 The Cavalcade of America starring Lee Bowman and Una Merkel Tonight the depart company at the special request of many of its listeners brings you a rebroadcast of the stirring blood Starring Lee Bowman and Una Merkel on the Cavalcade of America First here is gain Whitman. Good evening Whether your car is nine years old the average age of America's family car or the newest model off the production line Its general appearance will be improved by the application of a DuPont polish or wax To quickly remove traffic film Restore color and luster. We recommend DuPont number seven polish the liquid cleaner and polish that's easy on the arm If however, you want the ultimate in protection Plus a long-lasting luster clean the car first with DuPont's Duco cleaner then polish it with Duco wax These number seven automotive products are examples of DuPont's better things for better living through chemistry The stirring blood starring Lee Bowman as Dave Evans and Una Merkel as Opel on the Cavalcade of America I don't care where he is getting here get Dave Evans Evans in this office in three minutes Well proud the whole staff you heard me Oh Collins good you'll do now look get out to LaGuardia Airport right away. There's a plane to win from London. I want you to wait Hi, it's eating. Well, well, well Dave Evans. I've been trying to get hold of you for an hour What are you a reporter? I got your message at the hospital came as soon as I could get away Hospital what's the matter sick? Oh, no, I'm sick on your own time Oh, but I had to send Collins out to LaGuardia to cover a story that should have been yours Now wait a minute. Wait a minute. I've got a story right here in my pocket big page one Yeah, well, okay. Okay. Let's have it. I just came from the hospital. I witnessed a miracle and I got the whole thing Exclusive save the build up. Give me the story. Okay. Here it is a scoop by applying the Rh blood factor They've solved a case of erythroblastosis What was that? Erythroblastosis are you gagging? I'm giving you a page one scoop for what the encyclopedia? I'm telling you I've got a story. It's one of the greatest medical miracles that ever happened some matter with you best man on the Stamp and suddenly you'll go crazy over some crackpot medical. I'd crack pot It's the most fantastic life-saving miracle that ever happened, but it is a news Dave This is a newspaper chief. It's the biggest news since Noah struck land Dave Will you get out of here before I throw you out? You've got to listen to this chief. It's a miracle I saw it happen when you get a baby with erythroblastosis Go ahead bust the furniture tear your hair, but I'm gonna write this story What's more? I'm gonna do a Sunday feature on it And if you don't want to even listen to it, I'll write it for somebody else wait a minute Where are you going at the door? Oh, I quit cut it out now. Don't be sad touchy Sit down sit down. I'll listen to it, but I won't understand it Dave This is a newspaper not a doctor's quarterly There's no way to get that scientific stuff clear to our readers How about giving me a chance you kidding why the readers that get to the second syllable of that word? Erythroblastosis. Yeah, then they turn to the comic page listen See that girl out there at the third desk, which one the one with a toothpick What about it? Oh, she's the dumbest blonde in this office I'll give me ten minutes with her and if I can't get this story through her head in that time I'll I'll spend the rest of my newspaper days on the society page. Is that a deal? Oh You're going to explain this thing to opal not only explain it, but I'll make her understand it You've got yourself a deep Wait a minute Opal Opal Hey, wake up. Did you call me? Yes. Come in here a minute Okay, Dave. She's all yours. Thanks chief. Now wait just a minute. What is it? They will tell you they will tell me what It's all right. Opal now sit down Have some gum. No, thanks. I'm chewing some look opal Dave wants to tell you a little story It's about the RH blood factor and the erythroblastosis See she's hysterical all right just a minute chief Opal, huh? That's a beautiful ring you've got Engaged To my man. No, fine. Fine. That's good opal But did you know that before you get married you ought to find out what kind of blood your man has? Blood it's red I guess Yeah, yeah, honey, but but I don't mean that I mean before you marry you ought to find out his RH factor and your RH factor Are you kidding? No opal. I'm very serious You see if a woman's blood is what they call RH negative and a man's RH positive There's danger their children may not live. Oh You mean that could happen to me and my man. That's right If you are RH negative and he's RH positive. Well, I know he's awful positive about certain things Well, you're off to a great start. No, no opal. I don't mean that and what are you talking about? We're not sick if that's what you mean. No, no, no, this thing happens to perfectly healthy people Opal are you listening? Oh Sure, we're healthy, but we're not healthy two minutes are up Dave and you're not on first base shit Now now opal just just remember this there's blood. That's RH negative and RH positive. You got that sure Negative and positive just the opposite to each other. Hmm. Sure genius Listen opal Before we start on that big word erythroblastosis. We've got to work backwards first Pipes of blood and second the RH factor in blood now here take another stick of gum and relax You see opal Inside us. There's a wonderful organ called the heart it beats steadily quietly and Because it beats the blood flows through our bodies seems simple But blood isn't simple Because somewhere in the blood lie murderous elements Back in 1900 they gave transfusions. They thought blood was just blood. Everybody's the same If a man needed blood they gave him a transfusion, but it didn't always work Why the same blood that saved one man on Sunday would kill another on