History Snoopin': Banishment of the hated mask

Banishment of the hated mask

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by Bill Miller for the Mail Tribune

Monday, April 20th 2020

“We’re trying to save human lives here,” said Councilman John Carkin. “This council should be commended instead of getting senseless opposition.”

The crowd of at least 40 masked men hooted and booed. “It’s a highhanded outrage,” said a furious Councilman James Keene. “It smacks of the Bolsheviks.”

Medford City Council had just voted 4-3 to leave the decision of whether to abolish the mask requirement to the best judgment of the city’s board of health, a board composed of the four council members who voted in favor of keeping the masks.

It was December 1918. Jackson County was still fighting against the threat of the 1918 flu pandemic that was racing around the world and had already brought death to at least two county residents.

Mayor Charles Gates fired back at the agitators, reminding them that the flu epidemic had steadily decreased since the mandated wearing of masks had begun just three week earlier.

“There are only two classes of people opposing the masks,” he said, “those too dignified to wear them, and those who place the almighty dollar above human life.”

It had begun in early October, when Mayor Gates received a letter from Medford Dr. Elias Porter, who was studying in a Massachusetts hospital when the pandemic struck with a vengeance.

“It is the most terrible epidemic ever visiting America,” he warned, “and is very fatal. The disease appeared in Boston early in September. On the 14th of that month there were 21 deaths, and from that date until noon, Oct. 5, there have been over 80,000 cases and 2,270 deaths.”

Mayor Gates announced that starting Oct. 14, 1918, “We have decided to close all places of amusements, theaters, moving pictures, churches, lodges, schools and all public meetings of every description where people congregate, until the epidemic has subsided.”

Within days, William Barnum, one time boy-conductor on the Rogue River Valley Railway, was dead, and residents were getting sick.

Gates ordered a mandatory quarantine of anyone suffering from the flu and required a sign be posted on their door to warn the public.

By November, with 50 cases known in the county, the upper floor of Medford’s Sacred Heart Hospital was turned into an influenza ward.

Red Cross women began sewing flu masks, selling them to local stores and the public for 15 cents each.

On Nov. 24, when new cases had slowed, merchants who had lost most of their customers were delighted when the bans on gathering groups and closures were lifted.

However, two weeks later, with four deaths in four days and 150 cases of influenza, the council reinstated the gathering ban and the closures.

Also, everyone was now required to wear a mask everywhere they went, even inside where they worked. Violating the mask requirement meant a $5 fine for each offense, and over 20 men eventually were cited.

A Mail Tribune editorial supported the move. “The flu mask has been proved the best preventative, and while it entails considerable inconvenience, it is a question of safety first.”

Some merchants circulated a petition asking that the mask measure be repealed.

“The businessmen,” said City Health Officer Dr. Elijah Pickel, “are injuring their own cause. With flu masks, the individual can shop downtown without danger. Without them there would be danger on every side.”

On Jan. 4, 1919, the ban on gatherings and the mask requirement were lifted.

From the beginning, there had been 531 cases in the county, two confirmed deaths, and 26 deaths from pneumonia brought on by the flu. Sixteen deaths were in the county, outside of the cities.

“The schools reopen and all social activities will be on in full swing,” said a Tribune columnist. “It is expected that churches will be crowded again. 

Lovers of moving pictures will now be able to enjoy a show in comfort, thanks to the banishment of the hated mask.”

Writer Bill Miller is the author of five books, including “History Snoopin’,” a collection of his previous history columns and stories. Reach him at newsmiller@live.com.

https://mailtribune.com/lifestyle/banishment-of-the-hated-mask

History Snoopin': The Jackson County epidemic of 1868

The Jackson County epidemic of 1868

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by Bill Miller for the Mail Tribune

Monday, March 30th 2020

Though not a pandemic, smallpox was the scourge of 19th century America. Few diseases caused such fear and panic when it began to race through a community.

Even though Englishman Edward Jenner had shown the effectiveness of the smallpox vaccine over 70 years before the Jackson County outbreak in the winter of 1868, very few in Southern Oregon had been vaccinated.

The sudden epidemic killed over 20 men, women and children, and at least three times that number were infected but recovered.

Four hospitals were hastily set up outside the city limits and doctors assigned to each. There, those infected could safely be treated without fear of infecting others.

By New Year’s Day the town was in a panic.

Sister Mary Francis, one of the brave Roman Catholic nuns who volunteered to nurse and give comfort to those who were suffering, told a horrifying account of an infected 3-year-old little girl whose mother had just died.

“I have in my arms her youngest child,” she wrote. “Her face is as black as my dress, and the little sufferer, in trying to find a cool place, has rubbed her face on my cape and left pieces of her decaying flesh on it. Oh! This dreadful disease! No one except an eyewitness can form any idea of it.”

Two weeks later, the child died and was buried with her mother.

Jacksonville’s Board of Trustees passed stringent ordinances to combat the spread of the disease and established a fine of up to $100 for any violation.

