The Health bulletin [serial] - University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

26 The Health Bulletin December, 1927
were lots of them in the State—hundreds,
maybe thousands. There had
never been any accurate count made
of them. And then there were even
worse things than feet like Jane's.
There was something called infantile
paralysis that crippled them. Jane
didn't know exactly what that meant,
but she had heard her mother say
that her grandmother had paralysis
when she died last year. . . .
There was a man named Babbington
who had started the place where
they cured children with the wrong
sort of feet, or who had the thing
called infantile paralysis. He was a
mighty fine man, who loved children
and who was sorry for little folks who
couldn't run and play like other children.
The lady said he had dreamed
one night about a little boy with a
twisted foot, whose father didn't have
money to send him to a hospital, and
that was the beginning of the place
where they were going.
This man told somebody about his
dream, and they laughed at him. He
didn't like people to laugh at him, because
it was like laughing at a little
boy because he had a twisted foot that
he couldn't walk on. He kept talking
about his dream that he had, and people
kept laughing at him. Still he
kept on until he got a little place
started where little boys could come
and have their feet straightened.
Then he got the State to give some
money, and to put up a building, and
get some doctors.
It had taken him a long time to do
it, but he had kept at it. Once he had
got mad down at a place called the
Legislature and cussed because some
men told him that what he was talking
about was all foolishness. Jane
shivered a little when she heard that
he had cussed, because it was wrong
to cuss, but she was glad he had done
it, because the lady said that if he
hadn't kept at it there would be no
place for little children to go, and
there were so many of them crippled.
More than anything else, though,
Jane was surprised at her mother.
She could laugh and talk and enjoy
herself. Jane had never heard her
laugh out loud in her life. She told the
lady that she had been so sorry about
Jane's feet that she had never wanted
any more babies. She wt-s afraid that
they might be that way, too. She said
she sort of felt blood-guilty alwut
Jane's feet. But Jane didn't understand
that. She didn't think her mother was
to blame at all about her feet.
Another and larger town and then a
smooth road. The lady said they were
almost there now. They could see a
high thing that the lady said was a
water tank. Jane had never seen anything
so high, until she began to pass J
through towns that day. A long, sweeping
curve, and the lady said that there
was the place. Jane looked, and there
on top of the hill were some fine brick
buildings. The lady said it was a great
thing to be built out of nothing except
a dream.
A lady in a starchy white dress came
to the door when the Ford stopped. Her
name was Miss McCullom, and she was
nice and friendly. The lady seemed
to know her very well, and said she
had brought her another patient and
that this was Jane's mother. Miss Mc-
Collum said she was so glad they had
come, and they must not think of going
back for a day or two until they saw
how the little girl's feet were going to
be.
After that Jane was more bewildered
than ever. Out under the trees there
were more children than she had ever
seen, even at church. Most of them
were lying on cots, though some of them
were walking around. Some of them
had crutches and a lot of them had
white things around their legs and feet.
They looked like they were made of
biscuit dough, that had got hard. There
were ladies going around among them,
playing with some of them, giving them
good things to eat, helping them to
move about. Jane thought they were
all mighty friendly.
Coming toward them was a little girl
about Jane's age. She was walking as
if nothing had ever been wrong with
her. She had on a pair of fine new
slippers, like Jane had seen other girls
wearing at church. She could never
own a pair of slippers like that, because
her feet were twisted. But she
had wanted them. The girl started to
run when she saw the lady who had
driven the Ford.