NORTHWEST
East Oregonian
A2
Tuesday, October 12, 2021
‘I’m never free of it’
Baker City woman
recounts living with polio
Schott had contracted the type of
polio that caused paralysis. When she
regained some movement, the hospi-
tal staff would put her on the floor and
let her explore.
“I did the army crawl,” she
said.
She distinctly remembered crawl-
ing down the hall and into a room
filled with patients in iron lungs —
a tube-like machine that provided
breathing support for polio patients
suffering paralysis of the diaphragm.
“The whole floor was polio,” she
said.
Schott had heard the voice of a
patient through her wall — the voice
was deep and raspy, and she referred
to it as “my boyfriend.”
But when she crawled in there,
and lay beneath the iron lung to see
the patient’s face, she discovered that
her “boyfriend” was in fact a teen-
age girl.
“The last time I saw her, she
walked into a clinic with crutches
and braces up to her hips,” Schott
said.
She left the hospital on her fourth
birthday — Feb. 28, 1947.
“They saved my life,” she said. “I
wasn’t supposed to live. They told my
parents I would die.”
But though polio spared Schott’s
life, the virus never truly left her.
She used crutches until she was
13, and wore a brace on her right leg
for many years.
“They were terrible. Solid metal,”
she said.
The hospital stay was followed
by physical therapy and hydrother-
apy during the week, as well as four
By LISA BRITTON
Baker City Herald
BAKER CITY — A virus
changed Gloria Schott’s life.
Not the virus that has so dramat-
ically affected society today, but one
of many years ago — a virus that
mostly affected children and now is
nearly eradicated from the world.
Schott, of Baker City, was diag-
nosed with polio when she was 3 ½
years old.
“On Oct. 9, it’ll be 75 years. I lived
instead of died,” she said.
Schott was living with her family
in Weiser, Idaho. She’s heard stories
of how her illness began.
“I’ve been told it was my uncle’s
birthday and I wouldn’t eat ice cream.
Shortly thereafter I started to fall,”
she said.
Her parents took her to the local
doctor.
“He immediately diagnosed me,”
she said.
And immediately isolated her.
Schott was admitted to St. Luke’s
Hospital in Boise on Oct. 9, 1946.
Her parents were not allowed
to see her. She said her mom got a
job at the Table Rock Cafe in Boise,
and would come to the hospital after
work to peer at her daughter through
a crack in the door.
Schott remembers wanting her
mother. She would call out: “Mother,
mama, where are you? I need you!”
“And she was standing right
there,” she said.
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
Gloria Schott, who was diagnosed
with polio 75 years ago, at age
3, later was a poster child for the
March of Dimes, a nationwide effort
to eradicate polio. The Baker City
resident still has the blue dress she
wore for promotional photographs.
surgeries — three on her right leg,
one on her left.
Schott became an ambassador for
the hospital, and participated in fash-
ion shows to help raise money for a
new building.
She also became a poster child for
the March of Dimes.
Schott still has the posters and
flyers, as well as the blue dress she
wore.
The March of Dimes was founded
by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in
1938 as a nationwide effort to eradi-
cate polio. Much of the money raised
helped fund research to develop a
vaccine.
Some of that funding went to Dr.
Jonas Salk, who developed a vaccine
made from dead polio cells.
Schott received that vaccine.
Although she’d already contracted
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Mostly sunny and
cool
Rain and drizzle in
the morning
Mostly sunny
Warmer with
clouds and sun
Partly sunny
55° 39°
54° 36°
68° 47°
67° 41°
HERMISTON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
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PENDLETON
through 3 p.m. yest.
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Seattle
53/44
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Kennewick Walla Walla
54/41
Lewiston
53/43
61/46
Astoria
54/44
Pullman
Yakima 58/42
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57/38
Portland
Hermiston
56/45
The Dalles 60/45
Salem
Corvallis
55/40
Yesterday
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La Grande
52/33
PRECIPITATION
John Day
Eugene
Bend
58/43
54/36
51/33
Ontario
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Albany
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WINDS (in mph)
57/34
51/25
Trace
0.02"
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through 3 p.m. yest.
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TEMP.
Pendleton 48/25
56/42
24 hours ending 3 p.m.
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HERMISTON
Enterprise
55/39
59/44
54°
35°
67°
43°
84° (1934) 19° (2009)
PRECIPITATION
Moses
Lake
53/41
Olympia
53/36
54/38
Tacoma
Aberdeen
Spokane
Wenatchee
51/44
Yesterday
Normals
Records
Today
Boardman
Pendleton
Medford
60/43
Wed.
WSW 3-6
WNW 6-12
WSW 7-14
WSW 8-16
SUN AND MOON
Klamath Falls
53/31
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Sunrise today
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First
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Justin Zimmerman
set to tell the story
of flash animation
LA GRANDE — La
Grande is just weeks away
from hosting its annual
congregation of visiting film-
makers at the 2021 Eastern
Oregon Film Festival.
