Polio would strike in the summer and the disease hit its peak at the height of the cold war, he said.
”In the world in which I grew up, polio was this horrendous childhood paralyzing disease,” he said. “I remember when I’d go back to school in September, you know having fortunately survived this, you’d see kids in leg braces. You’d see kids on crutches and you’d see the empty desk where you knew the child had died from polio.”

The story of the fight against polio, which led to a vaccine for its prevention, is “one of the greatest medical breakthroughs of the 20th century,” he said.

Oshinsky lived through it and got to write about it.

“I had written a lot about the 1950s before, but I always tucked this one away as a personal story and one of these great success stories. This is a story with a happy ending,” he said.

While a revolution in medicine was prompted by polio’s devastation, which seemed to target the innocence and vulnerability of childhood, it also brought another major cultural shift.

“In some ways the most important part of the book is how the March of Dimes revolutionized medical research and philanthropy,” he said. “The polio fight really changed the way advertising was done in America and it changed the way medical research was done in America.”

Up until then, charities had searched for only a few large donors, but the March of Dimes flipped that on its head, searching for millions of small donors through a highly effective mass marketing campaign.

“In other words, no one was too poor to give a dime to help a kid walk again,” he said.
This shift in thinking is seen even today in the efforts of high-profile organizations like the Susan G. Komen Foundation and the Jerry’s Kids cause for the Muscular Dystrophy Association, he said.
The fact that highly popular President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was afflicted with polio also helped efforts to fight polio, he said.

The March of Dimes scared the public, but also compassionately showed its victims, Oshinsky said, noting that the disease still is not eradicated.

He said parts of Africa and Asia still suffer from the disease, while the U.S. and Western Europe have been successful in using vaccines for prevention.

Some aspects of polio still leave scientists wondering, particularly because at its peak, instead of striking impoverished areas, where residents often suffered from other diseases, polio seemed to target the middle class.

Polio struck in the suburbs, where new developments in technology enabled people to enjoy a higher quality of life.

Oshinsky said it is suspected a lack of exposure to disease during infancy, when antibodies from a child’s mother are still in their system, may have made some children susceptible.

“This obsession with cleanliness can have some consequences,” he said.

The students to whom Oshinsky will speak likely have never had to face polio, but the professor intends to give them some advice. He will also pick the top three winning essays — which will receive $250, $200 and $150, respectively. Seven finalists will receive $100 each.

The professor picked the essay topic: “How would you design your senior year to make it more useful and relevant in preparing for higher education or the job market?”

The contest was open to students from across the Rio Grande Valley.

“I teach lots and lots of students at the University of Texas and one of the things I know is they’re very smart, but many of them come to college pretty unprepared to deal with the intellectual rigors that they’re going to face,” he said. “I wanted to get a sense from high school students about what they think lies ahead of them and how they would change the process if they had the ability to do this.”
Nine Valley Rotary Clubs are partnering with the university to raise 25 cents for every dollar from sponsorships and ticket sales for the event, a press release said.

Funds raised from lecture series benefit the university’s annual fund that supports student and faculty projects and for which state funds are not available, the release said.

Advance ticket purchases are recommended for the evening lecture, since there is limited seating, the release said. General admission tickets are $100 per person and include admission to the post-lecture reception. Individual sponsor tickets are $250 and include admission to the pre- and post-lecture receptions and preferred seating.

UTB students are asked to bring their university ID for entrance to the morning lecture. To learn more about David M. Oshinsky and to purchase tickets, go to utb.edu/events or call (956) 882-4332.