Polio Wars (13 page)

58.
N. Thompson “Paralysis Patient's Story”
Brisbane Courier-Mail
January 16 1938.

59.
“Sister Kenny Was Political Pawn in Queensland”
[Sydney] Smith's Weekly
January 15 1938; see also John G. Kuhns et al. “Sixty-Seventh Report of Progress in Orthopedic Surgery”
Archives of Surgery
(1938) 37: 1035; “Australia (From Our Regular Correspondent),” 910–911.

60.
H. A. T. Fairbanks, Macdonald Critchley, E. I. Lloyd, C. Lambrinudi, R. C. Elmslie, George M. Gray, and Henry O. West “Infantile Paralysis and Cerebral Diplegia Clinic at Carshalton”
British Medical Journal
(October 22 1938) 1: 852–854; “Medical Practice: Report of the Committee Appointed to Observe the Kenny Method of Treatment for Paralysis at London”
Medical Journal of Australia
(December 31 1938) 2: 1133–1137. See also Kenny with Ostenso
And They Shall Walk
, 141–142; Alexander
Maverick
, 101–102.

61.
E. Kenny, letter to editor,
Medical Journal of Australia
(March 4 1939) 1: 368–369; Kenny with Ostenso
And They Shall Walk
, 141–142; W. R. Forster and E. E. Price “Medical Practice: Report on an Investigation of Twenty-Three Cases of Poliomyelitis in Which the ‘Kenny System' of Treatment Was Used”
Medical Journal of Australia
(February 25 1939) 1: 321–325; see also Alexander
Maverick
, 103–104. She reiterated these comments in a letter to Australia's prime minister, emphasizing that “two medical men of high degree should not be passed over”; Kenny to Dear Mr. [Arthur] Fadden, May 15 1939, Series A-1928, 802/17/Section, 3, AA-ACT.

62.
Elizabeth Kenny
Treatment of Infantile Paralysis in the Acute Stage
(Minneapolis: Bruce Publishing Company, 1941), 26, 119. She also claimed that she had told the Brisbane Hospital audience in 1933 that the exaggerated groove in the patient's neck was the result of spasm; Kenny
Treatment of Infantile Paralysis
, 146.

63.
Jean Macnamara “The Treatment of Infantile Paralysis”
Medical Journal of Australia
(March 8 1939) 1: 562–563. Macnamara (1899–1968) was a respected orthopedist with a private practice that emphasized polio care, and was a consultant at the physical medicine department of Melbourne's Royal Children's Hospital. She had been an advisor to Victoria's polio committee in the late 1920s and then to other state official bodies. She had spent over a year in Britain and the United States on a Rockefeller Foundation traveling scholarship (1931–1933) where she had met Agnes Hunt at the Shropshire Orthopaedic Hospital and
developed new ideas for splinting and rehabilitation. Her renown as an orthopedist had led to the honor Dame of the British Empire in 1935; Ann G. Smith “Macnamara, Dame Annie Jean (1899–1968)”
Australian Dictionary of Biography
, Volume 10 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1986), 345–347; see also Desmond Zwar
The Dame: The Life and Times Of Dame Jean Macnamara Medical Pioneer
(Melbourne: Macmillan & Co Limited, 1984). Kenny had met Macnamara at a 1936 conference on “the crippled child” in Canberra, and been rebuked by Lady Ella Latham, a wealthy philanthropist who was the head trustee of Melbourne's Royal Children's Hospital, a reminder for Kenny that many elite Australians shared Brisbane specialists' disdain for her; see Kenny with Ostenso
And They Shall Walk
, 127–129; Alexander
Maverick
, 82. On Latham see Howard E. Williams
From Charity to Teaching Hospital: Ella Latham's Presidency 1933–1945, the Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne
(Glenroy, Vic: Book Generation, 1989).

64.
W. Kent Hughes, letter to editor,
Medical Journal of Australia
(March 18 1939) 1: 448.

65.
Cohn
Sister Kenny
, 93; Alexander
Maverick
, 83, 94, 99.

66.
“Sister Kenny Explains Her Treatment of Paralysis”
Sunday Sun and Guardian
January 16 1938; “Sister Kenny's Paralysis Method: The Statements For and Against”
Australasian
January 15 1938; see also “The Treatment of Paralysis at the Elizabeth Kenny Clinic Royal North Shore Hospital of Sydney”
Medical Journal of Australia
(November 13 1937) 2: 888–894.

67.
Felix Arden, interview with Naomi Rogers, September 29 1992, Brisbane, Queensland; Alexander
Maverick
, 105–106. She told the hospital administrator that she wanted this ward painted blue in the same shade as her treatment room in the Townsville clinic; Kenny to Dear Dr. Pye, April 26 1939, Home Secretary's Office, Special Batches, A/31752, 1938–1940, QSA.

