Jennifer Bannon

Five Ladies and a Forklift Jennifer Bannon

Intent on reducing the number of SIDS cases in America, the executive director of SIDS of Pennsylvania, Judy Bannon, and her nonprofit staff set out to discover why babies were still dying in spite of the highly successful Back to Sleep campaign by the National Institutes of Health. Case studies indicated that while fewer middle- and upper-class babies were dying, the number of low-income babies succumbing to SIDS hadn't changed.

After poring over local death investigation forms, Bannon's team noted a startling trend-90 percent of the babies had been found in unprotected sleeping environments such as adult beds and couches. Was it possible that these tragic deaths were due to the simple fact that parents couldn't afford safe places for their babies to sleep?

Five Ladies and a Forklift recounts the inspiring story of how Judy launched Cribs for Kids-from her early struggles trying to convince others of the importance of safe sleep to the creation of the public-private partnership model that has allowed the organization to transform into a multimillion-dollar nonprofit that is reaching parents all across the country and saving thousands of babies every year.