 Presenting Claire Trevor in Penny Fancy with Walter Houston as Cavalcade's commentator on the Cavalcade of America sponsored by the DuPont Company, maker of better things for better living through chemistry. Good evening friends, this is Walter Houston. This next Friday our nation celebrates National Public Health Nursing Day, honoring some of the gallant and hard-working sisterhood of American nurses. And tonight on Cavalcade, we anticipate this national observance with a tense and exciting play called Penny Fancy written by Hugh Chaine. The heroine is Elizabeth Phillips, an American public health nurse who helped like an enemy of the British people far more deadly and dangerous than Hitler's Nazi bombs. And to star in our play tonight is our special pleasure to welcome an actress who, in addition to being one of our most talented picture people, has in her trophy case an award for being one of radio's outstanding performers. DuPont presents Claire Trevor as nurse Elizabeth Phillips in Penny Fancy on the Cavalcade of America. It is 1941 the year the Nazis tried to blast England off the face of the earth. In London a group of 65 American nurses including nine public health nurses have arrived to help the overworked English doctors who live in dread of a disaster more terrible than the deadly bombs. A dread which haunts them even as they go about their work in the overcrowded wards and in the operating rooms. The gerunds will be bombing soon, Dr. Larkin. Yes, but we have to finish this operation, Miss Phillips. Tenaculum. Yes, sir. Mock my face, please, Miss Cree. Yes, doctor. You don't leave us alone for 24 hours. I know not time enough to bury the dead that alone care for the wounded. The patients lost a lot of blood. We'll have to finish quickly. Four sips. Four sips, doctor. I'll say this, you American nurses have real stamina. You've been here since morning. You've been here longer than that, doctor. Get onto the table. Hold on. Are you all right, Miss Phillips? Paul. All right, sir. Stay where you are. Stay down. That one hit the power plant, doctor. Yes. Can you get the emergency lights on? Hurry, Miss Cree. This man's hemorrhaging. I'll get them on, sir. There. Sponges, Miss Phillips. Yes, sir. Doctor, sometimes I wonder how you keep going. You mean the bombings, who will survive them all right? But Lord, help us if we have an epidemic. Epidemic, doctor? Look at our hospitals crammed to the roofs now. Yes, and water mains bombed and sewers. Yes, England could be wiped out by a plague. Dr. Larkin. Yes, Miss Ellis. Could you spare Miss Phillips now? Why, I suppose so. We've finished with this case. Dr. Perry is here. He's asked to see her. Dr. Perry, up from Bristol. I'll come right now, Miss Ellis. Cree, you carry on. Call Malloy if you need her. Yes, Miss Phillips. Come along. Dr. Perry's just outside my office. But don't let Perry steal my nurses. Who is Dr. Perry, Miss Ellis? He's a chief medical officer of Bristol. Bristol's been having a time of it. Worse than London. Fine, no. He's in here. Dr. Perry, this is Miss Phillips. How do you do, Dr. Perry? Miss Phillips, I came up from Bristol on a very important matter. We have an extremely serious situation there. Yes, we heard the bombings have been very heavy in Bristol. Worse than bombings, young lady. Far worse. And we need nurses. Worse than bombings? Typhoid fever, Miss Phillips. Typhoid? I see. I don't have to tell you what that means. We had our first case not 10 days ago. Today in Ham Green Hospital, there are 220 cases. More coming in every day. So far, it's only in Bristol. But that's an epidemic. It is, and it's spreading. There's no lead up yet. When every doctor and nurse in Bristol is already working 24 hours a day, so that's where you come in, Miss Phillips. You want me to come to Bristol, doctor? You and the other American public health nurses. So Wilson thought you would be willing, although I know it is what you came to England to do. We came to help, Dr. Perry. Wherever we're needed most. I hoped you'd say that, Miss Phillips. The Lord knows, Bristol is where you're needed most today. You're too good, Sister Phillips. That's why you have to eat, Tommy, to keep your strength up. Now, just this last spoonful of porridge. Who am I going to die, Sister? Oh, of course not. But you won't be playing cricket again unless you eat. Cricket? That's my game. Well, the porridge, Tommy. All right, Sister. Good boy. There you are. Now, just rest and you'll get well. You have to go, Sister. You're not the only one with tar-foyed fever around here, Tommy. Go to sleep. All right, Sister Phillips. Well, Miss Cree. Yes, Miss Phillips. Oh, Tommy. Worse, if anything. Where are the rest of our girls? They're specialing in those five new cases, Miss Phillips. All tar-foyed? Oh, yes. I don't think Dr. Davies is the kind of man who makes mistakes. No, he isn't. Dr. Perry in the hospital. I saw him making the rounds in the next ward. He'll be here soon. I'm going to talk to him, Cree. To Dr. Perry? I certainly am. Here we are in the middle of a