,
Charles Armstrong,
John R. Paul, Thomas Francis Jr.,
Albert Sabin,
Joseph L. Melnick,
Isabel Morgan,
Howard A. Howe,
David Bodian,
Jonas Salk,
Eleanor Roosevelt and
Basil O'Connor. Francis grew up in
New Castle in western Pennsylvania, graduated from New Castle High School in 1917 and
Allegheny College on scholarship in 1921, and received his medical degree from
Yale University in 1925. Afterwards he joined an elite research team at the
Rockefeller Institute, first doing research on vaccines against
bacterial pneumonia, later he took up
influenza research. He became the first American to isolate human
flu virus. From 1938 to 1941 he was professor of
bacteriology and chair of the department of the
New York University College of Medicine. In 1941 he was appointed director of the Commission on Influenza of the
Armed Forces Epidemiological Board (AFEB), a position which enabled him to take part in the successful development, field trial, and evaluation of protective influenza vaccines. Later that year Francis received an invitation from
Henry F. Vaughan to join the newly established
School of Public Health at the
University of Michigan. At the University of Michigan, Francis established a virus laboratory and a Department of Epidemiology that dealt with a broad range of infectious diseases. When
Jonas Salk came to that university in 1941 to pursue postgraduate work in virology, Francis was his mentor and taught him the methodology of vaccine development. During this time at the University of Michigan, Francis and Salk, along with other researchers, deliberately infected patients at several Michigan mental institutions with the
influenza virus by spraying the virus into their
nasal passages. Salk's work at Michigan ultimately led to his polio vaccine. In 1947 Francis was awarded one of the first Michigan distinguished professorships, the Henry Sewall University Professor of Epidemiology. In addition to his work at the School of Public Health, Francis joined the
pediatrics faculty at the university's Medical School. As director of the University of Michigan Poliomyelitis Vaccine Evaluation Center, Francis designed and led an unprecedented $17.5 million nationwide field trial to test the vaccine. Conducted by a staff of more than 100 people from the University of Michigan, the year-long trial involved 1.8 million children in the U.S., Canada, and
Finland and an enormous network of community volunteers. The results of the study were announced in Rackham Auditorium of the University of Michigan on April 12, 1955, and signaled an era of hope and success in combating infectious diseases and, more broadly, in the development of large-scale efforts for the good of society. Of his work, Francis remarked: In 1933, Francis married Dorothy Packard Otton, and they had two children. He died in 1969 in
Ann Arbor, Michigan. == Honors ==