Comfort

by Joyce Moyer Hostetter

  Postwar Trauma

  At about the same time that the disability-rights movement was gaining strength, soldiers were returning from the Vietnam War. Many were showing signs of postwar trauma. Vietnam veterans and their families began to ask for help, and as a result, war trauma began to be acknowledged as a serious problem.

  Today we usually label the problem Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), a term that refers to various reactions people can have after any kind of traumatic experience. In the case of war trauma, soldiers’ brains are programmed to respond to threats of danger. Sometimes vets cannot turn this response off when they return home. The smallest noise or unexpected movement can trigger a violent response. Vets often sleep lightly because they expect danger at any moment. In addition, some vets feel guilty for their wartime actions or simply for being alive when so many others died. Anger is a common symptom of PTSD.

  Healing from war related trauma is difficult, but veterans can get help. Counselors encourage them to tell their stories. However, reliving war is painful. After World War II, many vets chose to be silent. They believed that putting it behind them would enable them to forget their terrible experiences.

  It is possible that Ann Fay’s father would struggle with memories of war for the rest of his life. Thousands did. In 2005 (sixty years after the end of World War II), more than twenty-five thousand WWII veterans were still receiving disability compensation for PTSD-related symptoms. In many cases, families paid the price of war by living with an angry or alcoholic vet.

  In the wake of recent wars, thousands of families around the world are experiencing postwar trauma for the first time. Thankfully, in the United States today, military and veterans’ organizations are better equipped to help returning vets than they were in the past. There are books, websites, and trained professionals available to help veterans and their families with PTSD.

  Post-Polio Syndrome

  Like war, polio has lingering effects. The polios I interviewed worked hard to overcome their disabilities. They danced, participated in sports, and took on jobs that used their good muscles. As they aged, however, many began to experience unexpected physical problems, and eventually they realized that these problems were related to their polio experience. Doctors now call these ailments Post-Polio Syndrome. Polios are banding together in support groups to share ideas for lifestyle tips, medical assistance, and emotional support.

  People-First Language

  Following the example of Franklin Roosevelt, many people who had polio call themselves polios instead of victims or survivors. Typically, however, individuals do not enjoy being defined by a disease or disability. Instead, they want to be known for what they can do well. Roosevelt did this by winning the country over with his smile, booming voice, and “can do” attitude.

  Today, there is a move to name the person before the disability. For example, we say “He uses a wheelchair” instead of “He is wheelchair bound,” or “She has autism” instead of “She is autistic.”

  For more information about People-First Language, visit www.disabilityisnatural.com/index.htm

  Who Was Real? Who Was Not?

  While writing Comfort I talked with people who had had polio and also with local citizens who remember the post-WWII era. Their experiences helped to shape Ann Fay’s story.

  Ann Fay’s friend Suzanne, the girl with club feet, still lives in the village of Warm Springs, Georgia. She is a park ranger at the historic pools where Roosevelt used to swim. Suzanne has been in this community and at the Warm Springs Foundation for her entire life. She answered many questions for me. And oh, by the way, although Suzanne had a mischievous streak, she never helped anyone leave Warm Springs without permission!

  The older girl named Martha who sometimes played games with Ann Fay was at Warm Springs in 1946 and even met and married Lou, a Navy man who came there for treatment. I interviewed her sister, read Martha’s letters, and handled the items she made in occupational therapy.

  Ed Frogge, the man who worked at the front desk in Georgia Hall, was a real person and apparently an unforgettable character. Dr. Pat (Raper), Dr. Bennett, and Ma Harding were all real people who worked at Warm Springs.

  Ann Fay’s attendant, Etta Mae Trotter, was the mother of a patient, Leon Trotter, who went to Warm Springs for multiple surgeries. She always found work at the foundation while her son was being treated. Leon is now one of my experts who reviewed the manuscript and helped me with accuracy. His practical joke using ketchup, recounted by Suzanne in one of her letters to Ann Fay, was one of many stories he shared with me. Carolyn Raville, mentioned briefly in Comfort, was at Warm Springs before Ann Fay’s time. She also answered many questions and reviewed my manuscript.

  Fred Botts was one of the first polios to show up at Warm Springs after Franklin Roosevelt expressed his vision for a rehabilitation center. He served as the foundation’s registrar and stayed until his death. The story of his lost singing career and his travel by train in the baggage car are true.

  Magic Hill was a real place. Several of my Warm Springs experts told me stories about it.

  President Truman created the “National Employ the Handicapped Week” in October 1945. I felt that having Ann Fay work at Whitener’s Store was in keeping with a typical polio’s experience. Many were “adopted” by local business people who sponsored their stay at Warm Springs or helped them acquire a job skill. The phrase “our little polio girl” came directly from Carolyn, one of the Warm Springs alumni I interviewed.