68.
[Cohn interview with] Abe Fryberg, [1953], Cohn Papers, MHS-K; see also Arden, interview with Rogers, 1992; and Abraham Fryberg “Experiences of a Medical Administrator: Address to College of Medical Administrators, Melbourne, 29th May 1968”
The Quarterly
([first published in Royal Australasian College of Medical Administrators First Annual Report, May 1968] reprinted December 2007)
http://racma.edu.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=104:experiences-of-a-medical-administrator&catid=8:the-quarterly-vol40-no4-december-2007&Itemid=182
. Fryberg (1901–1993) had stopped his clinical practice and become a health administrator after losing his arm in a car accident in the early 1930s. He received his Graduate Diploma in Public Health from the University of Sydney in 1936, and was appointed Queensland Director-General in 1947; he retired in 1967.

69.
Arden, interview with Rogers, 1992; see also Pye, interview 1980, Fryer Library; and Cohn
Sister Kenny
, 118. Aubrey David Dick Pye (1901–1994) was a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and the Royal Australian College of Surgeons, and was the Brisbane Hospital director from 1932 to 1967; in the first decade he was the only physician member of the Brisbane and South Coast Hospitals Board.

70.
Arden, interview with Rogers, 1992; Anthony Arden “Felix Wilfrid Arden,” Volume XI, page 25, RCP Munks Roll;
http://munksroll.rcplondon.ac.uk/Biography/Details/5130
. Felix Arden (1910–2002) was the medical superintendent of the Children's Hospital [Hospital for Sick Children in Brisbane, renamed The Royal Children's Hospital in 1968] from 1938 to 1946 and then entered private practice.

71.
J. D. Radcliff to Dear Sir [General Superintendent, Brisbane Hospital] May 15 1939, Kenny Collection, Fryer Library; Kenneth W. Starr
A Report to the Minister for Health, N.S.W. on Sister Kenny's Method of the Treatment of Infantile Paralysis
(Newcastle: N. Morriss, May 1939); on Starr's report see Alexander
Maverick
, 104–108.

72.
Kenny to Sir [Mr. Watson, Under Secretary, Chief Secretary's Department], February 14 1940, Home Secretary's Office, Special Batches, Kenny Clinics, 1941–1949, A/31753, QSA; Kenny “Complications Due to Immobilisation in Cases of Anterior Poliomyelitis,” [1939], [enclosed in] Kenny to Dear Dr. Pye, August 18 1939, Home Secretary's Office, Special Batches, Kenny Clinics, 1938–1940, A/31752, QSA; [Cohn interview with] H. J. Wilkinson, April 24 1953, Cohn Papers, MHS-K.

73.
Kenny “Complications Due to Immobilisation in Cases of Anterior Poliomyelitis” [1939], [enclosed in] Kenny to Dear Dr. Pye, August 18 1939, Home Secretary's Office, Special Batches, Kenny Clinics, 1938–1940, A/31752, QSA; Kenny
Treatment of Infantile Paralysis
, 20–26, 47–49; Kenny to Dear Dr. Pye, August 18 1939, Home Secretary's Office, Special Batches, Kenny Clinics, 1938–1940, A/31752, QSA; and see Kenny to Dear Sir [Manager of Brisbane and South Coast Hospitals Board], September 19 1939, Kenny Collection, Fryer Library.

74.
Herbert J. Wilkinson “Foreword” Kenny,
Infantile Paralysis and Cerebral Diplegia
, i–xvii.

75.
Kenny to Dear Sir, November 25 1938, John R. Wilson Collection, Quoiba, Tasmania (hereafter Wilson Collection).

76.
Kenny to Dear Sir [Manager of Brisbane and South Coast Hospitals Board], September 19 1939, Kenny Collection, Fryer Library.

77.
Cohn
Sister Kenny
, 119. See, for example, Sydney orthopedist Allen Fletcher who came with 2 colleagues to see her work at the Brisbane outpatient clinic and in Ward 7 and told the
Brisbane Telegraph
that they agreed that “of all treatment we have seen of the early stages of anterior poliomyelitis the method evolved by Sister Kenny offers greater hopes than any other”; Alan Fletcher to Dear Sister Kenny, December 18 1939, Australia 1939–1952, MHS-K; see Alexander
Maverick
, 110–111. Fletcher also sent a statement to the federal minister of health saying that they “were much impressed by the condition of the patients” and “that it would be nothing short of a crime if her methods are not made available to every sufferer from infantile paralysis”; Alan Fletcher to Minister for Health, December 18 1939; Series A981/1, United States 148, AA-ACT.

78.
K.G. Hansson “After-Treatment of Poliomyelitis”
JAMA
(July 1939) 113: 32–35; Kenny to Dear Sir [Manager of Brisbane and South Coast Hospitals Board], September 19 1939, Kenny, Fryer Library; see also Alexander
Maverick
, 110.