In the festival’s return to
a modified in-person expe-
rience, the event’s organiz-
ers are excited to be showing
a record-high 53 films this
year. Of the 17 filmmakers
coming to show their films in
person, Portland-based Justin
Zimmerman is embracing the
chance to come to La Grande
after missing out last year due
to the pandemic.
“It’s an incredible film
festival with an incredible
pedigree,” Zimmerman said.
“You know you’re in the
hands of people who really
love films and support film-
makers. Those are the places
that you want to be with your
work.”
While this year’s festi-
Oct 20
Oct 28
Nov 4
Justin Zimmerman/Contributed Photo
Jim Choma, left, serves as the focal point in Justin Zimmer-
man’s “Gone in a Flash,” which well be presented at the 2021
Eastern Oregon Film Festival. Zimmerman, right, filmed the
movie over three major shoots in Florida.
val will mark the first time
Zimmerman has stepped
foot in La Grande, he is
no longer a stranger to the
Eastern Oregon Film Festi-
val. Zimmerman presented
his short film “The Other
Border” at last year’s virtual
festival and enjoyed the
camaraderie among film-
makers, albeit virtual, that
the event presented.
“I participated in the Q&A
last year and I thought it was
a remarkable film festival,”
he said. “I was delighted
that another documentary
was invited this year, so that
I could come in person and
experience the town and the
festival.”
Zimmerman is showing
Man with terminal cancer
sentenced for child sex abuse
BEND — A Bend man with terminal
cancer was sentenced Friday, Oct. 8, to 12
years in prison for sexually abusing a young
relative more than a decade ago.
Terry Scott Haines, 48, last came to court
with the aid of a wheelchair in January 2020
seeking a release from jail due to brain cancer
that had spread to other organs and a progno-
sis of less than two years to live. He has been
on house arrest ever since.
He was sentenced in Deschutes County
Circuit Court having reached a plea deal,
more than two years after his arrest.
Haines’ attorney, Jonathan Char, told the
court his client is suffering from terminal
cancer.
During the sentencing, Haines asked
the court: “Am I going to a medical facility
because I’m not curable?” Judge Bethany Flint
told Haines she could not comment on that.
NATIONAL WEATHER TODAY
his film “Gone in a Flash,” a
documentary short about the
minds behind flash anima-
tion during the early days of
the internet. The four-min-
ute film dives into the artists
behind the early flash anima-
tion and its effect on a gener-
ation who was new to the
internet at the time. The film
centers around Jim Choma,
one of the original artists to
use flash animation who ulti-
mately became somewhat of
a cult-favorite across Canada.
“I love this film,” Zimmer-
man said. “It’s extraordinary
the cross-cultural impact this
guy had, but nobody knows
about him. So much of that
flash work has just disap-
peared.”
IN BRIEF
New
Yesterday’s National Extremes: (for the 48 contiguous states)
Oct 12
special abilities were sought for a
playground game.
“They’d get me sometimes for
kickball. If I had a cast, it was solid,”
she said, chuckling at the memory.
“I could kick it out of the field, and
someone would run for me.”
An invisible virus changed her life
three quarters of a century ago, but
Schott said it also created the person
she is today.
“I think who I am, my passions,
and my concerns for those who are
hurting, stem from this,” she said.
But she’ll never forget that virus.
“I’m never free of it,” she said.
“I thought with time I would be, but
polio still has a hold of me. I have no
memory of not having polio.”
Filmmaker embraces chance to visit La Grande
7:08 a.m.
6:15 p.m.
2:43 p.m.
11:04 p.m.
NATIONAL EXTREMES
High 95° in McAllen, Texas Low 12° in Bodie State Park, Calif.
polio, doctors told her parents that
she still could catch the other strains.
The vaccine would protect against
all three.
Growing up, the crutches and
braces limited her physical activity,
so jacks and marbles helped pass the
time.
And reading — a love that she
credited to her second grade teacher,
Ms. Holmes.
During that year, every day Schott
could choose a friend to eat lunch
with in the classroom. As they ate,
Ms. Holmes read “The Little House
on the Prairie” series of books.
“She instilled a love of reading,”
Schott said.
There were some times when her
By DAVIS CARBAUGH
The Observer
PENDLETON TEMPERATURE FORECAST
57° 37°
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
Gloria Schott smiles for a photo Tuesday, Oct. 5, 2021, on her front porch in
Baker City. Schott was diagnosed with polio 75 years ago, on Oct. 9, 1946.
Char said he believed Haines expected
imprisonment at a medical facility given
his condition, but would not elaborate on his
client’s state. In 2020, Haines suffered from
seizures and headaches.
“I can only say, he’s not getting better,”
Char said. “I do think it’s a waste of resources
to put him in prison.”
Deschutes County District Attorney John
Hummel said the crime justifies the sentence.
“I do not celebrate long prison sentences,”
Hummel said. “When my office seeks one, it’s
because we’ve determined it’s necessary for
community safety. This is one of those times.”
Flint gave Haines until noon Friday to turn
himself in at the Deschutes County jail, where
he’ll begin the process of transferring into the
state prison system.
First-degree sex abuse is a Measure 11
crime in Oregon, punishable by mandatory
minimum sentencing.
— EO Media Group
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