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| Griffin Hospital https://www.knowol.com |
“I was wondering about the time when you slipped going down the stairs going to school and you hit your head.....could you tell about this...
I am just curious about the details.”
When I was 10 years old, just started 5th grade, on 30 September1950, I sustained a 4.5" skull fracture by falling on some stone steps at Center School in Seymour. I didn't actually fall down stairs in the usual sense. There was a set of stairs at the first floor entrance in back. You came out the door onto a landing, turned left, and when down a few steps to the playground. Under the landing, a set of stone steps led down into the basement. We would stand at the top of those steps and jump out, grasp the landing floor, then swing out and then back to the top of the stone steps. I leaped out and grabbed the porch floor, but my hands slipped and I fell backwards, striking the left side of my head on the square corner of one of the steps.
I was unconscious for about 2 hours. They said I was thrashing out and not letting anyone touch me for part of that time. I woke up on a couch in the principal's office, Grandma Martin came and they decided I should go to Griffin Hospital so Grandma took me there. The entire left side of my head was one huge bump. If it was today, someone would have called 911 by then. They did a X-Ray and admitted me. I spent 19 days in the hospital and stayed home until school started in January after the Christmas vacation.
The recovery period was boring. Forced idleness, lousy hospital food, and not even any school work or other chores to do (I started working for Grandma Healey at the age of 7 (milking, feeding cows, etc. for $10 a month) and doing lawn work for the widow Husted at 35 cents an hour.) I remember listening to the World Series and became a Yankees fan. I also learned to crochet. Mom collected yarn remnants from my Aunts and I made an oval throw rug for my bedside. The colors changed with every new length of yarn, and the bands became narrower and narrower as the rug grew. At least I made it through 5th grade, even with the missing time, and I'm not aware of any lasting effects. Now, when I hear about the effects of football injuries, I wonder if I do have any latent issues. But there are also some other weird things that were done back in those days. When I had fluid behind my left ear, the doctor stuck a 6-inch wire with radium on the tip down my left nostril during weekly treatments. Also, in shoe stores they had machines that you put you feet in and, looking down from the top, you could see your foot and toe bones, illuminated by radium. (If you ever see me glowing green, you will understand why.
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