Smallpox, the only infectious disease to have been eradicated, was one of the most terrifying of human scourges. It covered the skin with hideous, painful boils, killed a third of its victims, and left the survivors disfigured for life. In this riveting, often terrifying look at the history of small pox, Jonathan B. Tucker tells the story of this deadly disease, the heroic efforts to eradicate it worldwide, and the looming dangers it still poses today.

Jonathan B. Tucker is an expert on biological and chemical weapons in the Washington, D.C. office of the Monterey Institute of International Studies. He studied biology at Yale University, rcieved his Ph.D. in political science from MIT, and served in the State Department, the congressional Office of Technology Assessment, and the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. He is the editor of Toxic Terror: Assessing Terrorist Use of Chemical and Biological Weapons.

Patrick Cullen, a native of Massachusetts, is a graduate of The Catholic University of America, in Washington, D.C., where he continues to live and work in the theater.