79.
Kenny to Sir [E. M. Hanlon], February 19 1940, Home Secretary's Office, Special Batches, Kenny Clinics, 1941–1949, A/31753, QSA.

80.
[Cohn interview with] Jarvis Nye, April 23 1953, Cohn Papers, MHS-K; see also Alexander
Maverick
, 112; E. M. Hanlon to Dear Miss Kenny, February 21 1940, Home Secretary's Office, Special Batches, Kenny Clinics, 1941–1949, A/31753, QSA. Note that she had sent letters to federal and state officials pointing out both “the humane value of the work” and its potential “financial gain” for the federal and state governments; see, for example, Kenny to Sir [Mr. Watson, Under Secretary, Chief Secretary's Department], February 14 1940, Home Secretary's Office, Special Batches, Kenny Clinics, 1941–1949, A/31753, QSA.

81.
Lee, Nye, Pye, Arden, and Fryberg To Whom It May Concern March 12, 1940; Series A981/1, United States 148, AA-ACT; Forgan Smith to Dear Sir [Basil O'Connor], March 11 1940, Series A981/1, United States 148, AA-ACT; Alan Fletcher to Minister for Health, December 18 1939; Series A981/1, United States 148, AA-ACT.

82.
See, for example, Paul de Kruif
Microbe Hunters
(New York: Harcourt, Brace Jovanovich, 1926); de Kruif
Men Against Death
(New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1932); de Kruif
The Fight for Life
(New York: Harcourt Brace, 1938).

83.
Kenny with Ostenso
And They Shall Walk
, 207. See also Kenny to Mrs. M. G. McCrae, January 16 1942, in Box 3, Folder 12, OM 65-17, Charles Chuter Papers, John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland, Brisbane (hereafter Oxley-SLQ).

84.
Kenny with Ostenso
And They Shall Walk
, 209; Henry Otis Kendall and Florence P. Kendall
Care During the Recovery Period in Paralytic Poliomyelitis
(Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1938, revised 1939, Public Health Service Bulletin No. 242). This Bulletin was cited consistently in Kenny's 1941 textbook; Kenny
Treatment of Infantile Paralysis
. In 1944 Kenny claimed that Cusack had given her the pamphlet saying that “this was the accepted work of the United States of America and no institution was interested in investigating my presentation”; Kenny “My Message to the People of the United States of America,” [1944] Evidence-Reports, Box 1, MHS-K.

85.
“My method introduces an entirely original conception in the treatment of poliomyelitis” that was “exactly the opposite to methods now employed”; “Australia Brings American Medicine New Method of Treating Infantile Paralysis”
Los Angeles Times
April 16 1940; see Cohn
Sister Kenny
, 126.

86.
Kenny with Ostenso
And They Shall Walk
, 209.

87.
Kenny with Ostenso
And They Shall Walk
, 210.

88.
Kenny with Ostenso
And They Shall Walk
, 210–211; see also Paul
A History
, 313. Rivers' later version of refusing to meet Kenny is only slightly different; see Saul Benison
Tom Rivers: Reflections on a Life in Medicine and Science
(Cambridge: MIT Press, 1967), 282–284; see also Tony Gould
A Summer Plague: Polio and Its Survivors
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995), 96.

89.
Richard Carter
The Gentle Legions
(Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1961), 116–121.

90.
Jessie L. Stevenson
The Nursing Care of Patients with Infantile Paralysis
(New York: National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, 1940).

91.
Roy L. Chambliss, Jr. “A Social History of the National Foundation of Infantile Paralysis, Inc, 1938–1948,” Master of Science in Social Service dissertation, Fordham University School of Social Service, New York, 1950, Public Relations, History, March of Dimes Archives, White Plains, New York (hereafter MOD), 83.

92.
Telegram from Australian Legation to Department of External Affairs, Canberra, April 18 1940, Series A981/1, United States 148, AA-ACT. On Casey see Hudson
Casey
.

93.
Chief Quarantine Officer [Brisbane] to J. H. L. Cumpston, April 22 1940, Series A981/1, United States 148, AA-ACT.

94.
Director-General of Health to Secretary, Department of External Affairs, Memorandum, April 23 1940, Series A981/1, United States 148, AA-ACT; External Affairs to Australian Legation, April 24 1940, telegram, Series A981/1, United States 148, AA-ACT; External Affairs to Australian Legation, May 7 1940, Series A981/1, United States 148, AA-ACT.

95.
Mrs. Salena Thomas, R.N. to Roosevelt, February 28 1940 [abstract] FDR-OF-1930, Infantile Paralysis 1934–1942, Box 1, Franklin Delano Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum Archives, Hyde Park (hereafter FDR Papers).