Listen America; John Gunther

The University of North Carolina presents listen America directed by John Clayton and produced by Johnny Lee for the University of North Carolina communications center Erwin director to do this series we went to 13 of the top authors of this country and asked them if there was something they would like to say at this time to the radio audiences of America. We told them that of course there would be no censorship from the University of North Carolina that they could select any theme. It could be a big one or every day as they chose and they could write it up as they wanted to play a dialogue a talk. One of these authors was John Gunther. But Mr Gunter's case we asked if he would permit us to broadcast readings from his book death be not proud. We suggested this because a few other stories in our time dramatized so well the remarkable courage to which individuals may sometimes rise. Now the University of North Carolina presents readings from John Gunther's study of his son death be not proud. With.

Almighty God. Forgive me for my agnosticism. But I still try to keep it gentle. Not cynical. You are a bad influence. And also if I were actually in the hippies except my gratitude for all the gifts. And I should try to fight the good fight. The prayer you just heard was written by John Gunther Jr. in May 1946. The voice you heard was not that of the author. Or the author Johnny Gunther is dead. This is not so much the memoir of Johnny as the story of a long courageous struggle. Between a child and death. It is in simple fact the story of what happened to Johnny's brain. Have you read John Gunther's memoir to his son. It is not John Gunther's voice you hear as you read it it is your own.

I write this story because many children are afflicted by disease. Though few ever have to endure a hard on. And perhaps they and their parents may derive some modicum of suffer from the unflinching fortitude and attachment with which he rode through his ordeal to the end. I must try to give you a picture of him. He was a tall boy almost as tall as I when he died and. And skinny. Though he had been plump as a youngster. And he was always worried about putting on weight. He was very blond with hair the color of wheat out in the sun a large bright blue eyes. And the most beautiful hands I have ever seen. His legs were still Paul hairy stalks without form but his hand were mature and beautiful. Most people thought he was very good looking. Perhaps as a father.

I'm prejudiced. Most people did not think of his looks however they thought of his his chyme and above all his brain. I've been rummaging this past month through all the papers and things he left things Francis and I had saved treasured from his earliest days. Johnny's first explorations of the external world but in the form of pictures. On. The violence with which a child sees animals then landscapes must begin green with trails leading to jagged mountains then standing on blue water. And later. Airplanes locomotives heavy train. Music came next. Johnny had considerable musical talent though he did not push it far. He took violin lessons early and kept his precious recorder close to him for the day he died. When he was about 10 he became fascinated with winds especially the bass. He would sit by the hour listening to when

music and we bought him practically every record that exists in which the best is prominent. He loved puppies and small caps and turtles. He loved to collect rocks and study them. And to smell bits of iron out of the ore. He loved magic and card tricks. Some of which. I never got on to. I do not mean to give the impression that Johnny was any prodigy. He was good at some things not good at others. You've known this boy you've seen him many times. You can see him now. This boy. Now some other boy perhaps some other boy who was learning to ride a bicycle to close up the house with treasured contraptions. Some of the boy who watches beside a waterfall or catches a bull frog in a can. Some other boy. Not this one. But this one was Johnny Gunther and he is dead. You are reading about this.

Johnny came home for Christmas in 1945. He looked fit and fine. He was lengthening out physically and otherwise as children do all of a sudden responding as it were to the release of some hidden inner spring. He had his usual check with trigger the family physician who pronounced him perfectly alright. Also we had to check with an eye doctor. This was important. Johnny had suffered some eye strain the summer before and was taking exercises to strengthen his visual acuity the eye doctor found nothing wrong. In fact the eyes had improved to a considerable degree. The day after the examination by trade Johnny complained suddenly of a slight stiff neck. If this had happened before Trego saw him but since he'd been given a clean bill of health just a stiff neck. Indeed it disappeared after a day and Johnny went back to school. Sighing a little but the holiday was over but happy and full of energy and

anticipation. This is no longer Johnny you were reading about. This is not John Gunther's voice you were hearing. Again it is your voice. And the boy is some boy you are thinking about now and you are speaking. If you had had an infantile paralysis case that spring and as is the custom of the school with its strict standards all parents were notified at once. Then in the third week of April I had a wire from the school Dr Johnson saying that Johnny was in the infirmary. But though he had a stiff neck there was no indication of polio and we were not to worry. Nothing at all alarming was indicated. Boys get stiff necks and charlie horses all the time. Johnny was going into the nearby town the next day to have a basal metabolism test a matter of routine. It was the nurse accompanying Johnny over to the hospital who first noticed it. He seemed to be stumbling ever so slightly and when he walked down a corridor or through a

