While writing Comfort I visited the Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute numerous times, where librarian Mike Shaddix answered my questions and generously gave me access to the archive. During a behind-the-scenes tour Linda Creekbaum handled my countless questions with grace and insight.
Steve Lane and David Burke of the Little White House also shared their expertise via phone interviews, and David M. Rose, archivist for the March of Dimes, welcomed my questions and provided me with 1940s photographs of the Georgia Warm Springs Foundation.
Suzanne Pike and Marion Dunn, who both had longterm experiences at Warm Springs, answered many questions and supplied me with rich details. Mary Ann Weston shared her sister’s Warm Springs experiences, letters, and artifacts.
Both Carolyn Raville and Leon Trotter, Warm Springs alumni from the 1940s, were treasure troves of Warm Springs history and the polio experience. Leon and I swapped countless emails. He answered the smallest of questions about braces, surgeries, and the people, history, and daily schedule of Warm Springs. He read and reread my manuscript, made suggestions, and fearlessly challenged my “facts.” Carolyn and Suzanne also submitted to multiple interviews, read the manuscript for accuracy, and inspired my story.
The following people shared their disability experiences with me, thus infusing Ann Fay’s story with emotion and detail I wouldn’t have known: Louise Lynch, Bobby Suggs, Jane Hewitt, John Myer, Shelby Duane, Kathryn Pennell, Sylvia Huffman, Dosia Carlson, Jackie Kimsey, and Dan Moury. Thanks!
Jean Whitener Frye, Rebecca Huffman, and Claude Wilson provided me with details about Whitener’s Store as it was in the 1940s. Edgar Robinson, Rebecca Huffman, and Violet Barkley gave me valuable information about Mountain View School during that era.
My parents, and nearly every senior citizen I know, answered questions for me about life in the 1940s.
Librarians at the Catawba County Library and the Hickory Public Library dug for local history and borrowed materials through interlibrary loan. Thanks, Alex, Regina, Alice, April, Janey, Hannah, and Martin! Thanks also to Karen Gilliam, librarian at Broughton Hospital, and Jim Williams and Franklin DeJarnette at the VA Medical Center in Asheville, North Carolina, who helped me rule out hospitalization as a treatment for postwar trauma.
Carolyn Yoder, my most excellent editor, once again forced me to dig deeper into my character’s motivations, analyze her relationships, and articulate her desires. Katya Rice, my copyeditor, enhanced the story by paying attention to details that I so easily missed.
My husband, Chuck, endured several research “vacations” and happily sent me on more of my own. Back home, when I slipped into another life in a different decade for months at a time, he waited patiently for me to resurface.