User:TSN Greg/Dr. Wayman Spence

History
Dr. Wayman Spence was born in 1934 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. In 1960 he earned his MD from the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine. He worked as a physician at a correctional facility in Lompoc, California, before setting up his practice as a physical medicine and rehabilitation specialist in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Before turning his full attention to insoles and wound care, Spence gained some fame as an anti-tobacco crusader. In 1970, he invented a three-dimensional ashtray in the shape of human lungs. When a lit cigarette was left in the ashtray, the smoke filtered through the lung, leaving behind a sticky brown deposit of tar. Spence hoped the sight of the blackened lung would inspire tobacco users to quit. The lung ashtray was sent to every member of Congress as part of a Federal Communications Commission campaign to allow free anti-smoking ads on television. Spence was a pioneer in podiatry and sports medicine, and known to run 40 miles a week. Maintaining foot health was said to be a passion, not only for himself and his fellow runners, but for his patients with diabetes and arthritis. Eventually, Spence went full speed ahead with his foot health inventions, and he is credited with creating the first silicone gels for preventing decubitus ulcers, according to a 1980 interview in Runner’s World magazine.