door he brushed the wall on the left side. On closer examination she saw that his eyes were not coordinating. He had a squint. The scared her she reported the matter to Johnson Johnson made an optical check and at once called Hahn in and Hahn took a spinal tap which showed an almost unbelievably heavy pressure in the fluid and casing the brain as well as the choked optic discs that indicated fierce pressure behind the optic nerve. It's three o'clock in the afternoon on Thursday April 23rd. Here in New York. As you reach for the telephone whatever you think on the telephone happens to ring. Hello. This is Dr. Johnson. Dr. Ben from Springfield to see your son Dr. Just. Oh yes I think your child has a brain tumor. You were too stunned to make sense. But that's very serious isn't it. I should say it is serious. His disks are completely choked. His what else

can a doctor in the world. That means choked disks and proceeded to describe other symptoms and implored me with the utmost urgency to get in touch at once with Dr. Tracey. The best man for this kind of thing anywhere within range. In fact even before talking with me he and Johnson on their own responsibility had put in a call for the next half hour passed in a grinding Kriss Kross of calls. Dr. Putnam and I picked Francis up in New Haven and driving hard through greasy rain on an ugly gritty night with the windshield smeared all the time by fog and penetrating mist. Breached if you were about 10. Five minutes after I got there I knew Johnny was going to die. I cannot explain this except by saying I saw it on the faces of the three doctors particularly Hines. Putnam order Johnnie to be brought into New York by ambulance we made the arrangements and set out early next morning to keep Johnny warm as we lifted him into the audience the nurse pulled a

gray blanket over his face. Francis helped or I didn't want to watch it was a long ride in the cold solemn slippery rain. Francis held down his hand while he dozed. The Neurological Institute would rise as stiff and tawny near the Hudson just below the silver spindles of the George Washington Bridge. That building. Became the citadel of all our hopes and fears for more than a year. The prism of all life. Dream. A comfortable room with a broad view of the river was ready. Johnny was transferred gently to a bed and we found ourselves plunged into the bast mechanism of a modern hospital with all its arbitrary and rectilinear confusion. And then the question was in a record of a blow you know and he reports of vomiting no chills or tremors no any abnormal involuntary movement no vision no headaches no business no no no no

no no nothing. This vicious invader has given us practically no warning. And the doctors so many doctors. We had 32 or 33 maybe more including some of the most famous specialist in the world before the end. But very soon we discovered several things about doctors One is that they seldom if ever tell you everything. Another is that there is much even within the confines of a splinter within specialty that they themselves do not know. Let me salute all those doctors. They had the best will in the world and nothing in the entire province of modern knowledge applied to this particular element was left unsearched. Indeed we tried some things that had never been tried before but the frontiers of medicine are in some fields astonishingly limited. Not to say unknown. And there are still mysteries in Johnny's case that no medical man can altogether account for. And Johnny How was John in taking this.

As you read you come to realize that this was not his fight alone and indeed no man is an island unto himself and that John his struggle was your struggle and as you read you were proud of his courage which in some small way you feel and hope is your carriage for 15 months. Hardly a week passed that Johnny did not have some kind of examination or other. For months after agonizing months there were the bandages and dressings to be changed every day day after day with never even the slightest respite. He faced and went through the most exhausting procedures. Yet I give my word on it. No whimper ever came out of Johnny after the first operation. No record of unreasonable protest or appeal no slightest concession to terror or giving way to misery. In fact his reactions were by and large the opposite. I am quite a guinea pig. He would say Johnny's operation this first operation took place on Monday April twenty one thousand

forty six. He went up stairs at 11 10 a.m. and came down at five point to keep one of the doctors told me that its effect on Johnny would be approximately that of the explosion of a 45 caliber bullet against the head. A tumor is a growth. What I ask about first of all. Is whether or not Johnny had cancer. All Cancers are tumors but not all tumors are cancers by any means. By one definition Johnny did have cancer by another. He did not. That is a brain tumor never metastasizes spreads through the body to attack liver or bones or whatnot. But if malignant it will spread within the cranium itself like a spot in an apple. Until the brain is destroyed. Therefore it must be removed at once there is no room for expansion within the skull of a foreign growth is present in the skull itself must be opened or death will be caused by

pressure. Those six hours are the longest Francis and I ever spent. Dreger found us in the solarium near Johnny's room. I took one look at his face and knew the worst. He had aged five years in those five hours. He was as gray and seared as if drawn by Blake. He could hardly control his features nor was I controlling my mind. Putnam came down a few minutes later. It was about the size of an orange. I got half of it now as you read your nostrils pick up the sterile odor of the hospital the quiet mysterious bustle of the hospital surround you. A nurse walks briskly down the hall. Information in the crisp stark shell of white the color of light knifes thinly the elevator door and hypnotized.

