Pretty little five-year-old Barbara Ann Mason, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd Mason of 1 (address) in Fairfield, is the darling of the Herrin hospital staff, and maintains a cheerful attitude toward life, although death from cancer is imminent.

Barbara Ann, expected to die within a matter of months, does not know of her fate. The malignant disease has so crippled her that she can no longer run throughout the hospital, but doctors, nurses, patients and visitors keep the child’s bed flooded with toys, dolls and candies.

She came home to visit her parents Saturday afternoon and remained until Monday afternoon. Mr. and Mrs. Mason have been very brave thus far in the ghastly ordeal, and have never given Barbara Ann any indication as to her fate.

Touching stories have been appearing in numerous newspapers throughout Illinois and the surrounding states. They originated from the typewriter of Merle Jones, managing editor of the Wayne County Record, and have been distributed by news services in all parts of the country.

Following is his story after Mr. Jones visited Barbara Ann at the hospital:

Death is creeping slowly but steadily through the life blood of a beautiful blonde-headed little five-year-old girl at Herrin hospital.

Death will make no detour. He has his cancerous mission – he will not be denied, doctors say. Barbara Ann Mason is doomed to an early grave.

Barbara Ann doesn’t know it, of course. Few people know in time. Barbara Ann is living a fictitious world of chocolate cookies and ice cream, company and attentions.

Through her good right eye she sees kindness and friendliness. She doesn’t know that the patch over her left eye is a mark of blindness. She doesn’t know that all will be forever dark from behind that patch. She has no left eye.

Barbara Ann’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd Mason of Fairfield, don’t know when she became blind in that left eye. Mrs. Mason first noticed the blindness by accident when Barbara Ann was three years old.

“She said she had hurt her eye in an accident while playing,” Mrs. Mason said. “I looked first for a cinder. It was then that I noticed that the left eye was not normal. I turned on a flashlight and held it before her left eye. Then I knew she was blind in that eye.”

Then began a long search from family doctor to the University of Illinois research hospital in Chicago. There were many stops in between, too.

In September 1948, a Centralia doctor removed Barbara Ann’s left eye. The little girl had a glass eye for a while. But she was still troubled after the operation.

In November 1948, a second operation was performed in Chicago. The first operation had not been in time. Retino-blastoma, a tumor of the optic nerve, had already spread beyond the area where the first surgeon’s knife had cut.

So the surgeon’s tools were used a second time in the race to head off the disease. There was little chance that Barbara Ann would survive the operation – much less live to face death again for the third time in her five years.

After the second operation, she seemed to rally for awhile. Her parents took her home. Another biopsy revealed that tissue removed the second time was also cancerous.

Early this year the little girl grew worse. She would appear normal for a few days and then complain of sore places on her body.

Eventually a knot appeared on the top of her head. That called for a third operation. Analysis of the tissue again revealed cancer.

For the past several months she has divided her time between her home and Herrin hospital. Her parents took her to Herrin hospital because it is the hospital closest to their home which has equipment to give deep therapy x-ray treatments.

But the treatments have been only temporary stop-gaps. Other bumps began to appear on the little girl’s shoulders, neck and temples. They came one at a time at first. The treatments would arrest one at a time – and she would go home.

Then the bumps started coming more frequently. They came faster than treatment would arrest them. So the little girl is now a full-time hospital patient.

Retino-blastoma is like a spinning wheel. Round and round it goes, and where it stops, nobody knows. It might hit the brain first. It might hit the liver. It might strike somewhere else – but it is already coiled with rattlesnake precision ready to strike a vital spot.

How long Barbara Ann will live is out of the hands of doctors. Her limbs are withering. Her joints are becoming sore and stiff. She no longer can run amok through the hospital where she long ago became the darling of doctors, nurses, patients and visitors.

Her case has touched the hearts of both men and women long accustomed to suffering and death. She has no special nurses but none are necessary. She lies in a six-bed ward where older patients can look in her direction with the feeling that perhaps they are luckier than Barbara Ann.

Not an employe or doctor at the hospital is unmindful of Barbara Ann. They all remember that just a few short days ago she bounced around the hospital with the cheerfulness of any youngster. She isn’t anybody’s patient – she’s everybody’s patient. Practically every doctor who see her would forfeit his life’s income – maybe more- if he knew how to cure her.

One day recently, Dr. Leo Brown, one of the hospital’s top staff members, observed a birthday. The hospital crew threw an impromptu party. Somebody remembered Barbara Ann and took her to the party.

Barbara Ann also had a present for Dr. Brown – a handkerchief. The present befitted the occasion. Dr. Brown wept at the thought that the future of such a sweet child was behind her. So did everybody else.

Barbara Ann’s case is not a rarity, and yet, it is not a common one, either. Cancer strikes children in three major forms. In no case is the chance of recovery better than 50 percent for children.

One type of child cancer is bone cancer, which may come at any age but usually comes to those under 20 years. The symptoms are vague – soreness near the joints followed by swelling.

Another type id leukemia. Publicity about children stricken with leukemia has lead to a mistaken conception that leukemia affects only children. It is most common to those aged 25 to 30. But in any case chance of recovery is no good. Proper treatment merely prolongs life about 30 percent. Symptoms are enlarged glands, puffy eyes, difficult breathing, coughing and tendency to bruise easily.

The third type of child cancer comes in the eyes. Eye squint and a gradual loss of vision are the chief symptoms. Chances of recovery are only about 50 per cent if only one eye is affected.

Cancer is not hereditary. Why it strikes where it does, nobody knows. Barbara Ann’s parents have another four-year-old daughter, Billie Joyce, who is a normal little girl. The father, 29. Is a caterpillar operator in the oil fields.

The story of Barbara Ann is not new to dozens of Herronites. One service organization has provided money to make it possible for her parents to be with her. Her bed is covered with toys and dolls. She never suffers from lack of company. Schoolgirls and grandmothers alike visit her and read stories. When no one else is around, the nurses take charge of their No. 1 patient.

Today Barbara Ann is the darling of the hospital. Within a short time she will be a memory. Years from now she will be a statistic – one of 400 children under five who die every year in Illinois from cancer.

Hope springs eternally in the hearts of medical men that some day there will be no more Barbara Ann cases. Meanwhile Barbara Ann’s world of chocolate cookies and ice cream is slowly melting away.