Q 01/05

Which singer rolled up his sleeve for Salk's polio vaccine in front of reporters in October 1956?

A) Frank Sinatra

B) Pat Boone

C) Elvis Presley

D) Buddy Holly

Answer · why

C) Elvis Presley

Elvis Presley: he took the shot in New York a few hours before headlining The Ed Sullivan Show, handing the vaccine drive the biggest teen idol in Ame...

Q 02/05

Asked by Ed Murrow who owned the patent on his polio vaccine, Salk replied, 'Could you patent' what?

A) The rain

B) The sun

C) The air

D) The sea

Answer · why

B) The sun

The sun: the vaccine, he said, belonged to the people. The foundation that paid for it had in fact looked into taking out a patent, then let the idea ...

Q 03/05

Cells taken from which cancer patient in 1951 were mass-produced to test Salk's polio vaccine?

A) Henrietta Lacks

B) Rosalind Franklin

C) Virginia Apgar

D) Helen Taussig

Answer · why

A) Henrietta Lacks

Henrietta Lacks: her HeLa cells were easily infected by poliovirus, so a cell factory was set up at Tuskegee in 1953 to ship them to the laboratories ...

Q 04/05

Where was Salk born on October 28, 1914?

A) Chicago

B) New York City

C) Philadelphia

D) Pittsburgh

Answer · why

B) New York City

New York City: born in East Harlem to parents with little schooling of their own, he was pushed to study hard and became the first in his family to go...

Q 05/05

Before Salk's vaccine, which season did American parents dread as 'polio season'?

A) Spring

B) Summer

C) Autumn

D) Winter

Answer · why

B) Summer

Summer: from 1916 an epidemic struck somewhere in the United States almost every year as the weather warmed, and children were warned off swimming poo...