1-10-25: TBT to 1947 at Harman, Virginia: I was 5 years old and had fallen in the creek three times while playing ‘Follow The Leader’ the previous day at Uncle Fred’s farm.

When we returned home to Harman I was unable to get out of
the next morning. Dad carried me to see Dr. J.P. Sutherland and he called UVA
in Charlottesville to tell them he was sending them a young patient with a dislocated hip.



One thing I still recall about the
ride was a Conductor kept walking up and down the aisles, going from car to car as I think there were several connecting cars on the train. The Conductor kept hollering “ Cigars, Cigarettes! Tiparillos!” Over and over every 20 minutes or so and scores of people were smoking. And since there was not much air circulation, I had my face pressed against the window trying to get away from all the smoke.


I
out the window at the
and hoped the ride would soon be over.


We were there for a week or two and after X-Rays and such, the doctors decided that my hip joint was out of socket & that my
needed to be placed in traction for several months to gently pull it back into place. They called Dr. Sutherland and he came to our Harman house and connected a pulley system in a baby bed next to a window. I could
out the window and could be taken out of the bed occasionally, but only for short trips.


Remembering that Dad would pull me down to the Company Store in a little red wagon occasionally
I missed the first half of First Grade and started First Grade after Christmas in 1948.
Mom taught me every day with lessons she devised and when I went to school after Christmas, I knew my ABC’s and could count to
and much more.


Dr. Sutherland telling me in later years that the only reason I was walking was because of that pulley system,
, and penicillin. Penicillin had just been invented and he gave me a shot of it every day as he came by our house. 

