Overcoming polio: fifty years after Jonas Salk's successful vaccine, a new exhibition traces the disease in U.S. history, including its impact on children whose lives would never be the same.(AROUND THE MALL: SCENES AND SIGHTINGS FROM THE SMITHSONIAN MUSEUMS AND BEYOND)

Publication: Smithsonian

Publication Date: 01-MAY-05

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COPYRIGHT 2005 Smithsonian Institution

Nearly half a million children and adults contracted polio in the United States before medical researchers announced, 50 years ago last month, that Jonas Salk and his co-workers had developed the first successful vaccine to prevent the disease. The National Museum of American History exhibition "Whatever Happened to Polio?" explores the social, cultural and political impacts of the affliction, now nearly faded from American memory. We spoke with a few people whose experiences transformed their lives.

CAROL BOYER contracted polio at age 3 in 1952. Two years...

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