Monday What was this killer in the blood? Doctors were baffled Now there was one particular doctor. His name was Carl Lanschdeiner He and other doctors worked night and day in the laboratory Trying to track down this killer in the blood Trying to learn why a transfusion saved one life and snuffed out the next that makes ten samples of blood from ten Different people including you and me. Yes, sir ten centimeters each. So we have ten different bloods We'll start with a simple experiment your blood. We will use first get me four test tubes We're going to divide your blood into five equal parts two cubic centimeters and each two correct We leave to CC in the original test tube keep that pure and unmixed the others will mix with different bloods Next one is Arthur's blood. We'll pour two cubic centimeters of his blood into yours Mark this one Robert Arthur and put it on the rack The next one is lily's we'll pour two CC of her blood into yours market Robert 38 39 40 there we are doctor 40 mixed and ten unmixed now the microscope Robert, please yes, sir No, I will get it. I have something I want to get Dr. Lanschdeiner doctor look what is it Robert? What's the matter? Look what's happened to this mixed sample mine and Joseph's the blood is clumped all clumped up It's funny the next one Joseph and lily's that too and nothing wrong with this one Joseph's and Arthur's Clumping of blood. What happened doctor? Robert Robert of course, don't you see some bloods will mix and some boot. That's what it looks like That's what he's got to be why if this thing happened in the body the person would die does die the transfusions that fail Exactly we've got the beginning of the answer to the problem of transfusions Why it's so simple some bloods well next some won't Simple Robert well isn't that no I don't think so there is always the big word why why does it happen? You see now we must find out what it is that causes this This fatal clumping of the blood cells quickly now Robert the microscope Well opal that was the start the first step and a big one now They knew that there were different kinds of blood and one kind wouldn't mix with another like oil and water get it Oh sure like the red cross has the ABC types exactly only there are there are four types and Every person regardless of race or color belongs to one of those four different blood groups a B a B and group O Anybody knows blood types. That's easy easy Well opal, maybe it sounds easy now, but it took years just to find it out Dr. Lahnsteiner and his assistants worked until they found the different types The discovery was so important and saved so many lives that dr. Lahnsteiner was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1930 Well, it looked as though the killer in the blood was found caught for good In 1937 dr. Rufa Stetson in charge of blood transfusions at Bellevue Hospital, New York Had a patient who had severe reactions on being transfused with her husband's blood Dr. Stetson sent to the blood transfusion Association in New York for donors 60 donors were tested and only eight proved compatible, but the patient's life was saved Dr. Eugene Katzen of the blood transfusion Association then sent the blood for continued study to Dr. Philip Levine at the Newark Beth Israel Hospital Dr. Levine was a former pupil of dr. Lahnsteiner's when dr. Levine reported to dr. Stetson I'd like to talk to you about this patient of mine dr. Levine as you may know she had just lost her baby She reacted so violently to the transfusion that they had to be terminated no error in grouping Everything was checked and cross-checked. It was her husband's blood and they were both of the same group I'm puzzled by the origin of these unusual antibodies in the mother's blood But I've got a theory dr. Stetson Was this her first transfusion? Yes Well, I believe the baby had a new blood factor inherited from the father lacking in the mother My new quantities of the baby's blood found their way into the mother's circulation Because the factor was absent in the mother's blood the infant's blood was therefore foreign to her and she responded by Producing an antibody just as any person responds when injected for any disease. That sounds reasonable. We have to study this further So dr. Levine and dr. Stetson knew there was a strange factor in the blood one they hadn't named Two years later. Dr. Lahnsteiner was working with one of his associates dr. Dr. Lahnsteiner, will you look at a patient of mine transfusion problem? Not with the first three but the fourth patients in here Well, mr. Gordon feeling better. Yes, thanks dr. Winnie good mr. Gordon. This is dr. Lahnsteiner. Hello, dr. How do you do mr. Gordon? I want to ask you a few questions First did you get the backache during the transfusions? Yes, cheers. I shook like a leaf fainted a couple of times. I see Well, thank you, mr. Gordon. I will stop in beta Well, dr. Mr. Gordon has definite signs of incompatibility of blood. I know but the blood matched mr. Gordon's was group a so was the donors There's something in the blood. We don't know about Something besides the grouping we already know I think so too and there's only one thing we can do Continue our research until we find out what it is Now opal you've got it straight First Dr. Lahnsteiner found out that there were different blood types someone together like will ham and egg Good I mean, but the other ones even if they were the same group blowy. That's right various doctors working independently learned that sometimes group a blood didn't work with the same group and another person Three out of every hundred cases went wrong. Look Dave. What's the gimmick? gimmick You won't believe it when I tell you why not because The gimmick is a monkey a recess monkey I never get tired watching these little clowns. They are delightful. That's we have work to do dr. All right now six weeks ago. We injected five cc's of a recess monkey's blood into a