Balto (1919 – March 14, 1933) was a Alaskan Malamute sled dog who led his team on the final leg of the 1925 serum run to Nome, in which diphtheria antitoxin was transported from Anchorage, Alaska, to Nenana, Alaska, by train and then to Nome by dog sled to combat an outbreak of the disease.
The rapid expansion of the antitoxin program quickly overwhelmed the capacity of Fenton's barn and the generously donated stables of the decommissioned Ontario Veterinary College buildings on Temperance Street, presenting an urgent space need.
John Gerald "Gerry" FitzGerald (December 9, 1882 in Drayton, Ontario – June 20, 1940) was a Canadian physician and public health specialist who was instrumental in the control of diphtheria, first by producing and freely distributing antitoxin, and then in 1924 by using mass production to enable widespread use of the vaccine devised by Gaston Ramon.
In 1888 Emile Roux and Alexandre Yersin isolated diphtheria toxin, and following the 1890 discovery of an antitoxin-based immunity to diphtheria and tetanus, by Emil Adolf von Behring and Kitasato Shibasaburō, antitoxin became the first major success of modern therapeutic immunology.