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Still Basking in Radio's Golden Glow
During the Great Depression of the 1930s, social workers reported that destitute Americans would sooner have given up
iceboxes, furniture, beds, and bathtubs than part with their radios.
For better or worse, Americans stopped writing, playing musical instruments, and going to bed when the sun went down.
Radio gave them something to stay awake for. In the 1930s, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's fireside chats reassured
people at a time when their most secure institutions were failing.
"In our television age, we have forgotten how incredibly new and powerful radio was… Radio changed the way we look at the
world," says film producer and director Ken Burns.
Ken Burns' film Empire of the Air: The Men Who Made Radio reminds those who forgot - and informs those too young to
know - about radio's profound impact on American culture.*
Though the glory days of radio's golden age have passed, the Puget Sound region enjoys a surprisingly vibrant old
time radio culture. Jim French's Imagination Theatre, a weekly radio drama series heard coast to coast, is produced
locally before live audiences. Saturday and Sunday nights from 10pm to midnight, KIXI radio airs "When Radio Was",
a showcase for classic shows such as "The Shadow", "Father Knows Best", stars like Jack Benny, George Burns, and
many others.
In addition, the Radio Enthusiasts of Puget Sound is one of the largest and most active radio clubs in the country.
"This is a club for people interested in vintage radio, radio that existed before television," says club treasurer
Frank Rosin. "Members can access our extensive collection of radio programs, and because of that we have members
from all over the United States and Canada."
The non-profit group got its start when a couple of mailmen with an interest in old-time radio noticed that some people
along their routes were regularly receiving mail-order vintage radio programs. Word spread, and the organization was founded
in 1991 when the collectors of the old shows decided to share their collections with one another.
"The group planned to meet monthly," says Bryan Haigood, club vice president. "And then they discovered that John
Archer, who had played The Shadow, lived in the area. They asked him to come to a meeting to talk about his days in
radio. There was a huge turnout for the event." The experience was so positive that the group has continued to
feature recreations of the old-time shows, along with special guests who worked during the "golden days".
"There are still a lot of people around who worked on the original programs," says Bryan, "and we've hosted many
well-known radio personalities over the years."
The group has a collection of old scripts and they recreate the classic shows, down to the sound effects-even putting
in the old commercials. "It can really sound almost exactly like it did back when it originally aired," adds Bryan.
Another popular aspect is when the guests talk about their days in radio, relating humorous anecdotes and interesting
stories. "The audience can ask questions, it really makes for a fun evening," says Bryan.
Interestingly, the organization attracts members of all ages. While many are old enough to remember the original
shows, there are a great many younger members, too.
"The shows are nostalgic, but they're also stand-alone entertaining, even if you've never heard them before," says Bryan.
Every year the group puts on an "extravaganza" production over the course of two days. This year the 16th annual event,
"The Grand Salute to the Greatest", is held on June 27-28 at the Bellevue Coast Hotel and features Dick Van Patten,
Shirley Mitchell (from The Great Gildersleeve, Fibber McGee & Molly, and I Love Lucy), Jim French and many more exciting
guests. For more information, visit
www.repsonline.org or call 206-542-6231.
Membership to this active group is $20. In addition to the annual event, the club has an extensive library, monthly
meetings and newsletter. They also perform in the community, give talks about old time radio, and lend scripts to
groups who want to recreate a show.
Frank Rosin is the keeper of the club's impressive sound effects collection (donated by well-known sound effects artist
Ray Erlenborn); Frank gives demonstrations of how the effects were done.
"Radio was and is tremendous entertainment. We would like to have you join us in sharing the fun as we seek to preserve
and protect the best of the past, and to seek the best of radio and audio entertainment today."
"It's a bunch of fun," says Frank.
*Excerpt from "When America Stopped to Listen" by John Budris is reprinted with permission by The Christian
Science Monitor.
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The Radio Enthusiasts of Puget Sound invites you to join them on June 27 & 28 at the Bellevue Coast
Hotel for a "weekend of laughs and chills!" Tickets run $15 to $118 per person. For more information about The
2008 Grand Salute to the Greatest Shows and Stars from the Golden Age of Radio, visit
www.repsonline.org
or call 206-542-6231.
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Sister Kenny and the Fight Against Polio
Symptoms Are Making a Comeback in Washington and Around the World
...by Dick Stannard
Two generations ago, infantile paralysis was the scariest disease in the United States. Then a tough minded, tough
talking Australian nurse named Sister Elizabeth Kenny arrived in this country with a radically different kind of
treatment that saved thousands in Seattle and throughout the United States from much of polio's crippling
aftereffects.
Colleen Long of Seattle, a writer, poet and retired teacher, is eternally grateful. In 1943, when she was 10 years
old, Colleen was completely crippled by the disease. Then began the grueling Kenny treatment of extremely hot wool
wraps followed by exercise and muscle movement, the exact opposite of conventional treatment. Like everyone else who
had them, Colleen has a vivid memory of the pain and agony of the hot packs. But even more vivid is her memory of the
successful treatment. "Mine is a miracle story thanks to an Australian nurse…and the fact that I lived where there was
a progressive hospital, Children's, using her treatment.
