Scope and Contents Toomer (b. 1929) was born in Pasadena, California. She received her RN in 1952 from St. Joseph's College of Nursing in San Francisco, California. She joined the Army in 1953 and took basic training at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas. She served at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, until her discharge in 1955. She contracted polio in 1956 and has been confined to a wheelchair since that time. She is a successful activist, petitioning for the rights of the disabled.