Paul Alexander (lawyer)

Paul Richard Alexander (born 1946) is a lawyer, writer and paralytic polio survivor. He is popularly known as one of the last people living in an iron lung after he contracted polio in 1952 at the age of six.[1][2][3][4]

Background and education

Alexander contracted polio at the age of 6 and was paralyzed for life, only able to move his head, neck, and mouth.[5][6][7]

During a major U.S. outbreak of polio in the late 1950s, hundreds of children around Dallas, Texas, including Alexander, were taken to Parkland Hospital. There, children were treated in a ward of iron lungs. He almost died in the hospital before a doctor noticed he was not breathing and rushed him into an iron lung to help him breathe.[8] Beginning in 1954, with help from the March of Dimes and a Physical Therapist named Mrs. Sullivan, Alexander taught himself voluntary breathing which allowed him to leave the iron lung for gradually increasing periods of time. [9] Alexander was one of Dallas Independent School District's first homeschooled students. He learned to memorize instead of taking notes. At 21, he graduated second in his class from W.W. Samuell High in 1967 becoming the first person to graduate from a Dallas high school without physically attending a class.[1]

He received a scholarship[5] to Southern Methodist University. He transferred to University of Texas at Austin, where he earned a bachelor's degree in 1978, then a J.D. (law) degree in 1984.[10] He got a job teaching legal terminology to court stenographers at an Austin trade school before taking his oath as a lawyer in 1986.[11][12]

Book

He self-published his memoir, Three Minutes for a Dog: My Life in an Iron Lung, in April 2020 with the assistance of friend, Norman D. Brown RN (retired). According to the Guardian "It took him more than eight years to write it, using the plastic stick and a pen to tap out his story on the keyboard, or dictating the words to his friend".[1]

References
  1. McRobbie, Linda Rodriguez (2020-05-26). "The man in the iron lung". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  2. Buncombe, Andrew (2017-11-22). "America's last iron lung users on their lives spent inside obsolete ventilators". The Independent. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  3. Casa Editorial El Tiempo (2021-02-11). "Lleva 70 años sin poder moverse y vive gracias a un pulmón de acero". El Tiempo (in Spanish). Retrieved 2021-02-13.
  4. Ramirez, Marc (2018-05-25). "Living inside a canister: Dallas polio survivor is one of few people left in U.S. using iron lung". Dallas News. Retrieved 2021-02-13.
  5. Hoffman, Barry (2014-12-01). "The Man in the Iron Lung". Consumer Health News | HealthDay. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  6. Marchildon, Jackie (2017-11-23). "Meet One of the Last Polio Survivors Who Uses an Iron Lung". Global Citizen. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  7. Adams, Phillip (2020-06-16). "Man in an iron lung". ABC Radio National. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  8. Panicker, Jobin (2018-02-27). "Polio survivors from Parkland reunite six decades late". WFAA. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
  9. The Guardian.
  10. "Mr. Paul R. Alexander". Martindale-Hubbell. Retrieved 2021-05-11.
  11. Ramirez, Marc (2018-07-05). "Dallas lawyer has lived most of his life in an iron lung". Star Tribune. Retrieved 2021-05-11.
  12. Brown, Jennings (2017-11-20). "The Last of the Iron Lungs". Gizmodo. Retrieved 2021-01-27.
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