raging epidemic, and the thing we know best how to do, we're not doing. Yes, but I don't think you'll bust the authority. Well, I can ask. Nightly port, please, Miss Martin. Yes, Dr. Perry. Oh, Dr. Perry. There are five new cases this morning. Yes, I know, Miss Phillips. I just looked at them. Your nurses are doing a good job. As good as we're able, just nursing. Doctor, what's been done about checking the epidemic? Have you found the source of it? No. No, we haven't. Well, then how on earth do you expect to stop it? This isn't enough. Hospitalization isn't enough. It's spreading, Doctor. My dear young lady, don't you think I know? Don't you think I've been screaming to the ministry in London for help, for technicians? There isn't a technician available in England. Not one trained person who isn't already working night and day. We have the training, Dr. Perry. What, with nurses? In America, public health nurses are trained in epidemiology. We know how to trace the sources of typhoid. And do you want to tackle this? You think you can track it down? I'm sure we can, Doctor. We'll need a laboratory, Dr. Perry, and the two technicians working with Dr. Davies, Miss Caswell and Miss Small. Well, it is an emergency. Of course it is. The way the epidemic's spreading in a few days, there'll be no stopping it. Very well. I'll let you try. Oh, thank you. I have to let you try. And Miss Phillips, I hope you work fast. Cree, as Caswell's sure, she'll have that test run before Dr. Perry gets here. She's finishing now, Miss Phillips. Maggie Malloy is with her. And where are the other nurses? Cameron brought in the milk samples you wanted. The rest will be over from the hospital this afternoon. We'll need all of the methods. Bristol Water doesn't test positive. Do you think I will sound about the water? Where we should get the sample, I mean? Well, water is the best known source of typhoid. Good morning, Miss Phillips. Miss Cree. Hello, Dr. Perry. I know it's only been a day, but I hope there's good news. We're hopeful, Dr. Perry. Caswell will be finished in a minute with a water test. Naturally, we tested the drinking water, but you're right, it might have become infected further from the source. Yes, since we know most of the cases are from poor sections, which have been bombed frequently. Miss Phillips. Oh, hello, Dr. Yes, Caswell. You finished the test? Yes, Miss Phillips. It's negative. You're absolutely sure? Absolutely. I think we can assume the Bristol Water supply isn't the typhoid source. Well, don't be discouraged, Miss Phillips. In a way, that's good news. Oh, I'm not discouraged, Dr. Perry. Only I was pretty sure. It may be a food infection from a human carrier. Yes, it might even be the milk supply. No, it isn't milk either, Miss Phillips. We tested the samples Cameron brought in. Are Cameron and Malloy both out there now? Yes, they are. Then we'll begin our last test. Interviewing the families of the people who have typhoid. What do you think you'll find there, Miss Phillips? We'll find out if the source of the typhoid is food. It would have to be a raw food because cooking kills the germ, and the same raw food eaten by nearly 300 Bristol families shouldn't be hard to find. But those 300 families are scattered all over Bristol, Miss Phillips? I know. We'll learn a lot about Bristol before we're through, because we're going to visit all 300 of them. So you see, Mrs. Hale, that's why it's so important that you help us. Don't know as I can. We're into making Miss Cameron and Malloy, if he got took with something to eat in this house. I'll have you know. Mrs. Hale, I was just noticing this throw you've got over the back of your couch. Did you make it? Well, yes. Well, it's the most unusual stitch I've ever seen. And the pattern is so lovely. I could show you how it's done in two minutes. Oh, I wish you would. It's easy to see you keep a beautiful house. Alfie must be very proud of his mother. He's a good boy. I've been so worried since you got this tie for it. Yes, I know. And we're here to do what we can to keep more people like your son from coming down with it, if you will help us. Well, I don't know how. I can help. If you just remember what he had to eat, what Cornish pastry it was. He had a bit of cake for tea when he came home from school. Don't you see how important it is, Mr. O'Brien, that you tell me just... Important is it. Sure, my good wife's dying in the hospital and you ask me a lot of silly questions. It's to save others, Mr. O'Brien. Oh, that's it. Sure, sure I can remember. Kipper's we had on the day you mentioned with a bit of a sweet I brought home from the bakery. Think, dear. Think. Oh, I'd do anything to help my sis. I would miscreate anything. But to remember back to what we had to eat. Now, just look on this list I have. This event doesn't make you remember something. We have something we had about that time. Cockles. We had cockles. Cree, it's here. It's somewhere in these reports and we can't find it. The girls haven't made any mistakes. Perhaps that's shellfish. Even though