As many of you know, I was injured at the age of nine with an unfortunate series of accidents that left me hospitalized for over an eight year period. Over most of these eight years, I spent Christmas in Shrinners Hospital for Crippled Children in Philadelphia at least five times. Most holidays, Birthdays and school years were spent in Shrinners from 1973 until 1980. The first year I spent over seven months in the local hospital called Roxborough Memorial from August 1972- June 1973. Much of the time, I spent in isolation, cut off from nearly all contact with others, only being touched with rubber gloves, only seeing half of a face because my family had to wear a mask. This was the beginning of a long illness and a long journey in my life that made me, shaped me into who I am as a person today.
In late Fall of 1973 my mother took me to see a surgeon by the name of Howard Steele at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, near Drexel University and the Civic center. At that time I had to wear a long leg brace made of Nickel that went from my right foot up and around my waist and was attached to a black leather shoe with a lift on the sole. I could not stand upright to walk and was hunched over much like how you would see a monkey walk. I also had to use crutches much of the time. The pain during this time was severe and I was spastic, experiencing paralyzing muscle contractions that would rotate my leg nearly backwards. I had already had seven or eight surgeries on my right femur and hip for the Osteomyolitis that infected me a year before. The wait was long to see Doctor Steele and he was my last hope to walk upright and to alleviate the pain. My family was nearly broke and bankrupt after my fathers Blue cross & Blue shield had hit it’s maximum payout (catastrophic loss) and we had no money. Dr. Steele was a Mason, and a high Mason at that, he was a Shrinner and the Chief of Surgery at Shrinners Hospital in Philadelphia. With little options for me, my mother and father placed me in Shrinners a few weeks later for a hip fusion that would rid me of the pain and help me to walk again without the aid of a brace of crutches.
The Shrinners Hospital for Crippled Children, as it was called then was in North East Philadelphia in Penny Pack Circle next to Penny Pack Park. It was a huge brown stone building that looked like an old Cathedral, Pantene Copper roof, Domes on the roof and lushly landscaped with evergreens in the front and an apple orchard in the back. The clinic was to the North side, under the girls ward that had a large waiting room and cubicles that were exam rooms. The basement of the hospital not only served as the clinic, but the brace shop, radiology and casting rooms were there also. My mother and father dropped me off at the southern side of the Hospital were the boys section was. It was divided into different wards; little boys ward for babies – 5 years old, big boys ward for kids older than toddlers and the teen ward which had 5 beds (I was really an old porch that was converted). The recovery room was behind the little boys ward and a series of isolation room were across from the recovery room that ran south.
I was greeted by the Nurses and the staff as my parents said good bye. I would not see them again for days, as the visiting hours in those were only on Wednesdays from 4-7Pm and Saturdays from 9 AM – 7 PM. A few years earlier, parents were not allowed contact at all with their children and could only view them through the windows. I settled into my hospital bed in big boys ward one of thirteen other crippled kids in a large room or hall. We all shared on TV that was on a shelf in the corner up high. Some boys played their black transistor radios or played cards. This was now the beginning of seven years in Shrinners, a time of emotional pain, physical suffering and my first experience in love, death of a friend and a surrogate family that I have since long buried in my memories.
This is one of the first times I told this story to anyone, a story of one of the greatest gifts that I received as a child on Christmas Eve in 1974. This was my second Christmas at Shrinners. We had the usual visitors, Woman from the order of the Eastern Star bringing baked goods and several different Temple Shrinner’s , Lu Lu, Egypt all deck out in their Fez hats and red jackets bringing gifts. We kids spent the day waiting for meal time, some of us when we were good we rewarded by eating in a small dinning room located across the hall from the Physical therapy department (God I hated that place). The dinning room was also the pantry and it had an octagon table with small chairs around it. Only kids that could be ambulatory could eat here because wheelchair couldn’t fit under the table. When we would eat there, we would have to say grace: "God is great, God is good and we thank him for this food, by his hands we all are fed, give us Lord our daily bread". The Nurses aid would pass out the trays covered in a metal dome with a hole in the top for your finger to lift it off of your plate. The trays came out of a large steel cart. The milk was usually warm. I wasn’t eating at the table this time because I was still in a body cast and unable to get OOB (out of bed) except for a wheel gurney that had large wheel chair wheels at the front that could be moved while lying on your stomach.
Evening was coming that Christmas Eve so we all gathered together in a kind of strange parade of wheelchairs, stretchers, beds and crutch canes down the long hallway toward the Girls ward to the classrooms past the reception desk. The class rooms were like a big auditorium that had huge sliding folding doors to separate the hall into three separate class rooms when we had school. We all gathered together in the class rooms met by the girls for the other end of the hospital were we were now nearly located. We had a few guests that wanted to sing for us some Christmas carols. I was on the left side of the class room nearest the first divider and by a window that over looked the long wheelchair ramp to the parking lot. On the other side of the room was a small closet where a HAM radio was stored. A half dozen kids walked into the room in black pants with white shirts and a deep red blazer with initials monogrammed ABC. Along with them were a few adults.
The kids were from "The Acadamy Boys Choir" of Philadelphia and they sang beautifully as in a way that only young boys can sing. I remember looking across to some of the other children in their beds and wheelchairs, one of whom became my first girl friend, Maya Shaw who spoke almost no English. Maya was from Puerto Rico and was here to have a spine fusion for scoliosis. She had olive skin and long black hair that hung to her waist. She was slim and tall as I remember her, before her surgery. I would get my first kiss from her, my first love letter in "broken Spanglish". We all watched as the kids from the boys choir sang to us that evening and it ended with "Silent night" . We were invited to sing along with them, so I sang one of the only verses that I knew at the young age of 12. Standing near me was one of the chaperones named Mr. Devlin. He had two sons there with him that night, ones name was Mathew and I forget the others name. They lived just a few blocks away from Shrinners, on the street that bordered the Southern property line, just off the Boulevard. After singing the final verse of Silent night the kids from the Boys choir mingled with us, giving us candy and trying to make small talk with institutionalized crippled kids that must have been awkward to say the least. Mr. Devlin approached me and said that I sang very well. He invited me, when I got out, like it was a prison sentence to be commuted, to come and "try out" for the Boy’s choir. He left his card with me and the kids departed. We made our parade back to our ward for the night and I never realized the gift that was given to me until thirty thee years later to the day.
