Epidemic
Page 31
22.William G. Shumard to Jacob Gould Schurman, April 15, 1903, CUTP.
23.“Many Fever Cases Reported in City: Number Suffer from Malady Which Differs from Typhoid,” Ithaca Daily News, January 26, 1903; “Local Fever,” Ithaca Daily News, January 26, 1903.
24.“Much Sickness: City Hospital Needs More Room—Many Cases at Infirmary,” Ithaca Daily Journal, January 28, 1903.
25.Ben P. Poor to Jacob Gould Schurman, April 20, 1903, CUTP.
26.Judson F. Clark to Jacob Gould Schurman, March 2, 1903, and March 18, 1903, CUTP. Judson Clark was the brother of Zella Marie and Annie Sophia Clark and was an assistant professor of forestry at Cornell.
27.“Drinking Water Should Be Boiled: So Advise City Health Authorities,” Ithaca Daily Journal, January 29, 1903; “Awaiting Report: Board of Health Not Certain About Cause of Prevailing Illness in City—Urge All to Boil Water,” Ithaca Daily News, January 29, 1903. Williams is not quoted in the Daily News story.
28.“Third Assembly: Delightful Social Event Given at Masonic Hall,” Ithaca Daily Journal, January 31, 1903. The author has warm thoughts for the newspaper clerk who typed in the names of the people at the gala so very long ago. These kinds of articles are drudgery for the writer but of great value in telling stories like this.
29.“Plea for Independence for the Filipino People: President J. G. Schurman’s Fine Address in Cooper Union,” New York Times, January 30, 1903.
30.“Philippine Problems: President Schurman and Gen. Greeley Address the Aldine Club,” New York Times, December 12, 1902; “Public School Education: Dr. Schurman of Cornell before the Twentieth Century Club,” New York Times, December 14, 1902; “Dr. Schurman to Speak in the West,” New York Tribune, December 23, 1902; “Free Trade for Filipinos,” Iowa State Press, January 14, 1903; “Favors Filipino Independence,” The Mansfield News, Mansfield, Ohio, January 17, 1903, reporting on Schurman’s speech at the University Club in Cleveland.
31.Lowell Daily Sun, Lowell, Mass., May 21, 1903.
32.“Third Assembly,” Ithaca Daily Journal, January 31, 1903.
33.Samuel T. Williamson, Frank Gannett, 53.
34. Lee’s presence in England during the 1901–1902 academic year is confirmed by a letter Schurman addressed to him at Oxford dated March 29, 1902, JGS. His presence in Ithaca during the 1902–1903 academic year is confirmed by a succession of news articles in which he is mentioned, including: “Fear Delivery’s Wicked Tongue: Local Democrats Show Signs of Turning From Attack, Syracuse Post-Standard, Sept. 28, 1902; “Needs of Student Life: Professor D. C. Lee Gives Interesting Talk in Barnes Hall—Tells of Oxford University,” Ithaca Daily News, Nov. 10, 1902; “Business Men’s Banquet: Arrangements Completed or Pleasant Event Tonight,” Ithaca Daily Journal, Feb. 10, 1903; and “Hill to the Front for the Presidency,” New York Times, April 14, 1903. 35. Former U.S. President George W. Bush’s great-great-grandfather, James Smith Bush, briefly taught Sunday school in the First Unitarian Church’s original building, which burned in 1893, according to a church history.
35.“Epidemic Spreads throughout the City,” Ithaca Daily News, January 31, 1903.
36.“Warning against Unboiled Water: Criminal Carelessness Alleged to Exist in City,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 24, 1903.
37.Burt G. Wilder to Andrew Dickson White, January 29, 1903, ADW.
38.“Claimed by Death,” Ithaca Daily News, February 2, 1903.
39.“Danger in Junior Week,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 2, 1903; Sisler, Enterprising Families, Ithaca, New York, 22.
40.Minutes of the Ithaca City Board of Health, February 3, 1903, Ithaca City Archives; “Fifty New Fever Cases Reported by Physicians,” Ithaca Daily News, February 3, 1903.
41.Editorial, “Fever Situation Becoming Dangerous,” Ithaca Daily News, February 3, 1903; Editorial, “The News’ Attitude on the Fever,” Ithaca Daily News, February 5, 1903.
42.Bishop, A History of Cornell, 305; Berry, Behind the Ivy, 63.
43.“Necessary Precaution,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 3, 1903.
44.“In Loving Remembrance,” Bethany Democrat, February 18, 1903.
45.“Ithaca’s Typhoid Epidemic,” New York Sun, February 6, 1903; Walter McCormick, acting mayor, and E. Hitchcock Jr., health officer, to New York Sun, February 6, 1903.