You want. Johnny's bed was wheeled in. I was sick with fright when I saw the oxygen and all the paraphernalia for a transfusion and you were just confused ignorant in a sea of wisdom. He's had a couple of pints of blood already. But of course that's more or less routine. He'll be unconscious at least until tomorrow morning. You may as well go home. I elected to stay so I got my first look at Johnny's face but his eyes were stuck closed and he looked as if he had two enormous shiners. His whole face was the size and almost the color of a football. Don't worry about that. It's just the result of a demon swelling following the shock of operation so I was told. Putting them in a raincoat just preparing to leave the hospital came up at a run after a nurse called him an injection of some stimulant was necessary. Johnny was still in shock. Another doctor said airily Oh you were here last night and you grit your teeth and read about the boy whose courage is your son's courage and you were proud when your son recognizes you last and says Hello Pop.

Are there going to be any more tests. Good Lord no. You're all through with tests. Once you realise you've had quite a serious operation of course. I had been drilling three holes through my skull. Also the sound of my brain sloshing around from the sound. One of the drawers might have had a three eighths of an inch a bit. I slept sitting up in the visitors room. I kept remembering the way he had looked when we hoisted him into the ambulance at Deerfield with a grey blanket across his face. Be an. CNN. Of course Johnny did not know the full seriousness of his illness. Above all he had to be shielded from definite explicit knowledge since his greatest asset by far. His only asset aside from his youth. Was his will to live. But there are layers and a sensitive mind. Deep down he had a pretty

complete awareness of what was going on. Immediately Putnam broke to him what he had. Johnnie did two things. First he called an adult friend Lewis Gannett. He drove three holes right through my head. Second he telephoned a schoolmate at Brenner. Guess what. That pressure I had was a brain tumor. He'd been afraid when he learned what he had was more serious even than polio. He was impressed and pleased. Nothing can hurt my old brain. He was sick ish one afternoon and I told him that the medicine he was taking always knocked hell out of people. It won't knock hell out of me and his considerateness once he told Francis that he had been chilly during the night she asked him why he hadn't called the nurse. Well she must be tired out. I hated to disturb her. What really interested him was getting back to school. He was terrified to think of what class work he had missed and how he was going to manage to catch up. School. We didn't dare tell him that it would be a miracle if he ever saw a school again. Helping with such vehemence

to recover. You're running with such a desperation to be all right again refusing Stuart like to admit that his left hand too was showing a little weakness now. He became heartbreakingly beautiful about everything the doctors asked. The first time I saw Johnny really frightened came in about the time he got ready for his first X-ray therapy. He kept saying that surely this must be just for taking pictures. He said to me again and again anxiously. It's just for pictures isn't it. Then he knew from the time he spent under the machine that something much more serious than taking pictures was going on and that this must be a form of treatment. He turned to me firmly and asked Does this mean that I have cancer. Then he murmured to Francis later. I have so much to do in this so little time. You read about this boy fighting for his life and you see in him something that is

universal in its appeal and unique in its perfection. The boy's love for his mother. I don't know what I'd do without you mother. His ability for self-analysis. My thinking is dependent on my temperature. It just depends on my stimulants. He's quiet never failing you Marie. I'm going to write a theme on being a guinea pig with teleological aspects. The youth who dreams as a boy I think I'd like a bottle of champagne at school for my birthday and the youth who dreams as a man. In my fourth year I'd like to take just math with a tutor. And relativity with Professor Einstein. This is the boy who has but a few months to live but who refuses to quit. Crisis follows crisis now in a series of savage ups and downs the skull flap which we call the ball drop the ball get slowly and mercilessly until it is almost the size of a tennis ball sticking out of his head. And as you read now you wonder at the boy who will not

quit on July 12. I brought Johnny into Trader for checked baggage. Not like the look of the bump and send us to mass on a neurological ugly analogy came up again. His brain was like an apple with a sparkling mass and took one look and said flatly he can't live more than a couple of months. Now we struck out hard on new pants. The rest of the summer is the story of pillars and a search who tried intravenous injections of mustard gas. A new development in cancer research it had never before been tried on a brain case. We tried special dietary therapy developed by Dr. Max Carson who had achieved remarkable restorations of cancer and other illnesses. Sometimes our hopes were fantastically high has done his conditions and magically to defy predictions. Then he worsened sharply. The bump looked like two tomatoes and he became very tired and feverish. But again recovery was miraculous. And on May 25th began it was probably the happiest week of life. Says Mr. White. I've got too much on these papers and examinations. He's

caught up to his class in everything except one examination and we're going to give him a diploma. This isn't a favor. It's Johnny's right. Come up next week and he will graduate with his class. We drove to do field on May 27 and Johnny graduated on June 4th. The procedure is that the boy is reaching the church lined up behind the pews and then walk one by one down the center aisle as each name is called Mr. Flynt the president of the Board of Trustees then shakes hands with each boy giving him his diploma in the left hand. We explained that Johnny might not be able to grasp the smooth roll of diploma with his left fingers. And asked Mr. Flint to slip it into the right hand instead. Again. Thank the boys began to mark prematurely and the driver should have been conspicuous with his white bandage. We didn't see him and I was and I got to be fearing that he would call America one by one the name for it.

