By now most people have probably forgotten the story of a frail heroine from the Philippines named Josefina ("Joey") Guerrero. After the Japanese invaded the Philippines. Joey became a guerrilla; when the Americans landed on Leyte in World War II. Joey continued to be a U.S. spy. flitting back & forth across the Japanese lines, carrying messages, maps. food, clothes. She had a sure immunity from capture: her face and body were blotched with the sores of leprosy, of which the Japanese soldiers were morbidly fearful.
After the war, a grateful U.S. War Department decorated Joey with the Medal of Freedom with silver palm, the third highest award that can be given to a foreign civilian. Later the Justice Department waived immigration restrictions, gave her a temporary visa to enter the U.S. for treatment at the Carville, La. leprosarium. After TIME reported the story of her wartime exploits and her arrival at Carville (TIME, July 19, 1948), more than 4,000 readers wrote letters expressing their sympathy and interest in Joey's future.
Last month I received a note from Joey herself. It was a simple note of personal triumph. It read: "Dear Mr. Linen. This is it! I thought you might like to know that I made it! I wanted you to rejoice with me." With the note was the announcement that Joey was graduating from the high-school class conducted for patients of the Carville hospital. I asked TIME'S local correspondent Ed Clinton to send us a report on Joey's school career and her graduation.
On her graduation day, reported Clinton, Joey was no longer wan and nervous. Treatment had brought her disease almost to the arrested point, and only a few pocked scars remained. Dressed in a white cap and gown, she mounted the steps to the stage of the hospital auditorium to make the valedictory address to some 400 fellow patients and friends, including the Philippine consul from New Orleans.
Joey told her story with simple feeling. The last five years had not been easy ones. Shortly after her arrival at Carville. her illness was complicated by an attack of double pneumonia. Said she: "I was sick. I was tired, I was disgusted, and there would be moments when everything seemed wrong and without purpose. And then, the thought would come: I have to give an accounting of my time. What have I invested? What have I saved? What interest have I earned? Where are my profits? No, I simply could not stop. I must go on. What would I do if I were suddenly to leave the hospital? I cannot live forever on the charity of my friends. I must stand on my own two feet. But on what? With stilts? With crutches? With leaners? No, while I am here, I must do something tangible with my time. I decided to invest at least four or five hours a day to study."
So, along with her regular treatment, Joey began her investment. It had been a long time since her student days in a Manila convent. The return to books was not easy. She plunged into a schedule of classes that lasted from 8:30 in the morning until midafternoon, five days a week, with every seventh week off for a rest.