46.“Class of ’04 Gives Brilliant Prom to Largest Number Ever at Junior,” Ithaca Daily News, February 7, 1903; “Didn’t Go Home Till Morning,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 7, 1903; Shumard letter to Schurman, April 15, 1903; “In Loving Remembrance,” Bethany Democrat, February 18, 1903.
47. “Church Bells Silent: They Will Not Summon Worshipers to Service Tomorrow,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 7, 1903.
48. Ithaca Board of Health minutes, February 3 and 10, 1903, Ithaca City Archives.
49. Veranus A. Moore and Emile M. Chamot to President Jacob Gould Schurman, February 19, 1903, 4–5, Typhoid Papers, Collection #35/4/42, Department of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University.
50. Letter, Veranus A. Moore and Emile M. Chamot to President Jacob Gould Schurman, February19, 1903, 4-5, Typhoid Papers, Collection #35/4/42, Department of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University.
Chapter 10: Apocalypse
1.“Ithaca’s Typhoid Epidemic,” Philadelphia Press, February 7, 1903; “Fever Scourge Spreads; Ithaca in Great Panic,” New York Evening World, February 23, 1903; Susan E. Dufel, M.D., “CBRNE-Plague,” Medscape, http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/829233-overview, accessed June 3, 2010. A typhoid epidemic, at least in the developed world, never approached the killing ferocity of bubonic plague. The “Black Death” in the pre-antibiotic era killed 40 to 60 percent of its victims, while typhoid killed 9 to 13 percent or less, depending on available treatment and luck.
2.William Budd, M.D., Typhoid Fever: Its Nature, Mode of Spreading, and Prevention (London: Longman’s, Green & Co., 1873), 2.
3.Coville, “Ithaca Epidemic of 1903,” 209; Huckstep, Typhoid Fever and Other Salmonella Infections, 187; Hare, The Medical Complications, Accidents, and Sequelae of Typhoid, 126; “Two More Deaths,” Ithaca Daily News, February 3, 1903; “Charles E. Helm,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 3, 1903.
4.Hare, The Medical Complications, Accidents, and Sequelae of Typhoid, 78–79.
5.“James C. Vinton,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 14, 1903; “Student Dies,” Ithaca Daily News, February 17, 1903.
6.Stewart, Treatment of Typhoid Fever, 13–17.
7.Hattie M. Greaves, “Nursing in Typhoid Fever,” The Trained Nurse and Hospital Review (New York: Lakeside Publishing Co., July 1906, Vol. 37, No. 1), 287–89.
8.Stewart, Treatment of Typhoid Fever, 26; Gay, Typhoid Fever Considered as a Problem of Scientific Medicine, 217; “Ernest Brand, M.D.,” British Medical Journal, Vol. 1, 1897 (London: British Medical Association), 692.
9.Stewart, Treatment of Typhoid Fever, 50; Luzerne Coville, M.D., “Typhoid Fever: With Especial Reference to Its Incubation Period and Reincubation Cycles,” New York State Journal of Medicine, Vol. 6, 1906, 117; Charles E. Page, M.D., “The Successful Treatment of Typhoid Fever,” The Arena, September 1892, 450–60.
10.Hahnemannian Monthly, Vol. 38, 1903 (Philadelphia: Homeopathic Medical Society of the State of Pennsylvania), 640.
11.“Two More Dead at Ithaca: Nearly 400 Cases of Typhoid Fever in That City,” Baltimore Morning Sun, February 9, 1903; “More Than 20 New Fever Cases Being Treated by the Physicians,” Ithaca Daily News, February 11, 1903; “Typhoid Spreading in Ithaca: Another Cornell Student Dead—Nineteen New Cases in a Day,” New York Daily Tribune, February 11, 1903; Luzerne Coville, M.D., “The Cornell Infirmary,” unpublished manuscript, May 6, 1903, CUTP; “Fever Patients in City Number More Than 400,” Ithaca Daily News, February 9, 1903.
12.“To Give E
uchre Party for Hospital Benefit,” Ithaca Daily News, February 6, 1903; “Fever Patients in City Number More Than 400,” Ithaca Daily News, February 9, 1903; Griffis Journal, February 11, 1903; “Open-Handed Charity: Rich and Poor Responded Nobly to the Need of the Hour,” Ithaca Daily Journal, March 17, 1903.
13.James C. Bayles, M.D., “Outlook for Ithaca Growing Brighter,” New York Times, March 14, 1903; “Cornell Medical Faculty and Trustees at Odds,” New York Times, March 20, 1903; Dr. Abram Kerr to Schurman, February 18, 1903, CUTP. The prohibition on medical school involvement may have had something to do with the disputes between homeopathic and allopathic physicians. Dr. Luzerne Coville noted in his lengthy protest screed of May 6, 1903, “The Cornell Infirmary,” previously cited, that the infirmary normally hired only homeopathic nurses. The medical school was allopathic.