  Ruth Whitener’s store was a gathering place for farmers and other locals. Ruth’s daughter Jean told me that her mother never hired anyone other than family to work in the store. The locals I interviewed all agreed, however, that reaching out to Ann Fay would have suited her character.

  Jean’s friend Beckie (Huffman) is a real person who helped me by answering many questions, sharing photographs, and reading the manuscript. Mrs. Barkley was an especially beloved teacher who taught eighth grade at Mountain View School during the 1940s.

  And What About the Dog?

  President Roosevelt did have a beloved Scottish terrier much like Mr. Shoes. Of course, Mr. Shoes—like Ann Fay, Junior Bledsoe, Otis Hickey, and most of the characters in Comfort—was fictional!

  A Timeline of Disability Rights

  1927 – Franklin D. Roosevelt establishes Georgia Warm Springs Foundation.

  1932 – Franklin D. Roosevelt is elected president of the United States, the first and still the only president with a physical disability.

  1945 – President Harry Truman signs a law calling for the creation of an annual “National Employ the Handicapped Week.”

  1952 – Hugh Gallagher (who later drafts the laws that make public buildings accessible to the handicapped) contracts polio.

  1953 – Ed Roberts (who later becomes father of the “independent-living movement”) contracts polio.

  1962 – Ed Roberts, in an iron lung, becomes the first person with a severe disability to attend the University of California at Berkeley.

  1968 – The Architectural Barriers Act (written by Hugh Gallagher) is passed. It mandates that federally funded buildings be accessible to people with physical disabilities.

  1973 – First “handicap” parking stickers issued in Washington, D.C.

  1974 – The Education for All Handicapped Children Act is passed. It establishes that children with disabilities have the right to attend regular public schools.

  1976 – Ed Roberts establishes the Westside Center for Independent Living in Los Angeles, California.

  1990 – The Americans with Disabilities Act is signed by President George H. W. Bush. It mandates that businesses, government programs, public buildings, communication, and transportation be accessible to people with disabilities.

  1990 – The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act is passed, guaranteeing federal funding to schools for education of children with disabilities.

  Resources

  Books

  Bla
ck Bird Fly Away, by Hugh Gregory Gallagher (Vandamere Press, 1998)

  FDR’s Splendid Deception: The Moving Story of Roosevelt’s Massive Disability, by Hugh Gregory Gallagher (Dodd, Mead & Co., 1985)

  The Greatest Generation Comes Home: The Veteran in American Society, by Michael D. Gambone (Texas A&M University Press, 2005)

  Images of America: Warm Springs, by David M. Burke Jr. and Odie A. Burke (Arcadia Publishing, 2005)

  A Nearly Normal Life, by Charles L. Mee (Little, Brown & Co., 1999)

  Patenting the Sun: Polio and the Salk Vaccine, by Jane S. Smith (William Morrow & Co., 1990)

  Polio’s Legacy: An Oral History, by Edmund J. Sass with George Gottfried and Anthony Sorem (University Press of America, 1996)

  Recovering From the War: A Woman’s Guide to Helping Your Vietnam Vet, Your Family, and Yourself, by Robert C. Mason and Patience H. C. Mason (Viking, 1990)

  A Summer Plague: Polio and Its Survivors, by Tony Gould (Yale University Press, 1995)

  The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien (Broadway, 1999)

  Through the Eyes of Innocents: Children Witness World War II, by Emmy E. Werner (Westview Press, 2000)

  To Hear Only Thunder Again: America’s World War II Veterans Come Home, by Mark D. Van Ells (Lexington Books, 2001)

  Warm Springs: Traces of a Childhood at FDR’s Polio Haven, by Susan Richards Shreve (Houghton Mifflin Co., 2007)

  Books of Interest to Young People

  Hero of Lesser Causes, by Julie Johnston (Joy St. Books, 1993)

  A Paralyzing Fear: The Triumph Over Polio in America, by Nina Gilden Seavey, Jane S. Smith, and Paul Wagner (TV Books, 1998)

  Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes, by Eleanor Coerr (Puffin Books, 2004)

  Small Steps: The Year I Got Polio, by Peg Kehret (Albert Whitman & Co., 1996)

  Soldier’s Heart: Being the Story of the Enlistment and Due Service of the Boy Charley Goddard in the First Minnesota Volunteers, by Gary Paulsen (Laurel Leaf, 2000)

  V Is for Victory: The American Home Front During World War II, by Sylvia Whitman (Lerner Publications Co., 1993)

