Armstrong – Table of Contents

“Election to membership is by nomination only submitted by an Academy
member. The candidates are selected primarily only in recognition of their distinguished
and continuing achievements in original research. Election to the Academy is considered
one of the highest honors that can be accorded a scientist or engineer.”
Armstrong’s election to the NAS occasioned again the outpouring of
congratulatory letters from former college teachers (9), Alliance, Ohio friends, and
colleagues. It was also duly noted again by Surgeon General Thomas Parran (9) who
wrote on May 1, 1944, “Dear Charlie, I was delighted to hear from Gene Dyer [Rollo
Eugene Dyer, Director of NIH] that you have recently been elected to membership in the
National Academy of Sciences. Congratulations on this well deserved recognition.
Sincerely yours, Thomas Parran, Surgeon General.”
As noted previously, although Armstrong made no major scientific discoveries in
the decade starting in 1940, this period was one of continued productivity. He continued
his ongoing studies with the rodent-adapted Lansing poliovirus strain and the virus of
lymphocytic choriomeningitis. He continued his laboratory activities during the move of
the old Hygienic Laboratory (NIH) from its Washington, D.C. location to Building No. 5
of the new Bethesda, Maryland campus in late 1940. It was during this year that he had
his initial unfortunate encounter with Q fever. He was one of the infected victims during
NIH’s first laboratory outbreak of this disease. Fortunately, he had a benign course and
was able to participate with Dr. R. D. Lillie in describing the animal and human
pathology of the infection (10). During this outbreak the Division sustained its first
casualty, Mr. Asa Marcy, a laboratory technician. The Division first hosted this organism
in 1938 when Dr. Dyer showed that the agent isolated from ticks in Hamilton, Montana