Members of the Red Cross Motor Corps, all wearing masks to prevent the further spread of the influenza epidemic, carry a patient on a stretcher into their ambulance, Saint Louis, Missouri, October 1918. Levin on his blog, “but the present moment offers a unique opportunity for them to create their own historical record.” “History may often appear to our students as something that happens to other people,” writes Civil War historian and high school educator Kevin M. With historians and organizations urging members of the public to keep journals of their own amid the COVID-19 pandemic, these century-old musings represent not only invaluable historical resources, but sources of inspiration or even diversion. The Vermont historian’s account, housed at the state’s historical society, is one of countless diaries and letters penned during the 1918 influenza pandemic, which killed an estimated 50 to 100 million people in just 15 months. “Then the movements began and I spent a good part of the time at the seat.” “Took a seidlitz powder”-similar to Alka-Seltzer-“about 10:00 and threw it up soon so then took two tablespoons of castor oil,” Kent wrote.

Instead, the physician advised his patient to place greased cloths and a hot water bottle around his throat and chest. Watson in the morning but he couldn’t come,” Kent added. Writing in his journal, the 42-year-old described waking up with a “high fever,” “an awful headache” and a stomach bug. Kent, a historian and businessman from Montpelier, Vermont, contracted influenza in fall 1918, he chronicled his symptoms in vivid detail.

Diary of a plague year