World War II Woman

Polio in the 1940’s

In his book Love, War & Polio, The Life and Times of Young Bill Porteous, by Timothy James Bassett, we learn what the title of his book really means. Several years after leaving the Panama Canal Zone, and following Bill’s marriage to Mable, he experienced an excruciating headache, which moved down his neck and into his shoulders. Within hours, he was unable to move. He had been afflicted with what we then called infantile paralysis, with his life about to change forever.

Mr. Bassett gives a detailed account of how the disease effects a person, along with some of the history of the times, including Sister Kenny, whom I had forgotten about. As a child back then, I remember the great fear that we all experienced, usually in August. We did not go any place where there would be crowds – not to the movies, swimming pools, or other places where people gathered. I think we still sent to church.

Bill was first admitted to Oak Knoll Naval Hospital, where there was one iron lung. This was used to assist the patient in breathing. After six weeks there he was transferred to Percy Jones Army Hospital in Battle Creek, Michigan. (Jim gives us much good history of Battle Creek, including the Kellogg brothers and C.W. Post and other famous people of earlier times. Also, former Senator Robert Dole was a patient at the hospital about the same time Bill was.)

There is much more about Bill’s life in this fascinating book, but I’ll leave it for now except for a reference to Mable’s more then two thousand drive to catch up with Bill when he was transferred to Michigan from California. This was quite a feat for a woman back then, and I am reminded of one of the stories in my book, We Knew We Were at War: Women Remember World War II. In order to visit her husband Buck in El Paso, Texas, Peg resigned her teaching position, bought a 1939 Ford, and drove from western Pennsylvania to El Paso. She dealt with engine trouble, difficult riders, and was forced by circumstances to purchase two tires on the black market. I guess we do what we have to do.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites