Humanity's Bent Twigs 



The marvelous ways in which infantile paralysis, 

 joint deformities and hunchbacks are cured 



A group ol patients wearing plaster-casts to correct deformities of the spine. When the casts are 

 finally removed the backs arc as straight and strong as nature intended them to be, and remain so 



FOUR years ago a j'oung Italian coiiplo 

 living in New York looked forward 

 with eager anticipation to the arrival 

 of their firstborn. They hoped it might 

 be a boy. It was. But their joy was much 

 clouded because the child had no feet. 

 There were no ankle-joints — nothing but a 

 large leg-bone. Just below where the ankles 

 should have been the legs terminated in 

 points. I bit- was a great misfortune. 

 .\e\er could the child walk. K.vcept for 

 this defect the l)aby was as fine a boy as 

 one would wish to sec. 



The other day I saw that baby, now 

 grown to four \-ears of age, run across a 

 ward of the Hospital for Deformities and 

 Joint Diseases in .New York city. Me ran 

 on flesh and blood feel, not as well, perhajis, 

 as though he had bc-en born with them. 

 lUit he ran. And we are taught that the age 

 of miracles is past! In orthopaedic surger>- 

 it is just beginning. 



The boy's parents ha<l heard of the re- 

 markable ca.ses of corrected deformities 



which the Hospital for Deformities and 

 Joint Diseases has to its credit, and took 

 him there. They hoped that some mechan- 

 ical means might be found to enable him 

 to walk^omething in the nature of a 

 brace, iierhajis. 



Dr. Henry \V. Frauenthal, the distin- 

 guished orthopaedist in charge of the 

 hospital, determined that through an 

 operation the child could be provided with 

 feet made from his own bone and llcsh. 

 Accordingly the leg-bones were broken at 

 the place where the ankles should have 

 been and then reset at right angles, to form 

 feet. To be sure, these feel h.iNC not the 

 spring, the resilience, of natural feet; but 

 the bo\- need ne\er be dependent on others 

 because of his inabilitv' to walk. I lis 

 general he.dth will be much better, since 

 he may exercise naturally. 



Kach <lay five hundred afflicted persons 

 attend the clinic at the Hosjiital for De- 

 fnrinities and Joint Diseases. It is the 

 nnl\- Niw ^'<p^k hi»pil.il th.it .iccepts chil- 



850 