However much more disassociated himself from the solid group on March 4 with a longing. The call was alphabetical and by the time the Jews were being remembered for strength we didn't know for sure the joining of the brotherhood as each boy passed down the aisle there was applause. From peripheral family. From our. Parents got there slowly very slowly. Johnny stepped out of the mass of his fellows and trod by us carefully keeping in the exact center of the long while looking neither to the left or the right but straight ahead fixedly. With a pipe bandage flashing in the light through the high windows. His chin up carefully not faltering steady but slowly so very slowly the applause began and then lowers. And the applause became a storm. As every single person in the whole. Country can pick. Up. Thank. You. For seeing. Your poor old. MacDonald. Woodson for going.

Bankrupt unemployment. Report. Just a. Couple. Of different. Right. I'm going to tell you. It has. To. Be. Among. Everything that Jani suffered was in a sense repaid by the few heroic moments of that walk down the center aisle of that church. This was his triumph and indomitable some a friend nobody who saw it will ever forget it. Or be able to forget the sublime strength of will and character. It took off. Came an awful morning on June 27. When Johnny turned to me across the breakfast table and

spoke as if very casually with his mother keeping herself these days. Then he felt the bump his hand played on it. Shocked. What on earth is that. Some of this has been going on I stared at it. What year was I had to feel. Like going to one of these pills work. Where was I last week. June 30th. Johnny had a severe headache and called for morphine. We'd gone through so many crises seemingly so much worse. However I called her immediately he stayed with Johnny. A brief moment and took me aside pale and with a stern expression. He's dying. Shall we do anything or not. We got to the hospital at a little after six. Francis and I sat with Johnny or paced the hall for a series of long vacant hours. He never regained consciousness. He died absolutely without fear and without pain and without knowing he was going to die. And you who read this memoir What of a grief that is a mother's

when you hear a word from Francis. Death always brings one suddenly face to face with life. The impending death of one's child raises many questions in one's mind and heart and soul. What is the meaning of life. What are the relations between things life and death. Medicine and research. Science and Politics and religion. Man man. And. There are many complex and they're united answers to all these questions. Yet at the end of the modern one has put away all the books and all the words. When one is alone with one's self. When one is alone with God and. What is left in one's heart justice. I wish we had loved John more. What is the grief that tears me now.

Missing him now. I am haunted by my own shortcomings. How often I fail. I think every parent must have a sense of failure even of sin merely in remaining alive after the death of a child. One feels that it is not right to live when one's child has died. That one should somehow have found a way to give one's life to save his life. Today when I see parents impatient or tired or bored with their children I wish I could say to them they may be a care and a burden but I think they are alive. You can touch them. Not. Dead. But alive. I wish we had loved Johnny more when he was alive. Of course we love johnny very much. Johnny knew that everybody knew it. Loving Johnny more. What does it mean. What can it mean now. Parents all over the earth who lost sons in the war have felt this kind of question and saw him answer. To me it means loving life more being more aware of the plight

of one's fellow human beings of the earth. That means obliterated in a curious but real way. The ideas of evil and hate and the enemy and transmuting them with the alchemy of suffering. Into ideas of clarity and charity. It means caring more and more about other people at home and abroad and all over the earth. It means caring more about God. I hope we can love John a more and more until we die and leave behind us as he did. The love. Of love. The love of life. Almighty God forgive me for my agnosticism or I should try to keep it gentle not cynical nor a bad influence. And no if thou art truly in heaven. Accept my gratitude for all thy gifts. And I shall try to fight the good fight on then. John Gunther Jr. made 1946.

For the past half hour you've been listening to a program written by John Gunther edited for radio by John Clayton. The series is listen in America directed by John Clayton and produced by Johnny Lee for the University of North Carolina communications center. Irwin director this series is produced on a grant in aid from the National Association of educational broadcasters made possible by the Educational Television and Radio Center on each program of the current series. One of the best of our American writers will present his views on the theme of his choice either dramatized or more directly as he chooses in Mr Gunter's program the reader was Charles Kuralt incidental NARRATION By Irwin George Brett Holtz was the voice of John Gunther Jr.. Our actors are students professors and townspeople of the university community. And this in America is recorded in the studios of the department of radio television and motion pictures on the campus at Chapel Hill.

This is D and E. B Radio Network.