Thelma and Lowell's Diary: July 13, 1943

Reva spends a final day in NOLA; polio outbreak alarms health officials

Thelma, Lowell and her sister Reva went swimming in the morning, probably at Audubon Park, which cost them 12 cents each. Lowell came home to sleep, as he was working third shift, while Thelma and Reva did some grocery shopping. Reva finished packing and the sisters went to the train station to check her bags. "She got a swell seat,” Thelma wrote — no small feat on what she described as a crowded train. The train pulled out of the station at eight p.m.

Crowds were a special concern that summer for children, because of a sharp upturn in the number of poliomyelitis cases in the country. To read about how Shreveport addressed the problem, read on.