The "Lancaster County's Contribution To Solving The Coronavirus Emergency" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Watching one of my favorite daytime TV shows, "The Price Is Right", when the show is interrupted for a White House News Update.  Some days the update begins at noon while other days it begins in the middle of my show.  And, it seems that most of those that speak are trying to tell the audience, you and me, what they think we want to hear instead of exactly what is happening.  The two health officials, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the National Institutes of Health of the United States spokesman and Coronavirus response coordinator, Dr. Deborah Birx try to give those listening to the news update the most up-to-date medical knowledge of the event that is affecting the entire United States as well as the world.  Drs. Fauci and Birx try to explain the situation so that the average layperson can begin to understand the severity of what is taking place in our world.  Without Drs. Fauci and Birx, I'm afraid most people would think that we have everything under control and all will be well very soon.  As I was listening to today's update, I noticed a familiar face in the newspaper sitting next to me on the arm of my chair.  

Dr. Deborah Birx

There was Dr. Deborah Birx talking to the residents of the United States while our President stood in the background listening to a professional speak.  I grabbed the newspaper and began reading the half-page article.  Seems that Dr. Birx, Vice-President Pence's "right arm", served as the United States global AID coordinator under President Barack Obama and served in the military at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the Department of Defense.  Now she is someone whom I can trust to tell me the truth instead of half-truths as the TV viewers are receiving from time to time.  Plus, she at one time was a resident of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania when she attended Lampeter-Strasburg High School.  Seems that science and medicine were always part of Birx and her family.  Her father was an engineer while her mother was a nursing instructor.  In 1971, as a ninth-grader at Lampeter-Strasburg Junior High school, she won an honorable mention award in the Lancaster City-County Science Fair with a project titled "Record in the Rocks" which focused on paleobotany and won her the award in the general science division as well as a U.S. Army Certificate.  The following year, as a sophomore in high school, she took third place in the competition with a more in-depth version of the same project.  The following year she and her family moved out of Lancaster County, but she still continued with her science projects.  In 1973, as a 17-year-old, she won two special awards at the Interantional Science and Engineering Fair in San Diego, California.  After high school she entered Houghton College in New York, majoring in chemistry.  She earned her medical degree from Penn State College of Medicine in nearby Hershey, Pennsylvania.  From there she went into the Army where she was a physician and rose to the rank of colonel before retiring from service and beginning a career in immunology and vaccine research that eventually took her to the high-ranking position in globally focused health organizations and ultimately to the White House.  A professional that is worth listening to when they talk on TV.  I decided to visit our local newspaper's archives and found an article from May 11, 1973 that tells of her winning her award in the local science fair.  Seems that Lancaster once again is part of the history of the United States.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.  PS - click on image to enlarge it.