(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
It is Friday, which means it's time for StoryCorps. This morning, we revisit a story about finding inspiration in unlikely places. Jeffrey Sherman is the son of Robert Sherman of the Sherman Brothers, the songwriting duo behind many of Walt Disney's classic films. Jeffrey came to StoryCorps with his wife, Wendy Liebman, to remember how getting a vaccine as a child sparked the creation of one of the most beloved songs in a Disney musical.
JEFFREY SHERMAN: My dad always filtered everything down to its simplest form. People thought maybe he wasn't listening, but he would always listen, and then he would form his words very carefully. Words were like his religion. He brought word builders on my mom and dad's honeymoon.
WENDY LIEBMAN: (Laughter).
SHERMAN: My mom complained. He wanted to just know words, and he loved the sound of words and how they felt on your tongue. My dad and uncle had a favorite song that they had created for "Mary Poppins" called "The Eyes Of Love." But Walt Disney said, could you write something that's more in line with the philosophy of Mary Poppins? And it was all just falling flat. They were both really depressed. Well, it happened that that day, I was at school. I was about 6 years old. And they were giving us the oral polio vaccine. You know, it wasn't the shot. So I, you know, stood in line with all my friends, and we all just took this thing.
And then I got home, and my dad looked depressed. And all the shades were closed. It was very dark in the house. And I said, oh, we had the polio vaccine at school today. And he looked at me, and he goes, you let someone give you a shot at school? Did it hurt? And I said, no, no, no. They took out this little cup and put a sugar cube in it and then dropped the medicine in it, and you just ate it. And my dad looked at me and started shaking his head. And he went over to the phone, and he called Dick and told him he had something. And the next day, they wrote, a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "A SPOONFUL OF SUGAR")
JULIE ANDREWS: (As Mary Poppins, singing) A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.
SHERMAN: They had this little recording studio. My uncle usually would play, and sometimes my dad would sing backup. So they would bring home the songs, and I would hear all these songs before anybody else. And he played "A Spoonful Of Sugar," and he said, thank you for that song. I think that the love of his family and each of us kids inspired different things all the time for him. It was kind of like that was his yarn, and he could make it into the most beautiful afghan. He could take the - something mundane like that and see the magic in it.
(SOUNDBITE OF DUKE ELLINGTON AND HIS ORCHESTRA'S "A SPOONFUL OF SUGAR")
MARTIN: Jeffrey Sherman with his wife, Wendy Liebman, in West Hills, California. Their interview is archived in the Library of Congress.
(SOUNDBITE OF DUKE ELLINGTON AND HIS ORCHESTRA'S "A SPOONFUL OF SUGAR") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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