14.Samuel Hopkins Adams, “Typhoid: An Unnecessary Evil,” McClure’s Magazine, June 1905, 151; Coville, “The Cornell Infirmary,” Ibid.
15.“More Than 20 New Fever Cases Being Treated by the Physicians,” Ithaca Daily News, February 11, 1903.
16.In the Matter of the Estate of Edwin Besemer Deceased, Filed March 6, 1903, Tompkins County Surrogate Court, Ithaca, N.Y.; “Arthur Besemer, M.D.,” History of Rochester and Monroe County, Volume II (New York: The Pioneer Publishing Co., 1908), 1165.
17.“Funeral of Willis Dean,” Ithaca Daily News, February 20, 1903; “Stanton Griffis Marries,” Palm Beach Post, September 15, 1973.
18.“Children Safe in Local Schools: Superintendent Explains the Precautions Which Are Observed,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 26, 1903; “Warning Against Unboiled Water: Criminal Carelessness Alleged to Exist in City,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 24, 1903.
19.“Victim of Typhoid,” Ithaca Daily News, February 20, 1903; “Cesar Larrinaga,” Ithaca Daily Journal, March 7, 1903; “Dr. Lewis, State Expert, Does Some More Talking,” Ithaca Daily News, February 28, 1903. “The air is filled with farewells to the dying” comes from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem, Resignation. See, Thomas R. Lounsbury, ed. Yale Book of American Verse (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1912), Bartleby.com, 1999. www.bartleby.com/102/, accessed June 11, 2010.
20.Mentions of Louise Zinck’s illness can be found in the Ithaca Daily News editions of Feb. 18, 20, 21, 23 and 24. A brief account of her visit to a rooftop party in Syracuse, N.Y., is found in the Syracuse Sunday Herald of July 23, 1899.
Chapter 11: The Fixer
1.“Board of Health Adopts Measures to Check the Prevailing Epidemic,” Ithaca Daily News, February 4, 1903; “Water Analysis,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 2, 1903.
2.“Inspectors Officially Report on Awful Conditions along Buttermilk Creek Watershed,” Ithaca Daily News, February 17, 1903; “Health Report: Findings of City Inspector about Ithaca Water Are Sickening,” Cornell Daily Sun, February 17, 1903.
3.“The Condition of Ithaca’s Water Supply,” Editorial, Ithaca Daily News, February 17, 1903; “Prominent Business Men Speak Out against the Big Dam and Bad Water,” Ithaca Daily News, February 18, 1903.
4.“Water Company States Position,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 12, 1903. It is probably hard for any twenty-first-century reader not to think of O. J. Simpson and his search for the “real killer” after reading that quotation from Summers.
5.“Committee Begins Exploring Creeks; Canvass of City Progressing,” Ithaca Daily News, February 13, 1903; “The People’s Forum,” letter to Ithaca Daily News, February 19, 1903; “Work of Local Health Officers,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 16, 1903; “Mild Occipito-Spinal Faradization a Sure Cure of Diabetes Mellitus,” The Medical Council, Vol. 6 (Philadelphia: The Medical Council, 1901), 170.
6.See, Joel A. Tarr, “Urban Pollution: Many Long Years Ago,” American Heritage, October 1971, for the environmental impact of horses on American cities in the early twentieth century.
7.“Filth in the Streets Not Epidemic’s Cause,” Ithaca Daily News, February 10, 1903; “Find Dead Horse Near Creek’s Bed: Putrid Carcass Drained into Source of City Water Supply,” Ithaca Daily News, February 10, 1903; “Water Very Bad,” Ithaca Daily News, February 18, 1903.
8.“May Be Cause of Scourge,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 23, 1903; “Report False: Health Authorities Had Informed Journal Story Was Untrue, Yet It Was Published,” Ithaca Daily News, February 24, 1903; “Was Not Typhoid,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 24, 1903.
9.Water rental billing, May to November 1903, Ithaca Water Works to Edwin Besemer, Edwin Besemer estate file, Tompkins County Surrogate Court, Ithaca, N.Y.
10.“Swears Official of Water Company Claimed City Supply Was Not Impure,” Ithaca Daily News, February 27, 1903.
11.Richard Summers and Louisa Waterman were on the patient list printed by the Ithaca Daily News on February 18, 1903. Allen Treman is mentioned in a story in the Daily News on March 2, 1903. Charles E. Treman’s departure to Europe is mentioned in a regrets note he submitted in advance of the February 21, 1903, meeting of the Cornell Board of Trustees, Executive Committee Files, #2/5/5, Department of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University Library; “R. T. Summers, 28, Dies Following Brief Illness,” Ithaca Daily Journal, October 5, 1923.