  Wilma Rudolph: A Biography, by Maureen M. Smith (Greenwood Press, 2006)

  Wilma Rudolph: Olympic Runner, by Jo Harper (Aladdin, 2004)

  Wilma Unlimited: How Wilma Rudolph Became the World’s Fastest Woman, by Kathleen Krull and David Diaz (Voyager Books, 2000)

  The Wonder Kid, by George Harrar (Houghton Mifflin, 2006)

  Videos

  All Quiet on the Western Front, by Delbert (Mann Lion’s Gate, 1979)

  In Search of the Polio Vaccine, by Modern Marvels (History Channel/A&E Home Entertainment, 2005)

  Martha in Lattimore, by Mary M. Dalton (Mary M. Dalton, 2005)

  A Paralyzing Fear, by Nina Gilden Seavey (First Run Features, 1998)

  The War, by Jon Avnet (Universal Studios, 1994)

  The War, by Ken Burns (PBS, 2007)

  Warm Springs, by Joseph Sargent (HBO, 2005)

  Wilma, by Bud Greenspan (S’More Entertainment, 2007)

  Web Sites

  www.americanhistory.si.edu/polio/ – Whatever Happened to Polio? – A Smithsonian Institution online exhibit about polio, the epidemics, and vaccines.

  www.disabilityisnatural.com/index.htm – The Disability Is Natural website provides insight and resources for understanding how alike we all are and how disabilities do not define the individual.

  www.kidstogether.org/kidstogether.htm – Site of Kids Together, Inc., an organization formed to provide resources for people with disabilities.

  www.ncptsd.va.gov/ncmain/information/ – This Veterans Administration site provides information about Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. This page contains links to Frequently Asked Questions, a fact sheet about PTSD, and a video.

  www.patiencepress.com – The website of Patience Mason, a counselor who is married to a Vietnam veteran. Filled with helpful resources on war-related and other kinds of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

  www.rooseveltrehab.org/ – The official website of the Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute for Rehabilitation (formerly known as the Georgia Warm Springs Foundation).

  Thank You!

  While writing Comfort I visited the Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute numerous times, where librarian Mike Shaddix answered my questions and generously gave me access to the archive. During a behind-the-scenes tour Linda Creekbaum handled my countless questions with grace and insight.

  Steve Lane and David Burke of the Little White House also shared their expertise via phone interviews, and David M. Rose, archivist for the March of Dimes, welcomed my questions and provided me with 1940s photographs of the Georgia Warm Springs Foundation.

  Suzanne Pike and Marion Dunn, who both had longterm experiences at Warm Springs, answered many questions and supplied me with rich details. Mary Ann Weston shared her sister’s Warm Springs experiences, letters, and artifacts.

  Both Carolyn Raville and Leon Trotter, Warm Springs alumni from the 1940s, were treasure troves of Warm Springs history and the polio experience. Leon and I swapped countless emails. He answered the smallest of questions about braces, surgeries, and the people, history, and daily schedule of Warm Springs. He read and reread my manuscript, made suggestions, and fearlessly challenged my “facts.” Carolyn and Suzanne also submitted to multiple interviews, read the manuscript for accuracy, and inspired my story.

  The following people shared their disability experiences with me, thus infusing Ann Fay’s story with emotion and detail I wouldn’t have known: Louise Lynch, Bobby Suggs, Jane Hewitt, John Myer, Shelby Duane, Kathryn Pennell, Sylvia Huffman, Dosia Carlson, Jackie Kimsey, and Dan Moury. Thanks!

  Jean Whitener Frye, Rebecca Huffman, and Claude Wilson provided me with details about Whitener’s Store as it was in the 1940s. Edgar Robinson, Rebecca Huffman, and Violet Barkley gave me valuable information about Mountain View School during that era.

  My parents, and nearly every senior citizen I know, answered questions for me about life in the 1940s.

  Librarians at the Catawba County Library and the Hickory Public Library dug for local history and borrowed materials through interlibrary loan. Thanks, Alex, Regina, Alice, April, Janey, Hannah, and Martin! Thanks also to Karen Gilliam, librarian at Broughton Hospital, and Jim Williams and Franklin DeJarnette at the VA Medical Center in Asheville, North Carolina, who helped me rule out hospitalization as a treatment for postwar trauma.

  Carolyn Yoder, my most excellent editor, once again forced me to dig deeper into my character’s motivations, analyze her relationships, and articulate her desires. Katya Rice, my copyeditor, enhanced the story by paying attention to details that I so easily missed.

  My husband, Chuck, endured several research “vacations” and happily sent me on more of my own. Back home, when I slipped into another life in a different decade for months at a time, he waited patiently for me to resurface.