Caswell tested it. No, I've looked through these lists until I'm dizzy, Cree. It's all too general. Meat, cakes, pastry, bread. Every bakery shop in Bristol makes its own pastry and yet we've had typhoid cases from all over the city. Some ingredient they all bought from the same place. That won't work. If it had been cooked, the typhoid germ would have been killed. Certainly does seem hopeless. Dr. Perry will be here in a moment, Cree. What can I tell him? You've done all you can, Miss Phillips. We're the ones who must have missed something. Not you. Cake, bread, meat pie. Nothing raw. Just have to tell Dr. Perry we failed. But we can't stop his epidemic. Good evening, Miss Phillips. Cree. Oh, come in, Dr. Perry. Well, it's... not good news. You didn't find the common denominator? No. We've been going over the list for hours. But there isn't a single raw food that enough people ate to give us grounds for suspicion. I'm... I'm sorry, Dr. Perry. Nothing to be sorry about. We've done as well as anyone could. I don't see how we could have missed anything, Dr. Perry. Every item of food has been traced right back to its source. There must be an answer. Let's look at that map again. Yes, here, sir. Cases from every part of Bristol. If it were milk or water, broken main pipe, there'd be even more. But with cases scattered throughout the city, yet not concentrated anywhere, must be some food product. If this were home in the States, we'd... we'd know. What do you mean? Well, it would be a human carrier. Someone handling food where it was manufactured in large quantities. Would we manufacture food? Yes, but anything raw that could carry a typhoid germ is made by the store which sells it. And at home, a factory would make it and ship it to small stores wholesale. That's the American method. The American method? At home, nothing would get to the public unless our whole public health system broke down. We have one Bristol company that's very proud of its American methods. Mr. Lott, you mean a big factory that sells to retail stores? Yes, the Ebon Company Limited. Dr. Perry, what... what does that company make? It's mass production bakery. That's it. What have you found? The only common denominator in our reports was bakery products. But we were told everywhere we went that each bakery store made its own product. That's what fooled us. You have found something. Well, give us 12 hours, Dr. Perry. Cree, we've got to find out exactly. And the only way to do that is to interview the patients. We're listening to Clare Trevor as Elizabeth Phillips and Penny Fancy on the cavalcade of America, sponsored by the DuPont Company of Wilmington, Delaware, maker of better things for better living through chemistry. Tonight, Clare Trevor is starred in the dramatic story of one of England's most desperate moments, and the part played in it by a group of American nurses. Our play tells of the time when England, fighting for her very life, was threatened by a new enemy more terrible than any across the channel, typhoid fever. As our story continues, nurse Elizabeth Phillips and the other American nurses are interviewing patients trying to find the source of the typhoid epidemic. Try and think, Mrs. Fry, ten days before you were taken sick. That's a long time back to remember. I know, but please try. Please. What did you have for dinner, for breakfast and lunch? It's very important that you remember everything. The fever, Mum, to remember. Well, you remember. It was the 26th. The 26th? That should be easy enough. The 26th was my Freddy's birthday. For breakfast, we had the usual. A cup of tea and toast. For lunch, a bit of fresh fish caught by Mr. Thomas. Down the street. For tea, a bit of cold mutton. And for a sweet, Mrs. Fry. My Freddy brought all my pair of penny fancies from the bakery shop across the way. So, you see, there was nothing unusual in what I ate. Fish and chips, that's what it was. Fish and chips and nothing more. Since we've been bombed up, Mum's not been doing the cooking at once. She did. And that's all, Gwen? No, it was not. I was so hungry on my way to work, I did stop in at Jack's bakery for a bit of cake. What kind of cake, Gwen? Let me see. Oh, yes, and good it was, too. A penny fancy. Tell me a penny fancy for a treat. After supper, we had these penny fancies. Why, that night for tea, we had a penny fancy. Was it penny fancy? Penny fancy. Penny fancy. Oh, good evening, ladies. Good evening. Is this Jack's bakery shop? Indeed it is, ma'am. What'll it be now? Blackberry tart, nice and fresh. Well, look at what you have. Are you the proprietor, sir? I'm Mr. Jack. Mr. Jack, excuse me for seeming to pry, do you bake your own goods here? Most often. And no one can say we use anything but the best, even these war times. Do you sell penny fancies? Penny fancies, indeed I sell them. And how many will you have? Which are they in the case, please? These here, nice and fresh. Why, they're sort of cream puffs. Cream. No, you don't be finding real cream in Bristol these days, I'm afraid, ma'am. That's a substitute