12.“Minor Accident: T. W. Summers Felled by a Mail Bag,” Ithaca Daily Journal, January 30, 1903; “A Gas Explosion Occurred in Hornellsville Last Evening,” Elmira Advertiser, February 3, 1903; “Explosion at Hornellsville: Accident at Plant of Hornell Gas Light Company,” Elmira Daily Gazette & Free Press, February 3, 1903.
13.Veranus A. Moore and Emile M. Chamot to Jacob Gould Schurman, February 19, 1903, CUTP.
14.“Cornell to Probe Causes of Fever: President Schurman Promises That Something Will Be Done,” Ithaca Daily News, February 11, 1903; “Pres. Schurman on City’s Health: Says Emphatically There Is No Cause for Alarm,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 11, 1903.
15.Minutes of the Cornell University Executive Committee, February 16, 1903, EC; Gardner S. Williams to Jacob Gould Schurman, February 13, 1903, CUTP; “Businessmen Indignant over Water Co.’s Scheme,” Ithaca Daily News, February 17, 1903; “Campus,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 17, 1903, 3, 7.
16.“Cornell Students Want Pure Water,” Ithaca Daily News, February 17, 1903; “C. J. Schlenker Died at Cornell Today,” Batavia Daily News, Batavia, N.Y., February 17, 1903.
17.“Student Petition to the President and Board of Trustees,” February 17, 1903, Records of the Executive Committee, #2/5/5, Department of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University Library; “Minutes of the Special Meeting of the Executive Committee,” February 17, 1903, Records of the Executive Committee.
18.“University Men Want Safeguard,” Ithaca Daily News, February 18, 1903.
19.“Common Council Gives Ithaca Chance to Own Water Works,” Ithaca Daily News, February 19, 1903; “Pure Water for Ithaca By Next September,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 19, 1903; “Filtering Plant for Cornell: City Council Accepts the Proposition Made by the University,” New York Tribune, February 19, 1903.
20.Editorial, “Let There Be No Halfway Business,” Ithaca Daily News, February 19, 1903.
21.Jacob Gould Schurman to Arthur W. Hickman, February 11, 1903, JGS; Jacob Gould Schurman to Andrew D. White, March 9, 1903, ADW.
22.“What Matters the Ten-Cent Sale?” Ithaca Daily News, February 14, 1903; “Sad, Sad Story,” Ithaca Daily News, February 16, 1903. The increase in the circulation of the Ithaca Daily News is derived from two documents. “The News Circulation,” an editorial published on January 8, 1902, says that the average daily circulation during the previous month was 2,929. A letter of recommendation written for Frank E. Gannett Jr. by publisher Duncan Campbell Lee on May 15, 1903, states the current circulation to be 4,200, or a 43 percent increase over January 1902.
23.There was clearly at least one other important student str
inger, based on a vituperative letter to the Ithaca Daily Journal on February 24, 1903, written by Sidney Graves Koon, a student. Koon claimed the stringer boasted that he “owned the Associated Press” and “all of the New York papers except one.” Koon mentions that this stringer had already received his bachelor’s degree and was working on another degree, which eliminated Lynn George Wright as a candidate. Wright received his bachelor’s degree in 1903.
24.“The Death of Lynn G. Wright, Managing Editor of Printer’s Ink,” Printer’s Ink, article published in 1919. Copy of obituary found in Lynn George Wright’s alumni file at Division of Manuscripts and Archives, Cornell University Library; Constance Frick, The Dramatic Criticism of George Jean Nathan (Port Washington, N.Y.: Kennikat Press, 1972. Reissue of original Cornell University Press edition), 6–7.
25.Frank E. Gannett Jr. to Jacob Gould Schurman, February 15, 1903, CUTP; affidavit of A. T. Seaman, Watson W. Lewis, L. G. Wright, and Charles A. Stevens, reporters for the Ithaca Daily News, February 14, 1903, CUTP.
26.Jean Folkerts and Dwight L. Teeter Jr., Voices of a Nation: A History of Media in the United States (New York: MacMillan, 1989), 248; “Class of 1872, Brainard Gardner Smith,” Hamilton College Archives, Clinton, New York.
27.Alumnus, “Communication,” letter to Cornell Daily Sun, February 18, 1903.
28.“Many Students Hear President,” Ithaca Daily Journal, February 19, 1903; “Cornell Will Run Boarding House for Men During Present Epidemic,” Ithaca Daily News, February 19, 1903.
29.“Goes With Bryan: Manton M. Wyvell an Enthusiastic Cornell Student,” The Sunday Herald, Syracuse, N.Y., October 28, 1900; “The Mass Meeting,” Cornell Daily Sun, February 21, 1903.