"As time went on, I could move more and more," she wrote in a memoir. "Soon I was able to eat my meals sitting up... One
wonderful day I shall never forget, I stood all by myself with no help from anyone. The doctor said it was a miracle." Her
mother continued the treatments at home, and within a few months, Colleen was walking normally and back in school.
John Clark of Spanaway has a similar story. He was stricken in 1946 in Minneapolis when he was five and immediately began
the Kenny treatment. He even saw the famous lady. "She came by and pounded on me a couple of times," he recalled. At
first, John was completely paralyzed. "My arms came back first." He spent 18 months in Sheltering Arms Hospital, getting
the hot packs and exercises every day. By the time he was seven, he was able to walk with a brace on one leg and using
forearm crutches. He, too, went on to a successful life as a teacher-30 years in the Kent School District and seven more
in a private school.
Before Sister Kenny, traditional treatment called for immobilizing the affected limbs, which nearly guaranteed permanent
crippling. Sister Kenny, who developed her methods as an outback nurse to aboriginals and isolated farm children in Australia,
came to this country in 1940 with all the fervor of an evangelist to show American medicine a better way.
Grudgingly at first, then enthusiastically, doctors began using her revolutionary methods with the same remarkable success
that she had achieved in Australia. Minneapolis was the first Kenny polio center in the United States. In 1942, Seattle
Children's Orthopedic Hospital (now Children's Hospital), sent a doctor, a nurse and a physiotherapist to Minneapolis to
learn the new techniques. Seattle was one of the first areas in the U.S. to benefit from the Kenny treatment.
Thanks to the Kenny treatment, thousands upon thousands, mainly children, were spared a lifetime as cripples. Older victims,
like Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lionel Barrymore, never walked after they were stricken.
Now, with polio almost eradicated in the U.S., Sister Kenny is largely forgotten, but back in those days she was an
international celebrity, guest of President Roosevelt and feted by Congress.
Unfortunately, this is not a "lived happily ever after" story. Colleen and John, and many thousands of other polio survivors,
are now struggling with a totally unexpected problem which has come to be known as post polio syndrome. Half or more of all
polio victims, not just those treated with the Kenny method, have contracted post polio syndrome many years after they
first became ill. As John describes it:
"Fourteen years ago, post polio hit me like a bomb while I was teaching." He was able to continue teaching in a
wheelchair for awhile, but the growing crippling eventually forced him into retirement. He is now on oxygen 24 hours
a day, but continues to lead a full life with the help of his wife, Vivian.
Colleen has not been hit as hard. She walks normally, but she can no longer stand or hold up her arms for any length
of time, and tires easily. Because she doesn't look disabled, she finds herself having to explain her growing physical
limitations. It's a problem she shares with many disabled people.
John's wife, Vivian, represents another aspect of this largely unknown problem. Vivian was a student at Franklin High
School in Seattle in 1954-ironically, just before polio vaccine became widely available-when her best friend came down
with bulbar polio. Several months later, Vivian developed severe headaches and fatigue, and a high fever. She got over
it without further problems and never connected it to polio until the late '1980s when she came down with severe
chronic fatigue, leg pains, muscle fatigue, chronic pain and headaches. She consulted a rheumatologist who said she
had fibromyalgia and handed her a brochure of the symptoms. The first symptom listed was severe chronic fatigue, the
second was "Did you ever have polio?" The rest of the symptoms were similar to the late effects of polio. It was only
then that she made the connection to her friend's 1954 illness.
"I'd been brushed by it and never knew. Many thousands of us have the same problem. We never knew we had polio, but the
muscle and nerve damage lingered in our systems and erupted later in life."
Polio survivors have not taken this new onslaught lightly. There is an international network of polio support groups
meeting to share problems, discuss treatments, and lend aid and comfort wherever they can. Washington State alone has
15 support groups. Vivian Clark writes a quarterly newsletter, Polio Outreach of Washington, and with John serves as the
central contact point for people seeking information. The phone number is 1-800-609-5538.
Though this post polio scourge has been known to medicine for a number of years, it is almost unknown to the public.
With development of the Salk vaccine in 1955 and the Sabin vaccine in 1962, the disease has been largely eradicated and
forgotten in this country. What was not anticipated was the long term impairment of muscles and nerves which, as polio
patients grew older, undermined their bodies. It is not believed that post polio victims still carry the virus. Doctors
believe post polio syndrome adds as much as 15 years to the victim's chronological age in terms of physical decline,
although they do not think it shortens lives.
Little can be done for this problem except to get plenty of rest and good nutrition, and use pain control when required.
Post polio meetings help too-sharing, supporting and learning.
Despite their post polio symptoms, Colleen, John and thousands more continue to be grateful to that tough talking nurse,
Sister Elizabeth Kenny.
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