| Martha Lillard | |
| Birth Name: | Martha Ann Lillard |
| Birth Date: | 8 June 1948 |
| Birth Place: | Shawnee, Oklahoma, U.S. |
| Known For: | Being the last person in the iron lung |
| Family: | Cindy (sister), Daryl (brother-in-law) |
Martha Ann Lillard[1] (born June 8, 1948) is an American polio survivor who is still living in an iron lung. She became the only person after Paul Alexander's death still living in the iron lung. She contracted polio in 1953 when she was five years old.[2]
Martha Ann Lillard was born on June 8, 1948 in Shawnee, Oklahoma.[3] As a child, Lillard once had a friend named Karen Rapp, the one she would later call "that's what keeps me healthy. That's what heals me. That's what allows me to breathe the next day" [note: Lillard referred to her iron lung machine in those words, not to her friend Karen];[3] she also has a sister named Cindy and a brother-in-law named Daryl.[4]
During the 1950s in the United States, there were documented cases of polio, including Lillard. Lillard celebrated her fifth birthday on June 8, 1953 with a party at Joyland, an amusement park in Oklahoma. On June 17, 1953, over 1 week after her fifth birthday, she woke up with a sore throat and pain in her neck. Her family took her to the hospital, where she was diagnosed with polio.[5]
Later, she spent six months in the hospital, placed in a giant metal tank, a negative pressure ventilator informally called the iron lung, to help her breathe. In the end, she chose to live in the iron lung for the rest of her life.[5] Lillard at that time was one of the last people in the United States still using an iron lung.[6] In an NBC News interview in 2012, she said that when she was put in the iron lung, "When I first got into this, it was a huge relief."[7]
Lillard has gotten stuck in the iron lung once when an ice storm came through Oklahoma and her emergency generator failed to start, leaving her trapped in the device without heat. She tried to call 911 but failed, she called the situation "It's like being buried alive almost, you know — it's so scary".[8]
After Paul Alexander died on March 11, 2024, Lillard became the only person who is still living in the iron lung.[9]
Lillard spends much of her time alone. She paints, watches old Hollywood movies and takes care of her beagles. She sought isolation throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, seeing her sister Cindy and her brother-in-law Daryl in the evenings.[2]
She was homeschooled for most of her childhood and unable to participate in most extracurricular activities, though she still remembers wanting to go camping with her siblings. She cannot have children or hold a steady job because of her physical limitations.[2]
In a 2021 interview segment about her by National Public Radio, Radio Diaries, and All Things Considered, she said she was having trouble finding replacement parts to keep her machine running.[7]