Twyla Winters Woods, Polk County

Interviewee: Twyla Gay Winters Woods
Interviewer: Kate Scott
Date of Interview: 12/07/07
Run Time: Approximately 30M

Cassette
Biographical Data Form
Oral History Release
Transcript
(No photographs Available)

Twyla Winters Woods believes her mother may be correct - she may have contracted polio in 1958 or 1959 from the vaccine.  "I was sick when they were giving out the polio vaccine...I was not able to take it. Then, finally when I was able to take the vaccine, it is my mother's belief that they actually gave me a vaccine that was not ready to be given out to anybody.  I  understand that there was a time that they did give out the virus to people by mistake."  Reflecting on her treatment at Blank Memorial Children's Hospital in Des Moines, "I was in a room with a couple of white kids and a couple of us were black and we were just family because we were all in the same room.  We lived together for a year or more. We fought and we hated each other and then we loved each other and we were just a bunch of kids.  Race was not even a thought.  One [child] was in an iron lung.  Most of us were in our own beds and we would talk across the beds.  I made my bed into my own little apartment [with] pretty blankets.  The beds were kind of like large baby beds with rails on the side.  We were little...I was maybe six or seven.  My mom came every single day.  My aunt, who worked at the hospital as a maid, would come across on her breaks and see me.  And, when I was officially released, I was released to my aunt who quit her job so that she could take care of me.  So, I lived with my aunt through the week."