Armstrong – Table of Contents

Based on the initial early results of Armstrong’s investigation, on January 24,
1930, President Herbert Hoover (5) issued Executive Order No. 5264 which “prohibited
the immediate importation of parrots into the United States, its possessions and
dependencies from any foreign port except under such conditions as might be prescribed”
until the causative organism and means of transmission of psittacosis could be studied.
Surgeon General Cumming, at the same time, started holding regular staff meetings to
put into effect the provisions of the executive order. Over time and into the present era,
regulations for the importation of parrots and other exotic birds have been established and
administered by various United States government agencies (5, 9).
Armstrong and his trusted laboratory technician, Henry “Shorty” Anderson, (5, 6,
7) delved immediately into efforts involving irritable, aggressive birds that demonstrated
extremely unhygienic habits. The birds projected their fecal and oral droppings out of
their cages onto the floor surrounding their cages and scattered their food in similar
fashion. The cages were improvised arrangements consisting of a few conventional open
cages but primarily of metal garbage cans with wire mesh covers on top. Armstrong was
aware that the ill birds were highly contagious. He tried to confine potential infection
from the rest of the building by working with his assistant in two small dark basement
rooms. For other primitive sanitary precautions, they kept the birds behind moist curtains
soaked in disinfectant, and they placed troughs containing cresol in the doorways. They
also scrubbed down the walls and floors with disinfectant. They did try to take some
minimal isolation precautions themselves; they worked with heavy rubber gloves and
wore either laboratory aprons or smocks. The modern extensive bio-safety protective
measures were not in common use in microbiology research institutions in the 1920-