guinea pig I've drawn off the serum from the guinea pig and divided it into 12 test tubes We have 12 different samples of humans. That's right All right, let's add one cc of different human blood to each tube of this here. All right. I'll work from this end You can start from where you are No reaction from these first two none here at a second or here Are they third or here before or are they look here? This one blood is beginning to come there is a reaction There must be something else in the blood so that no matter what the blood group is there must be another factor that can kill We're listening to leave all men as Dave Evans and Euna Merkel as opal in the stirring blood on the cavalcade of America sponsored by the DuPont company maker of better things for better living through chemistry In an effort to persuade his editor to run a feature story on the RH factor in blood Dave Evans reporter is telling the story to opal one of the girls in the office Dave continues so opal dr. Lahnsteiner and dr. Wiener named the new factor in the blood the RH factor They use the first two letters of research named it after the monkey. Mm-hmm, right Well, most people have the RH factor in their blood, so they're called RH positive Those who don't have it are called RH negative I see and nowadays when they give transfusions They they not only match blood type, but also the RH factor Well, if a person who's RH negative gets a transfusion of RH positive blood Does it die? Well not at the first transfusion unless the person is a mother, but you just said they had a match Yeah, I know I know, but there's this RH negative blood hates RH positive. It puts up a battle, but RH positive blood Oh, so the negative wins then what? That's where you're wrong opal the RH negative wins the battle at first The enemy is dead. Sure But thousands upon thousands of the dead enemy are floating down the arteries and what happens this The dead enemy clogs and clumps literally chokes the life out of the victor So it's no victory at all. How do you like that? Mr. Evans? Tell me about when I get married. Oh, wait a minute opal. I I've got to clear up one more thing first Now suppose an RH negative person gets a transfusion of RH positive blood. What happens? You just told me there's lots of trouble the second time. Good. But now remember I said that most transfusions worked even before the RH factor was discovered. I'll remember. You know why? Because if you're RH positive and get a transfusion of RH negative, there's no trouble at all No matter how many transfusions you get and 85 out of a hundred people are RH positive. Oh, I Get it that makes only 15 out of a hundred people RH negative Right. So if there's a hundred transfusions, maybe 85 of them would be RH positive and they could take either negative or positive without Conquering out. Opal, I love you Well, it'd be like having 85 red hats in a room with 15 green ones And if you had to reach in and the dog can grab one you'd probably get a red one because there are more of them Sure sure before the RH factor was discovered it was like reaching in the dark. I get that but Now how about me getting married and having babies? That's my last point What happens to a baby if one parent is RH negative and the other is RH positive? Does he die? That's what the doctors had to find out. Does the blood of the unborn baby fight the blood of the mother? Does the blood of the mother kill the baby? Well, one day dr. Lahnsteiner's former pupil dr. Philip Levine now at the Ortho Research Foundation called on him He who seemed to be in a hurry let me just excited doctor I want to tell you something about an unexpected finding of mine Yes, it's an outcome of my research with dr. Stetson you see I've been spending a lot of time on erythroblastosis Yes, I know actually you and I have been working independently on the same RH factor now I've been able to prove that a baby's RH positive blood can find its way into the RH negative mother's blood stream You have yes the mother suffers from severe reactions if she's transfused for the first time with the blood of her RH positive husband then you mean that the mother responds to the baby's RH positive blood exactly her RH negative blood Produces antibodies which in turn destroy the transfused blood precisely now What's still more interesting is the fact that the women in all the cases I speak of give histories of having had babies with Erythroblastosis babies who appear normal eventually develop jaundice or anemia they do and those babies are sick because the mother's Antibodies destroy the baby's positive blood. This is an important discovery Levin Look, I'd like to have you meet my associate dr. Wiener he and I have given this fact of the name RH But we did not realize the connection between it in your first case with dr. Stetson. This is very important to me. I congratulate you And so opal the work of dr. Levine led straight to the fact that there was a connection between erythroblastosis and the RH factor You mean if I'm negative and my man is positive we can't have any kids or your first two children will be all right Levine showed that you see it takes time for the RH negative mother to build the armies that attack the RH positive blood But Dave what happens if there are more than two children? I guess they die. No, no, not necessarily Even now they they don't know everything. There's lots to be learned about these factors They only know that sometimes the unborn babies blood gets into the mother's bloodstream Then again the mothers and the babies blood don't get together at all in that case the RH negative mother can keep having healthy RH positive children, so Don't be scared opal have all the children you want But gee what of the chances of my baby having that the what that word erythroblastosis. Oh, yes The chances are only one in three or four hundred. What if that chance comes up Dave? Ah That's where the biggest