Among my earliest memories is one of listening to my mother – Pat Webb, née Toner- talking about New York and the 2nd World Confederation of Physical Therapy (WCPT) Congress which she attended in 1956.
As I write this second-hand reminiscence, World Physiotherapy (as WCPT is now known) president Mike Landry is welcoming 4,000+ physiotherapists from 127 countries to the World Congress in Japan. Seventy years earlier, Mildred Elson welcomed 2,000 physiotherapists from 34 countries. According to the then president, in her welcome, it was the broadest gathering of any group ever in New York.
It sounded so glamorous! And the archival film reels confirm this – ladies in beautiful dresses – and hats. The welcome reception was held in one of New York’s most fashionable hotels and my mother had a dilemma. Her legs had swollen considerably on the long-haul flight from Dublin, Ireland, via Gander, Newfoundland to New York (then called Idlewild, now JFK). The elegant shoes no longer fitted – so the choice was miss it or go wearing rope sandals. In true physiotherapist form and despite being fashion-conscious, my mother chose the sensible option and went, wearing the unflattering rope sandals.
She became ill and the hotel doctor diagnosed ‘ptomaine’ poisoning. Coincidentally the doctor’s name was Webb, the same name as her fiancé. There must have been time for shopping as my mother bought part of her trousseau while there for her wedding the following year.
The Congress produced a newsletter every day – a different colour for each day. I often marvel at this feat – I imagine a group of women beavering away on typewriters (what are they some of you might well ask?) in some basement, then rushing off to the printers for designing, formatting and printing – to have it for the attendees to read the next morning.
There was apparently huge interest in the guest of honour, Jonas Salk, a native New Yorker who has developed the polio vaccine the previous year. His major breakthrough (later known as the Salk vaccine) was being acknowledged by WCPT as so many physiotherapists (including my mother) were treating people with polio.
She had to do a report on her attendance – accountability was an important physiotherapy principle even then. The concluding point said it all ‘……. more research is needed’.
My mother was thrilled when the Irish Society of Chartered Physiotherapy (ISCP) commemorated her attendance at the 1956 Congress forty-five years later by presenting her with a beautiful piece of Irish cut-glass at its annual conference in 2001.
It is often said that friendships made at world physiotherapy congresses can last a lifetime – and so it was for my mother. I vividly remember the exotic stamps on the Christmas cards that fell through the letterbox onto the hall floor from Canada and Sweden. Beautiful handwriting gave accounts of life in each previous year. In 2006, the Swedish physiotherapist came to Ireland and met up with my mother. Looking on, it seemed to me they just picked up where they left off fifty years before.
As late as this year, I heard another vignette. In July, I went to Bath, with former Europe Region Chair Sarah Bazin, to visit a colleague and wonderful friend of my mother’s Olwen Finaly. In reminiscing about their working together, she mentioned that she had embroidered ‘WCPT 2nd Congress’ on to a tablecloth in the physiotherapy department for a coffee morning marking for my mother’s attendance. I wonder where that tablecloth is now?
In the last minutes (literally) of my term as Irish Society of Chartered Physiotherapists (ISCP) president (2006), I watched as my mother handed over all her Congress papers (including those newsletters) to Sandra Mercer-Moore, the then WCPT president, who was in Ireland for the ISCP annual conference. These papers were a contribution to the WCPT archives.
Esther-Mary D’Arcy (author), her mother Pat Webb and WCPT Chair, Sandra Mercer-Moore
My second-hand experience of this Congress definitely ignited my interest in our great profession. On reflection, my mother was curious and questioning throughout her professional life, and I think now that was what bought her to the 2nd World Congress all those years ago.
