Red Skelton look on.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
March of Dimes president Basil O'Connor poses (right to left) with 1952 poster child Larry Gross and President Harry Truman. Also pictured at left is Washington, DC commissioner Joseph Donahue.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
In 1953 Dr. Jonas Salk developed a controversial killed-virus vaccine. He displayed his confidence in it by vaccinating his family during the trial stage. It would be replaced in the U.S. By the oral Sabin vaccine in 1962, but later came back into use.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
Emerging country music star Johnny Cash joins the fight against polio, posing with his guitar for a March of Dimes fundraiser.
Credit: March of Dimes Foundation
Wearing a March of Dimes pin, actress Marilyn Monroe encourages Americans to take the polio vaccine. Monroe and baseball star Joe DiMaggio were one of the biggest celebrity couples of the Fifties.
Credit: March of Dimes FoundationReturn Of Polio Virus Is An Urgent Reminder On How To Prevent A Crisis
Polio virus, illustration. Each virus particle is composed of a protein coat around a core ... [+] containing RNA genetic material. This virus infects children and causes the disease poliomyelitis or infantile paralysis. Although it normally causes a mild illness, in some cases it causes damage to the nervous system, which can lead to paralysis or death. Vaccination, starting in the 1950s, has been effective in controlling the disease. It has now been eliminated from Europe.
gettySome crises strike suddenly and without warning, while others can be seen as soon as they appear over the horizon.
Polio's recent return to the U.S. And U.K. Is the rare crisis that falls into both categories, as evidenced by these headlines on Forbes in the past three months:
Polio Spread Detected In London Sewage For First Time In Decades (June 23)
First U.S. Polio Case In Nearly A Decade Reported In New York (July 21)
Poliovirus Identified In New York City Sewage, Health Officials Say (August 12)
'Very Tip Of The Iceberg'"A polio case identified in New York last month is 'just the very, very tip of the iceberg' and an indication there 'must be several hundred cases in the community circulating,' [according to] a senior official with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention," CNN reported yesterday.
Polio is also an example of a crisis that can be prevented—or at the very least minimized—thanks to the availability of the polio vaccine. Unfortunately, vaccination rates in some places fall short of ensuring the permanent eradication of the disease.
"Polio is a very serious virus that can have lifelong devastating effects. There are still a handful of people living in an iron lung today because of polio they caught decades ago," Dr. Laura Purdy observed via email.
Crisis Prevention And MitigationFor corporate executives, the unfolding situation in New York and London are urgent reminders to take all appropriate steps now to help manage, prevent or mitigate a crisis at their companies or organizations. The best practices include:
Polio virus, illustration. Each virus particle is composed of a protein coat around a core ... [+] containing RNA genetic material. This virus infects children and causes the disease poliomyelitis or infantile paralysis. Although it normally causes a mild illness, in some cases it causes damage to the nervous system, which can lead to paralysis or death. Vaccination, starting in the 1950s, has been effective in controlling the disease. It has now been eliminated from Europe.
gettyGovernment officials appear to be responding to the return of the polio virus as best they can.
"Public health authorities are handling the situation appropriately. There is full transparency regarding the unfolding events," Dr. Nesochi Okeke-Igbokwe, a public health expert who is CEO of Dr. Nesochi LLC, said via email.
Advocating For Vaccinations"As epidemiological investigation continues, the general public has been informed about the best means to stay protected from polio (i.E., vaccinations). Public health officials and the medical community will continue to advocate for vaccinations and advise that all individuals remain up to date with their polio vaccine series," she noted.
CDC Now Considering OptionsThe CDC "is considering a variety of options to protect people from polio, including offering children in the area an extra shot of the vaccine, as UK health authorities are doing now in London, or recommending extra doses to certain groups of adults," Dr. José Romero, director of the CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases told CNN.
"We're looking into all aspects of how to deal with this. At this point, we don't have a definitive answer," he said.
1955 Vaccine Dramatically Reduced Infections"Polio was at one time among the most dangerous diseases in the U.S. And caused more than 15,000 cases of paralysis annually, according to the Centers for Disease Control," Forbes reported.
"A vaccine was introduced in 1955 and slashed infections dramatically. Because of widespread vaccination, there is no longer year-round transmission of the virus that causes the disease, according to the CDC. No known polio cases have originated in the U.S. Since 1979, but infected travelers have brought the virus into the country since then, most recently in 2013," according to Forbes.
The Shadow Of Polio: A Syracuse Twin, Still Driven By The Loss Of Her Brother
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Jan Flood Nichols and her twin brother, Frankie, as young children in DeWitt; Frankie died of polio. Jan survived the disease.
(Submitted photoJanice Flood Nichols)
A column this morning on post-polio syndrome - a backlash encountered by thousands of aging Americans who contracted polio as children - led to many reflections from readers on a painful era in American history: It was 60 years ago this month that Jonas Salk's vaccine offered a first step toward bringing the virus under control.
Among the many notes received today was one from an old friend, whose experience with polio still shapes her life: Eight years ago, I wrote a column about Janice Flood Nichols, who grew up in DeWitt. When she was 6, she lost her twin brother, Frankie, to the disease; on the day of his funeral, her parents realized she was also a victim.