miracle of all comes in Can that child be saved? Well I'm glad you got here in time dr. Wiener. We've only a few minutes as a child isn't born yet dr. Levine No, not yet this way, please I'll fill you in briefly this woman about to have her third child. What's her factor RH negative in here, please scrub up first You uh, you said the mother's RH negative and the father thought it is But what about the first two children? Well the first perfectly normal second-born dead this third one Well death is almost certain unless we can do something about it. We can try dr. Levine You've shown us that erythroblastosis is brought on by the two different RH factors of the parents We've got to transfuse the baby immediately with RH negative blood wait Why shouldn't we draw out all the child's blood and replace it? That might say that draw out the child's blood and replace it Yes, of course, we'll do that. It's the right way. I'm certain. We're ready 300 cc's of RH negative blood to use if it's necessary, but we'll take a test of the infant's blood first I've explained it to the obstetrician. He's cooperating with us all the way Let me look up It looks normal dr. Wiener But her skin color bronze usually a sign of blood disease better take a blood count right away. Yes, that's indicated She's getting pale her breathing shallow rapid. No time for a blood count nurse the syringe valve We'll draw off the blood and inject fresh blood right now. Yes, right here, dr. How much is that now 250 cc's of new blood her colors coming back heartbeat? stronger he Mcglobin level 75% She she's out of danger You can take her back to the nursery now They did that opal like the kid was a crankcase and they were changing oil for the winter Yeah, that's right. Oh wait, let's tell my boyfriend and say mr. Evans. How do you know so much about it? How do I know? I'll tell you my wife's RH negative. I'm RH positive And opal that was my baby the doctors saved Think of that. It's terrific wonderful Well, is there a story in a chief it took a little longer than ten minutes But take as long as you want on a day, but write that story does it make a Sunday feature? Yes. Go ahead. All right, I Want to write about Those men of the medical profession the hospital staffs The research workers I want people to know how much we owe to the doctors who work quietly year after year beating back death rescuing lives by the million conquering the unknown opening another medical frontier Here a baffling terrifying puzzle that confronted the world for years has at last been solved through painstaking effort of scientific research Again in America a challenge has been met and another fear banished I'm going to sing about these doctors in headlines They made the blood flow again. They made the heart beat firmly Surely gain weapons speaking for DuPont Medical science has made more progress in our time many physicians believe and in all the centuries of history until now All science has taken a great leap ahead During these past few decades By and large the chemical industry which as you know is founded on chemical science is a real treasure house for the science of medicine Often a compound manufactured by a chemical company like DuPont is sold to a drug manufacturer He uses it in making the products your doctor prescribes for you and your local pharmacist hands to you over the drugstore counter a Number of important drugs widely used today by physicians Came originally from the laboratories of the chemical industry The first sulfur drug to name one was not born in a hospital But in a die stuff laboratory Then there's another way chemical products enter the service of medicine a Specific product like DuPont nylon yarn may be used to make a delicate filter or blood plasma Surgical sutures are made of nylon filament Even such a well-known friend as DuPont cellophane acts as a barrier to germs in surgical dressings Cellophane has also been used in surgery after operations around tendons and joints a small sheet of it placed between bones Where cartilage has been removed? Prevents the ends of the bones from adhering and greatly reduces the pain of bending the joint after the operation and Any adequate account of the relation between health and chemistry would have to mention DDT Which controls many insects and and to which destroys brown rats? Both insects and rats are known carriers of many diseases So it is that with the know-how of the DuPont company and other chemical companies Many compounds are made which in one way or another lend themselves to medicine and health We think you will agree That such compounds deserve the verbal blue ribbon we'd be to stow upon them when we speak of them as DuPont better things for better living through chemistry Carrie Thomas was graduated from Cornell and her father thought she should give up this Scholastic nonsense and get married, but Carrie entered Johns Hopkins There she was refused a degree, but Carrie did something about it fiery indomitable She fought back and became well listen to her story next Monday to lady of distinction Starring Ida Lupino on the cavalcade of America The music for the DuPont cavalcade is composed and conducted by Robert Armbruster Tonight's cavalcade was written by Sigmund Miller and Halstead Wells Lee Bowman appears through the courtesy of Columbia Pictures producers of the Technicolor musical down to earth Unimerical is soon to be seen in the eagle lion picture Texas legend In the cast with Lee Bowman and Unimerical were Ken Christie as the editor Her Butterfield as dr. Landsteiner Elliot Reed as dr. Wiener Stanley Waxman as dr. Levine and Jerry Hausner Howard McNeer and Tobin and Hugh Thomas This is John Heaston inviting you to listen next week to Ida Lupino in Lady of Distinction on the cavalcade of America brought to you by the DuPont Company of Wilmington, Delaware cavalcade of America came to you from Hollywood This is NBC the national broadcasting company