Deacon Matthew Smith, longtime President of the Philadelphia Chapter of the National Action Network (NAN), has made transition. He was well-respected in his neighborhood, throughout the greater community, and around the city, particularly in African American organizations that work to uplift our brothers and sisters.
For those who didn’t know him, he had a story worth telling, a story of triumph over polio. Who does that? Not many.
What is Polio? The formal word is Poliomyelitis, and it is an infectious disease caused by the poliovirus. The effects of polio have been known since prehistory; Egyptian paintings and carvings depict otherwise healthy people with withered limbs and young children walking with canes.
Mention polio to anyone born before 1955, and they instantly recall the reign of horror that held America hostage for over a decade. Thousands of children and adults who had full, active, and healthy lives were almost instantly crippled by the horrible disease known as polio.
That’s what young Matthew Smith had to deal with as a child. He was born in 1943 and lived until March 27th of this year. So you see, he was born right when the Polio disease had just begun to hit hard in America. He was 8-years old when the illness crippled him, but after enduring several surgeries over a period of three years, he recovered.
Getting through that major hurdle, Smith declared that the rest of his life would be very purposeful and directed. He excelled in school and was known throughout his neighborhood as the “smartest kid in Swansca, South Carolina,” where he was born and raised through his formative years. He was even Valedictorian of his senior graduating class. A proud graduate of a Historically Black College (HBCU), he matriculated through Benedict College in Columbia, South Carolina–after which he migrated to the North, choosing Philadelphia to be his home.
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