due to the war. Mr. Jack, do you make these? Not these, ma'am. I'm now well-bought of the penny, so I get my supply, as most bakers in Bristol do, from the Evan Baking Limited. That's the name. That's the name Dr. Perry mentioned. I'll make a penny fancy right now, Mr. Jack. But Dr. Perry, I'm sure the Evan Baking Company has no health violations. We're not blaming the company, Mr. Akin. But the microscope showed that the oil cream in your penny fancies was infected with typhoid resilience. And that means there must be a human carry in the plant. Oh, we're sure you are. Still, typhoid can get by the best technicians. We only want to make a few tests, Mr. Akin. What tests? Of the girls who fill the penny fancies. You haven't made any shipments today, have you? No, not a one, Doctor, after your order came down. We sent inspectors to get every bit of stock back from the retail store. How many girls did you say are working at the filling table? Five. All steady workers. Hand careful. Those at that table. Oh, well, let's stop here where we can watch them. They look very clean. We're sure of that, Dr. Perry. Is Miss Cree ready with the vino punctures? Yes, she's all set up in the order office. Will you ask them to report to her, Mr. Akin? Yes. Do you want them in any special order? No, it doesn't really matter. Send that young blonde girl in first. And that's Eleanor Barnes. All right, then in the order they are on the table, the tall girl on this end will be last. Very well. She's our newest girl. Only been here about three weeks. Her name is Margaret Wicks. Your arm, please, Miss Wicks. What's this all about? That's what I'd like to know. Miss Wicks, we're sorry to have to take a little of your blood. Mr. Akin's told me something like that, and I'll have none of it. We're trying to help the people of Bristol. What do you mean? Well, someone here must be a carrier of typhoid germs. Perhaps it's you, Miss Wicks. Me? I ain't no such thing. Well, the only way to be sure is by making these blood tests. It'll hurt very little, Miss Wicks. The other girls have had theirs taken. All right. But I... That hurts, it does. It'll stop hurting shortly. There. Now hold this piece of cotton over the needle while I pull it out. What do you think us working girls are? Miss Wicks is the last one, Miss Phillips, and I've arranged for the other samples to be tested. Fine, and thank you, Miss Wicks. You've helped us a great deal. Now we'll really know. Now we'll be sure. 27 White Lady Road is the next house. It's next to the corner, Miss Phillips. Dr. Power, I do think that girl stayed away from work on purpose to avoid us. She was so difficult when Cree took her blood yesterday. Well, she'd probably frightened, but we don't see she cooperates. I'm sure she will, and we explain what it means to other people being a typhoid carrier. No new cases reported today, and with Margaret Wicks under control, well, yes, here we are, number 27. Now we'll see. She's living with a Sanders family. Wasn't that the name? This is the bill. I'm hoping the girl's here. Yes. Are you Mrs. Sanders? I am. What do you want? I'm Dr. Perry, Medical Officer of Bristol. Is there a girl named Margaret Wicks living with you? Oh, it's about the fever. Yes, it is. She didn't go to work today. Could we speak to her? Well, she ain't here. What? She's gone left this morning. Where is she gone? We have to know, Mrs. Sanders, it's very important. Well, but I thought that's why you were there. It's quite a time I had with the poor girl. She took deathly sick last night. I called the ambulance, shipped her off to Amgreen Hospital. What was the matter with her? Didn't you know the doctor who was here said typhoid? Typhoid? Oh, but carriers don't get typhoid, Dr. Perry. You know they don't. Not so far as medical experience goes. Oh, then we'll weigh off the track again. Someone else is infecting those cakes, and we still have to find out who. Took blood tests of all the girls, Mrs. Phillips? Then maybe it isn't the cakes at all. No, wait. We know it's the cakes. That's barely possible. This is a rare case, an exception. We're going to visit Margaret Wicks at Amgreen and find out. Doctor, am I going to die? Of course not, young lady. Now, just rest quietly and answer some of our questions. You know I never meant to do anything wrong. And you didn't do anything wrong. You see, Margaret, we think you've been carrying this typhoid germ wrong for a long time, and you didn't know. You couldn't know. So you accidentally put the germs in the penny fancies. Then why wasn't I sick too? For a long time. And that's what we're trying to find out, Margaret. Margaret, do you suppose you could remember what you ate over the bank holiday? Everything you ate. It's not easy, Miss. I didn't work at all for three days, so I ate in there with friends or had tea in the little shop across the way. Most of the time I just fixed myself a bit at Mrs. Sanders. Did you eat any penny fancies? Oh, yes, Miss. Took borough home with me for Mrs. Sanders, and then Sunday night I saw she hadn't