“Each and every person residing within the town limits who has never been vaccinated or, in the opinion of a competent physician, is liable to an attack of smallpox, shall submit to vaccination.”

The town marshal was ordered to record the name of every person in town, and a statement determining whether the person had been vaccinated or had previously survived a smallpox attack.

Physicians were to be immediately notified and were required to vaccinate anyone on the list who was “unvaccinated.” The doctor would receive 50 cents for each vaccination, but would be fined up to $100 if they failed to change clothing after each vaccination.

Anyone exposed to the disease was banned in public places; including stores, bars, hotels, “private houses of amusement,” public gatherings, or even walking down the street.

Funeral processions of victims through town were not allowed, and mourners at nighttime-only burials were restricted to family. County residents who died of any infectious disease were completely barred from burial in the town cemetery on the hill.

On every home or building where infected persons were living, a visible yellow flag was required outside, as was a large sign on the door reading “Smallpox.”

The requirements were so strict that the local newspaper had to apologize for the lack of local news within its pages.

“Our paper is not interesting and we know it. No local items, but we can’t help it. The town is like the grave, but it is not our fault. Yellow flags are to be seen on every side, and if this issue partakes of the ghastly character of its surroundings, we are not to blame.”

At the end of February, it was finally over and the newspaper celebrated.

“We are rejoiced to say that smallpox has entirely disappeared from this place. Every house in which cases have occurred has been disinfected and the quarantine flags removed. We hope it may stay away, but if it should appear again, our people will be apt to recognize it.”

Writer Bill Miller is the author of five books, including “History Snoopin’,” a collection of his previous history columns and stories. Reach him at newsmiller@live.com.

https://mailtribune.com/lifestyle/the-jackson-county-epidemic-of-1868

History Snoopin': The Pandemic of the Spanish Lady

The pandemic of the Spanish Lady

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by Bill Miller for the Mail Tribune

Tuesday, March 9, 2020

They called the pandemic of 1918 the attack of the Spanish Lady, an influenza outbreak that raced from human to human and continent to continent with such incredible speed that many people feared they were watching the end of the world — and rightly so.

Not since the Black Plague had so many people around the world died in such a short period of time. Over 2,000 victims in Oregon, over a half-million in the U.S., and perhaps 30 to 100 million people died worldwide.

Ironically, Spanish Influenza didn’t start in Spain, but rather in America’s heartland — Kansas.

One March morning, a Fort Riley Army private skipped breakfast and reported to sickbay, complaining of a sore throat, headache and fever. By noon, 100 soldiers with the same symptoms joined him. In just four days, patients at the post hospital overflowed into tents

, and doctors were treating over 500 men.

Then, soldiers began to die.

Disease spreading within groups of men living in close quarters was common and didn’t worry public health officials, and so, when civilians began to get sick, no one noticed and no one sounded the alarm. Besides, Americans were getting used to soldiers dying.

For nearly a year, WWI had transformed high school students into “doughboys,” marching off to France with rifles on their shoulders, unknowingly carrying the most deadly weapon of all, the flu.

Rogue Valley residents read newspapers and watched the death toll set new records. In just one day, Boston recorded 202 victims, then

Philadelphia followed with 289, then New York City surpassed them all with 851 in a single day.

Medford physician Elias Porter, while studying at Boston’s Massachusetts General Hospital, wrote home about the “horror” he saw each day. “Patients have been ill just a few hours,” he said, “and within a few hours more they are dead.”

The plague had stayed away from the Northwest, and everyone was sure there was nothing to fear. They ignored the Mail Tribune editorial that warned, “The epidemic is sweeping westward rapidly. Its presence here is only a question of a few days.”

In September 1918, an army troop train arrived from Boston at Ft. Lewis, Washington. Within a week, the invisible virus hitchhiked by rail and highway down the coast and into the Rogue Valley.

The Spanish Lady now began knocking on valley doors. Over 200 confirmed cases in less than a week, and at least 12 of those died.

Washington state resident Bill Bezold was hoping to beat the snows in the Siskiyou Pass. With wife, Edna, two children and everything they owned stuffed into their car, the family was moving to Arizona.

They stopped in Ashland to eat. Bill began to sweat and needed medical attention. By the time they reached the hospital, Edna and an infant son showed the same symptoms.

All three died within hours and were buried in Ashland’s Mountain View Cemetery. Only their orphaned 4-year-old son miraculously survived and returned to his grandmother’s Washington home.

There never was an accurate count of the valley dead, but newspaper reports indicate that in just a three-month period, somewhere between 200 and 400 valley residents died from the influenza virus.

The “Lady” disappeared almost as quickly as she arrived, but the swift and painful deaths she left and the panic she provoked are still a part of our fading memory.

And every few years we have to wonder. Could it ever happen again?

Writer Bill Miller is the author of five books, including “History Snoopin’,” a collection of his previous history columns and stories. Reach him at newsmiller@live.com.

https://mailtribune.com/lifestyle/the-pandemic-of-the-spanish-lady

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