SAGES OF SANDPOINT Sandpoint is full of remarkable individuals, but the following four sages, all men in their 90s, are special not only because they are doing remarkable things but because they’ve been doing them for a remarkably long time, and they continue to make significant contributions.
By Cate Huisman Photos by Jesse Hart
FORREST BIRD
Forrest Bird, 92, aviator, inventor and biomedical engineer
patients with lung problems. The first Bird Universal Medical Respirator, later known as the Bird Mark 7, went into production in 1958. The more recent models, now known as Percussionators, ventilate “kinda like a dog pants, very rapidly,” as he puts it. Ironically, Mary contracted pulmonary emphysema. Using her in his research, Dr. Bird perfected his Intrapulmonary Percussive Ventilator, extending her life for 10 years before she died in 1986. He is most proud of his ventilator for infants, nicknamed the “Babybird,” which has saved more lives than anything else he has invented. It gives newborns with respiratory problems a chance to survive until their lungs are ready to support them. Introduced in 1970, it reduced respiratoryrelated infant mortality from 70 percent to 10 percent. Despite the fame of his inventions, Bird kept a relatively low profile in Sandpoint until he and current wife, Pam, opened the Bird Aviation Museum and Invention Center in 2007. The entire town of Sandpoint was invited to his 90th birthday party there in 2011, at which, to his surprise, he was awarded another of his numerous awards, the American Association of Pediatricians Neonatal Pioneer Award for his contribution to the care of newborns through the Babybird. Other accolades include the Presidential Citizen’s Medal, awarded by the second President Bush, and the National Medal of Technology & Innovation from President Obama. In 1995 he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame. Local appreciation for him is more tangible; readers might recognize his name from the Forrest Bird Charter School.
Encouraged by his father, a World War I aviator, Dr. Forrest Bird learned to fly when both he and aviation were quite young. He completed his first solo flight at the age of 14, nearly 80 years ago, and by 16, he was working toward earning major flight authorizations. In 1937, he witnessed aviation history twice. Around noon on May 6, he flew his father’s 1927 Waco next to the doomed Hindenburg airship as it passed near his Massachusetts home; it exploded in flames just hours later. That fall, on a trip to the Cleveland Air Races, he met Orville Wright. “I looked up to him because I loved aviation, and he started it,” said Bird. By the time he entered the Army Air Corps in 1941, Bird already had so many hours of flying time that he was able to advance quickly, piloting nearly every aircraft in service. During and after World War II, he worked on breathing devices for flying at extreme altitudes, and this led to an interest in making breathing apparatus for medical uses. He tested his respirator by traveling in his own airplanes to medical schools and asking doctors for their most ill patients. He married a Sandpoint girl, Mary Moran, and built his business and home on 300 acres in the woods south of Sandpoint, at the end of the road on Glengary Bay. Although he has more than 200 patents to his credit, Bird is most famous for having developed respirators for
WINTER 2014
061-079_SMW14.indd 61
SANDPOINT MAGAZINE
61
10/17/13 3:16 PM