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| View Larger Image | In the Shadow of Polio: A Personal and Social History | Paperbackby Kathryn Black (Author)
| List Price: | $16.00 | | | Available: | Usually ships in 24 hours |
| | Binding: | Paperback | | Publisher: | Da Capo Press | | Page Count: | 330 Pages | | Publication Date: | May 15, 1997 | | Sales Rank: | 649,386th |
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EDITORIAL REVIEWS |
Product Description
In 1954 Kathryn Black’s mother became one of the millions of people worldwide stricken with polio. A year later, as the Salk vaccine became widely available, the nation heaved a collective sigh of relief, and promptly buried its memories along with its dead.In the Shadow of Polio offers a penetrating look at this intense and significant period in American history. Black explores the lethal progression of her mother’s illness and its devastating emotional impact upon her family, interweaving her story with chapters that broaden into the social and historical context of the epidemic that randomly swept the nation in the 1940s and 1950s. Rich with anecdotes from Black’s years of interviews and correspondence, In the Shadow of Polio is a journey into the homes and hospitals, the lives and memories of the people who lived through this period in our common past. |
Amazon.com Review
A memoir of her mother's horrifying descent into an iron lung--and into the grave two years later--this powerful, heart-wrenching book is also a well-researched and vivid account of the onset of the polio epidemics of the turn of the century and the conquering of the disease in the 1950s. Virginia Black, the author's mother, contracted both bulbar and spinal polio just weeks after the first American children had been inoculated with Jonas Salk's controversial vaccine. Virginia Black did not survive, but her daughter, six years old when her mother died, grew up to write an important first-hand account of this frightening crippler. |
CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 5.0 based on 9 reviews)
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Wow! by B. Flatt  5 Stars
August 30, 2007
This memoir written by the daughter of a woman that had polio and a history of polio is an excellent book. I really felt like I knew the author, her mother and the whole polio experience much better after I read this book.
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Excellent Read by Taz 5 Stars
May 21, 2006
Kathryn Black's journey to understand her mother's struggle with polio is well written and poignant--a definite contribution to appreciating the human condition. This book is worth every penny.
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Another polio survivor by Fascinated 5 Stars
April 18, 2005
As a polio survivor myself, I am fascinated by the biographies of others. I am very much reminded of TO CATCH THE SNOWFLAKES, another survivor who did not allow himself to be a victim.
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Misleading Info about the book- please read!! by Amanda Silber (MD United States)  3 Stars
November 12, 2002
The book was inspirational and taught me a lot about the disease- things I never knew; but when I read the summary for this book, I thought it was going to be a story, not a research paper. Yes, Ms. Black does tell snippets of her mother's story every other chapter, but there is so much nitty gritty info in between- unless you want to know the entire history of the disease, don't buy this book. I did, thinking I would get an in depth view into the life of a family affected by polio, and instead got, for the most part, an essay on the history and effects of polio. Please don't be mislead by the title- it's a good title, but it conveys a personal and intimate sense which is not entirely present in the book itself. I hope my experience with this book helps you in the future.
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Excellent research combined with touching personal accounts. 5 Stars
July 27, 1999
As a daughter of a polio survivor, I found this book to be an excellent resourse. the excellent research and doucumentation of a social and scientific phenomena of this century.
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SIMILAR PRODUCTS |
| Polio: An American Story
by David M. Oshinsky (Author)
Here David Oshinsky tells the gripping story of the polio terror and of the intense effort to find a cure, from the March of Dimes to the discovery of the Salk and Sabin vaccines--and beyond. Drawing on newly available papers of Jonas Salk, Albert Sabin and other key players, Oshinsky paints a suspenseful portrait of the race for the cure, weaving a dramatic tale centered on the furious rivalry between Salk and Sabin. He also tells the story of Isabel Morgan, perhaps the most talented of all...
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| Living with Polio: The Epidemic and Its Survivors
by Daniel J. Wilson (Author)
Polio was the most dreaded disease of twentieth-century America. Whenever and wherever it struck, hospitals filled with victims of the virus. Many experienced only temporary paralysis, but others faced a lifetime of disability. Living with Polio is the first book to focus primarily on the personal stories of the men and women who had acute polio and lived with its crippling consequences.
Writing from his own experience as a polio...
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| Small Steps: The Year I Got Polio
by Peg Kehret (Author)
Ten years ago, In a riveting story of courage and hope, Peg Kehret wrote of months spent in a hospital when she was twelve, first struggling to survive a severe case of polio, then slowly learning to walk again. The book deeply touched readers of all ages and received many awards and honors. This anniversary edition includes an updated and extended epilogue about the author's experiences since the original publication. It also includes twelve pages of new photos and a lengthy section about...
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| A Summer Plague: Polio and Its Survivors
by Mr. Tony Gould (Author)
This work is a comprehensive account of the poliomyelitis epidemic. It takes the story from the first major outbreak of "Infantile Paralysis" in New York in 1916 - which induced panic on a scale reminiscent of the great plagues of history - through to its lingering aftermath in the shape of the so-called, and still mysterious Post-Polio Syndrome. This account combines several strands - biographical, political and social - as well as clinical and microbiological. It focuses on those individuals...
| | | Elegy for a Disease: A Personal and Cultural History of Polio
by Anne Finger (Author)
During the first half of the twentieth century, epidemics of polio caused fear and panic, killing some who contracted the disease, leaving others with varying degrees of paralysis. The defeat of polio became a symbol of modern technology’s ability to reduce human suffering. But while the story of polio may have seemed to end on April 12, 1956, when the Salk vaccine was declared a success, millions of people worldwide are polio survivors.
In this dazzling memoir, Anne Finger interweaves her...
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