1948

Sister Kenny testifies before House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce – which was gathering support for its position in favor of including special disease commissions in the proposed NSF -- as “a medical populist who transformed the Washington hearings into a platform to attack organized medicine, especially . . . the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis” (Rogers II, 97). Its director, Basil O’Connor “relied on his friend Morris Fishbein to promote the Natl. Foundation’s interests in his public role as editor of JAMA and, behind the scenes, as private censor” (107). Kenny “was unable to muster support for a government research agency that targeted polio, much less for her distinctive theory of the disease, and the National Foundation was able to make sure no National Polio Institute was ever established. But the 1948 hearings did help legitimate the mixing of populism into the politics of science research” (102). By the time she came to Washington “Kenny was struggling not just for legitimacy (on her own terms) but also for her legacy. Even as medical texts and public health bulletins on polio came to reject splinting in favor of hot packs and muscle training, they often left out Kenny herself . . .” (106; cf. Oshinsky II, 107-113 on Kenny’s repudiation by the Funding [Basil O’Connor] and medical [Morris Fishbein] establishments).