This is Janice's email, followed by the column I wrote in 2007, after she wrote a book about her brother - and her life afterward:
Hello Sean,
It's been several years since you wrote an article about the polio epidemic that struck DeWitt in fall 1953. Since you wrote that article, I have devoted a major part of my life to speaking out about the importance of polio eradication. I have traveled to many States and the province of Ontario, Canada on the topic and have even been in a PBS and BBC documentary. Last fall, I was honored as one of 10 global citizens at the Global Poverty Project's Global Citizen Festival in NYC. I am thankful that my twin's story has reached so many people as yet one more reason to eradicate the disease once and for all.
Thank you again for the good work you do through your column. Even though I do not live in Syracuse, I frequently read your column... I feel that your article gave my "mission" a wonderful start. All of my work is done via word of mouth and you helped to get the ball rolling.
I wish you the very best.Jan Flood Nichols
One child lost, one life changed forever: Syracuse twin recalls brother lost to polio
Sean Kirst, columnistThe Post-StandardNov. 9, 2007
For years, Brett Sagenkahn couldn't figure out why he hated Halloween. Every fall, his entire mood would change. That continued long after he left Central New York and settled in Florida, where he built a career doing contracting work and selling yachts.
Not long ago, Sagenkahn took a call from Janice Flood Nichols, who lives near Buffalo. It was a voice from his childhood. She told him she was writing a book about her brother.
For Brett, almost instantly, the Halloween mystery was solved.
Janice was the twin of Frankie Flood, Brett's best friend as a small boy in DeWitt.
"From the time we were able to walk, we'd always play together," Brett said.
In his earliest memories, Frankie is always there. They sat next to each other for a 1952 kindergarten photo at Moses DeWitt Elementary School. A year later, as first-graders, the boys stayed in the same classroom.
That Halloween, Frankie, Janice and Brett would have gone trick or treating. It didn't happen. A few days before the holiday, Frankie's mom kept him home from school with what she thought was a cold. It quickly became worse. Frankie couldn't breathe.
His parents rushed him to the old City Hospital, where the muscles that controlled Frankie's breathing and swallowing shut down. The doctors put him in an "iron lung," a machine that forced the breath in and out of his body. He died in the arms of his father on the day after Halloween, one of seven children - including his twin sister - who contracted polio in the same classroom in DeWitt.
Brett and his family ended up quarantined in their home. Fifty-four years later, he remembers looking out the window to see a hearse in his friend's driveway.
That is why he hates Halloween.
"It was that exact time frame, and it changed me forever," Brett said. "Once you go through a trauma like that, you never know when the other shoe is going to drop. You look back and you have to be so appreciative of life, and how fragile it is."
Janice hopes others take a similar revelation from "Twin Voices: A Memoir of Polio, the Forgotten Killer, " her new book, which she will sign Saturday at Creekside Books & Coffee in Skaneateles.
It is a summary of a lifetime spent missing her twin, and seeking to honor him.
"Everything in my life has been shaped by Frankie's death and by the fact that I survived," she said.
She also wrote the book based on a simple reality: Younger Americans cannot remember the raw fear of the polio era. For years, she has quietly supported global efforts to eradicate polio, a disease that caused terror across the United States into the 1950s. The fear of polio dwindled only after Dr. Jonas Salk invented a vaccine credited with all but wiping out the disease in this nation.
Yet polio is still killing and crippling unvaccinated children in other parts of the world, said Janice, a medical rehabilitation counselor and the wife of a surgeon. To her, that ought to haunt our national conscience.
What she wants parents to appreciate, beyond all else, is the savage and voracious nature of the disease. Her brother essentially drowned because he could no longer control his throat, a reality she shares to underline the family horror.
Janice said her parents were never the same after Frankie's death. The Onondaga County Health Department ordered them to burn every toy and piece of clothing that belonged to the children, a step seen as necessary for containing the disease.
"My dad could never cry until he was dying in the hospital," she said. "My mother pulled away from people. For the rest of their life, a lot of (Frankie's) story stayed on in their hearts."
Janice, too, was profoundly affected. She remembers Frankie's wake, when more than 300 mourners came to their house. She began to feel sick in the hours after the funeral. She developed a splitting headache, and her panicked mother and father took her to the hospital.
Like her brother, she had polio. She fell into a deep sleep that lasted for days. Her legs were paralyzed, and it was months before she regained the ability to walk.
Janice eventually recovered. Before long, with her parents' encouragement, she could run, ice skate and dance.
"God let you live for a reason," her mom and dad would tell her, although the death of her twin was a wound that never healed.
Janice Flood Nichols and her twin brother, Frankie.
It took a long time for her to shake a regular nightmare in which she and Frankie would be riding in their double stroller, and Frankie would abruptly disappear. For years, she would ask her parents to repeat every story and tale they remembered about her twin, simply to guarantee she preserved his memory.
"The twin relationship is very special, and some people may think this is nuts, but I still have a very special connection with him," she said.
At 60, her mental image of Frankie remains vivid. She recalls how adults would sometimes give the twins a little money, and how Frankie was the one who always kept it in a pile.
"He wouldn't let me go near it," Janice said.
Eventually, their father converted the little stack of change and singles into a $10 bill. Not long before his death, Frankie gave it to Janice along with two silver dollars, a gesture even the twins' parents found startling.
Janice still has it. She wonders if Frankie had a premonition. The $10 bill is one of the few keepsakes that wasn't burned.
It was a gift from twin to twin, much the same as this new book.Sean Kirst is a columnist with The Post-Standard
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