touched them, so I ate them all. Couldn't let them waste, though they were a bit stale. Dr. Perry? Yes, that would explain it. That oil cream is such an ideal incubation material. For the time, Margaret ate those penny fancies, she must have gotten a lethal dose of typhoid germ. Enough to infect her, even though she is a carrier. I am going to die. No, you're not. Being a carrier, you'll have a strong natural immunity, then I'm sure it will save you. And don't you see, Margaret, by answering our questions and by cooperating with us, you've saved hundreds of people. Maybe you've saved England. I did, Miss. Well, you, Margaret, and these American nurses, Miss Phillips and the rest. You're from America, Miss. Whatever you're doing, why over here in Bristol? We're nurses, Margaret, and it's our job to use our training wherever it's needed most. You did more than your job, Miss Phillips. Oh, no, Doctor. When the results of hard work are smiling, healthy faces, every bit of it's worthwhile. Our thanks to you, Clare Trevor, and to all other members of tonight's DuPont cavalcade. When I read about the launching of a ship called the USS Hydrogen, I thought it was a pretty odd name for a ship. But I find the United States Maritime Commission is building a whole little fleet of vessels with chemical names, the argon, the carbon, the radium, and a lot of others. Let me tell you a bit more about the Hydrogen. She's made of concrete, the first concrete reefership of her type which is a floating refrigerator, a big one. She manufactures 500 gallons of ice cream and 20 tons of ice a day. Nicknamed as the ice cream ship. The ice cream ship is out in the South Pacific now working for the Army. I don't have to tell you why soldiers and sailors like ice cream, they like it for the same reason you do because it tastes good and it's good for you. It's because all of us know thousands of tons of dairy products are going to the men on the fighting fronts that we take it good-naturedly when we can't buy a double-dip cone or more than a pint of ice cream. They need tons of ice in the South Pacific too. I'm going to ask Jane Whitman to tell you more about it. Refrigeration is very important in war, especially in the tropics. All our warships have refrigeration systems from submarines to battle wagons. For comfort, to protect foods, and to condition explosives. Our 50 new baby flat tops all carry refrigerating machines to cool meat, dairy products, vegetables, fruit, and to manufacture ice in 25-pound blocks. Their machines use Freon-12 refrigerant, the safe DuPont refrigerant used probably in your own refrigerator. At the present time, genetic chemicals incorporated, owned jointly by General Motors and DuPont, has developed a new refrigerant in the series Freon-22, which is the ideal refrigerant for very low temperatures. With Freon-22 after the war, using smaller and less costly compressors, manufacturers will be able to produce entirely different kinds of low-temperature refrigerating systems. You'll be able to obtain temperatures as low as 100 below zero for quick freezing and industrial uses. And in the future, genetic chemicals will bring you other Freon refrigerants. The aim is to provide a whole range of them, so you can have a refrigerant for every purpose. Freon refrigerants are examples of DuPont better things for better living through chemistry. Tonight's play, Penny Fancey, has told one story of what the brains and initiative of American nurses have done overseas. There are many other stories we could have told. Thousands of American women have already taken their place beside these women of the Harvard hospital unit. As Army and Navy nurses, but right now, we need for still more of this self-sacrificing work on behalf of American men at arms. We must be able to tell countless more stories of the skill and heroism of America's sisterhood of nurses. Yet even now, hospital units are leaving to go overseas without nurses to go with them. If you are a registered nurse, you are urgently needed by men with battle wounds. Get in touch with your Red Cross, won't you, or send a telegram to the Surgeon General of the Army in Washington, D.C., and please do it now. Whether the world is fighting a war or whether it is at peace, there is always one mighty struggle going on. The struggle of science against nature and medicine against death. In a sense, it is a race, a race for time, a race for some human being's life. Next week, our cavalcade play is the story of one round in this never-ending struggle, the story of doctors banding and best, and their victory over diabetes through the use of insulin. Be with us next week when Vincent Price and Richard Worf will co-star in a race for Lenny. Thank you and good evening. Clare Trevor, star of tonight's cavalcade, may currently be seen in RKO's Murder, My Sweet. The music was composed and conducted by Robert Ambrester. This is Gain Whitman sending you best wishes from cavalcade sponsor Vincent Dinamoys and company of Wilmington, Delaware. This is the national broadcasting company.