All day today I thought about this moment lost in my gray mater and buried deep to prevent me from reflecting on a time of my life that was so hurtful and full of grief. Then came the name, Mr. Devlin. At first, I couldn’t remember who he was and where he fit into my life or why now after 33 years his name came to me.... A gift for me to ponder so many Christmas ago, a gift among hundreds of material insignificant gifts once given to bring a moment of happiness. No gift cherished has lasted or existed since it was given to me, oh maybe a HO train set or a stuffed toy like the monkey I got after one of my surgeries that I casted in a hip spika, but none lasted buried in a time capsule like this one memory that I share with you today. The memory of a Christmas hymn and what happened that Christmas to the gift that was given. It not that the gift was the song, but the invitation to join the Academy Boy’s Choir which I did in the spring of 1974 when I got out of Shrinners. I did as Mr. Devlin suggested and tried out in a large building on Market Street in Philadelphia connected to the Schubert Theater and the Philadelphia College of Performing Arts on the third floor, if I remember correctly. There stood Dr. Carlton J Lake, the Choirs director, a portly grayed hair man. I was given a few musical pieces to sing with Mrs.Lynn Zucker accompanying me on the piano. I did the best I could in front of 75 other kids who were already in the choir.
Over the years in the ABC, four of them that I belonged and while I was still a soprano, I traveled, sang with orchestras and met dignitaries from around the US and the World. In 1976 we performed in Elis Alley where Thomas Jefferson once lived and where he wrote the Declaration of Independence. Later that fourth of July we performed for President Gerald Ford at Valley Forge PA, a picture of which hangs by my desk still today. I met Supreme Court Chief Justice William Burger in his home one late evening to sing for his wedding anniversary, shook hands and remember how nice he was. In 19 77 we traveled to Europe to participate in the Worlds Boys Choir competition in Corwyn Cynwd Wales where we places sixth and sixteenth in the World, beating renowned choir such as Harlem and Vienna boy’s choir. There we traveled to London to perform in West Minster Abby for a younger, much younger Prince Charles in this gorgeous Church hall, home of the black & white tile floors and whispering walls. We then traveled to Paris were I met a young Parisian girl who spoke no English & I spoke no French yet we conversed in Spanish which I was still fluent in from my days a Shrinners.
The gift of a song in 1973 in what was once Shrinners Hospital in Philadelphia is the gift I remember this Christmas Eve. And the gift of sharing the experiences of my life buried so deep in the mantle and crust of what was once my youth. I can not think of a better gift ever received in my life at a time of grief, pain and growth that would have served me any better today than the day it was given. Thank you Mr. Devlin for your gift and the memories that it made for me.
from an old flyer I found this morning:
ABOUT THE ACADEMY BOYS CHOIR ...
The Academy Boys Choir is an ensemble of approximately eighty boys ranging in age from eight through fifteen, representing various ethnic backgrounds and coming from public, private and parochial schools in the Delaware Valley. They have performed ex¬tensively here and abroad. In 1968 the choir participated in the Philadelphia premiere of Ginastera's Psalm 150 with the Philadelphia Orchestra, here and at lincoln Center in New York. At the annual Eisteddfod in Philadelphia they won first prize and embarked on a two-week jaunt to Holland, Denmark, England and Wales, receiving the second highest rating among foreign choirs at the International Eisteddfod in that country. The following year brought a highly acclaimed performance <It the--,Acadomy-of Music with famed Carii'ldi<'ln contralto, Maureen Forrester, and the first of two 'summer stays at Saratoga Springs, New York during the festival season. In this and the following year, the boys appeared at the famous Performing Arts Center and at historic Canfield Casino. <br>In 1972 the choir again invaded the Continent, representing the United States as the only non-sectarian choir in the Roman Catholic Pueri Cantores Convocation at s'Hertogenbosch, Holland. At the International Youth Music Festival in Graz, Austria, the boys received high praise from the judges: " ... a rating of "excellent' with high grades for tone, technique, musical effect, discipline, stage presence and appearance," wrote Rupert Doppelbauer, director of the landesmusikschule in that city. For the Christmas season of 1972, the boys were invited to appear in the widely acclaimed TV special, Christmas, 1775, along with actor-folk singer-historian, Oscar Brand, and the brass quintet from the Philadelphia Orchestra. The program has been rebroadcast every year since.
In the Spring of 1973 the choir added Gilbert and Sullivan's Trial by Jury to its repertory, the most popular of its several costume operettas, and in the summer of 1974 made a highly successful tour of Jamaica. The past year has been a busy one for the choir. The boys were invited to make their third appearance with the Philadelphia Orchestra, performing the Mahler Third Symphony under the' baton of Claudio Abbado, and also took part in the world premiere of Theodore Antoniou's Die Weisse Rose, a work composed especially for the boys and included in the dedication concert of the renovated Shubert Theatre, now under the auspices of the Philadelphia Musical Academy. The present performance marks the second of many concerts - the boys will be performing in connection with the Bicentennial Festivities, future performances to be given at historic St. George's Church in Society Hall, on long Beach Island, New Jersey and during the choir's summer residence at Amherst, Maine.
D. H. R.