1956 – Helen Hayes Dedication

Announcement Date: January 7, 1956

The New York Times

The Jack Martin Respirator Center was dedicated yesterday at Mount Sinai Hospital. Representatives of groups that raised $200,000 for the sixteen-bed unit attended the ceremony in the hospital’s Blumenthal Auditorium. Alfred L. Rose, president of the hospital, presided at the dedication. Earlier in the day, he had escorted Helen Hayes, actress, who unveiled a plaque, through the center. She spent more than an hour chatting with patients paralyzed by poliomyelitis. The actress’ daughter, Mary MacArthur, died of the disease a few years ago.

Money for the center was raised by the Jack Martin Polio Fund, in whose honor a plaque was unveiled outside of the unit on the first floor of the Children’s Pavilion. The Jewish Philanthropic League of Brooklyn, which donated $20,000 toward the project, was honored by a plaque. The unit has been operating since 1953.

 

The project was named in memory of Jack Martin, a 34-year-old manufacturer and war veteran who died of poliomyelitis in 1950. Dr. W. Kenneth Lane, assistant director of respirator center services of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, emphasized the need for contributing
to the March of Dimes campaign. He pointed out that the daily cost of maintaining the unit was 7,524 dimes.

The New York Times
Published: January 7, 1956

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