Tuesday, November 17, 2009

1918 Influenza Pandemic

"When we think of plagues, we think of AIDS, Ebola, anthrax spores, and, of course, the Black Death. But in 1918 the Great Flu Epidemic killed an estimated 40 million people virtually overnight. If such a plague returned today, taking a comparable percentage of the U.S. population with it, 1.5 million Americans would die."(source)

"In the fall of 1918 the Great War in Europe was winding down and peace was on the horizon. The Americans had joined in the fight, bringing the Allies closer to victory against the Germans. Deep within the trenches these men lived through some of the most brutal conditions of life, which it seemed could not be any worse. Then, in pockets across the globe, something erupted that seemed as benign as the common cold. The influenza of that season, however, was far more than a cold. In the two years that this scourge ravaged the earth, a fifth of the world's population was infected."(source)

"As the world's peoples were celabrating the end of war, the end of dying, and a fresh beginning, the second and most virulent of three waves of a new killer, 'Spanish Influenza', rages with freocity greater than all the killing power of the previous four years of war, killing tens of millions."(source)

"In the ten months between September 1918 and June 1919, 675,000 Americans died of influenza and pneumonia. When compared to the number of Americans killed in combat in World War I, World War II, Korea, and Vietnam combined- 423,000- it becomes apparent that the influenza epidemic of 1918-1919 was far more deadly than the war which it accompanied. (Crosby, 206-207) The United States and the rest of the world had been exposed to such epidemics in the past, but never at such a severe cost in human life."(source)

"If you had lived in the early twentieth century, your life expectancy would have been much shorter than it is today. Today, life expectancy for men is 75 years; for women, it is 80 years. In 1918, life expectancy for men was only 53 years. Women’s life expectancy at 54 was only marginally better."(source)

"The plague did not discriminate. It was rampant in urban and rural areas, from the densely populated East coast to the remotest parts of Alaska. Young adults, usually unaffected by these types of infectious diseases, were among the hardest hit groups along with the elderly and young children. The flu afflicted over 25 percent of the U.S. population. In one year, the average life expectancy in the United States dropped by 12 years"(source)


"The impact of this pandemic was not limited to 1918–1919. All influenza A pandemics since that time, and indeed almost all cases of influenza A worldwide (excepting human infections from avian viruses such as H5N1 and H7N7), have been caused by descendants of the 1918 virus, including "drifted" H1N1 viruses and reassorted H2N2 and H3N2 viruses. The latter are composed of key genes from the 1918 virus, updated by subsequently incorporated avian influenza genes that code for novel surface proteins, making the 1918 virus indeed the "mother" of all pandemics."(source)

"Overall the United States was the least affected with some 675,000 deaths. The biological origins of the flu may have been from birds, transmitted to pigs, and as it mutated to humans. It was the most devastating epidemic in recorded history and depressed life expectancy in the United States by ten years. With the close of the war in Europe and the transition to the roaring twenties those who survived tried to move on. The impact was hard to measure at the time but the destabilization in Spain with the death of the King was the precursor to events that would contribute to the unthinkable Second Great War."(source)

Book 1
Book 2

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

WWI

"(1914 – 18) International conflict between the Central Powers — Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Turkey — and the Allied Powers — mainly France, Britain, Russia, Italy, Japan, and (from 1917) the U.S. After a Serbian nationalist assassinated Archduke Francis Ferdinand of Austria in June 1914, a chain of threats and mobilizations resulted in a general war between the antagonists by mid-August. Prepared to fight a war on two fronts, based on the Schlieffen Plan, Germany first swept through neutral Belgium and invaded France. After the First Battle of the Marne (1914), the Allied defensive lines were stabilized in France, and a war of attrition began."(source)
"The explosive that was World War One had been long in the stockpiling; the spark was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austria-Hungarian throne, in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914. Ferdinand's death at the hands of the Black Hand, a Serbian nationalist secret society, set in train a mindlessly mechanical series of events that culminated in the world's first global war."(source)

"The causes of World War One are complicated and unlike the causes of World War Two, where the guilty party was plain to all, there is no such clarity. Germany has been blamed because she invaded Belgium in August 1914 when Britain had promised to protect Belgium. However, the street celebrations that accompanied the British and French declaration of war gives historians the impression that the move was popular and politicians tend to go with the popular mood."(source)

"World War 1 became infamous for trench warfare, where troops were confined to trenches because of tight defenses. This was especially true of the Western Front. More than 9 million died on the battlefield, and nearly that many more on the home fronts because of food shortages, genocide, and ground combat. Among other notable events, the first large-scale bombing from the air was undertaken and some of the century's first large-scale civilian massacres took place, as one of the aspects of modern efficient, non-chivalrous warfare."(source)

"Foreign policy was only occassionally an issue of broad concern in the United States in 1914. The country was excited over 'the slendid little war' with Spain, but that war lasted only a few months.The number of people actually involved with national security affairs-such as army and navy personal, diplomats, or colonial administrators-was miniscule. Contemporaies and historians debated the morality of conquering The Philipines and Theodore Roosevelt's methods in acquirering control over Panama. They disagreed over the meaning of the Open Door Policy for Asia and the purposes of dollar diplomacy. But these issues, as important as they were, did not immediatly bring fundamental changes to the character of the nation or the lives of the people. In 1914 an era passed. Foriegn policy suddely determined the nation's future. The ocassion was the outbreak of war in Europe."(source)

"By 1918 there were strikes and demonstrations in Berlin and other cities protesting about the effects of the war on the population. The British naval blockade of German ports meant that thousands of people were starving. Socialists were waiting for the chance to seize Germany as they had in Russia. In October 1918 Ludendorff resigned and the German navy mutinied. The end was near. Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated on November 9th 1918. On 11th November the leaders of both sides held a meeting in Ferdinand Foch's railway carriage headquarters at Compiegne. The Armistice was signed at 6am and came into force five hours later"(source)

"World War One was a milestone in U.S. History.While winners and losers in Europe came out of the war crippled, the United States, in many ways, gained in stature. The nation, at last, had become a world power. With all the pride and hardships that role brought with it."(source)

Book 1
Book 2