Family History Play #4--Love in the Time of Spanish Flu--1918--Another Pandemic a Century Ago

My Mother's Parents a Century Ago

After WW1, as we know, the entire world was ravished by an influenza pandemic, worse than the one we have now, since the world was recovering from a huge war, the people were weak, economies wrecked, medical science was very young compared to the current time (there was no medical support for very sick patients, no anti-bacterials, no drug therapies.) People died in the millions, all over the world.

Even in the small towns and cities in the heart of America. My Grandparents were an engaged couple: he was a young physician and she was just about to graduate from a young ladies' college in the spring of 1919--then they would be married.

In the photo, they are probably a bit older--maybe mid-twenties?

Anyway, he (being a doctor) understood there was a serious risk of contagion, illness and even death for her to remain in the school. Also, he may have been keen to get their life together started, established.  He was able to persuade her and her family for her to leave school and marry in late December, just about Christmas, of that year.  This way, he could quarantine her at his house!  

I always wondered why they married so near to Christmas. I never talked to my Grandmother about this; she passed away in 1971. But years later my Mother related the story. And it turned out that after all the years passed and he was already gone, she told Mother that she somewhat regretted not finishing her college (even though I think it was just a "light" liberal arts study, with social deportment, sewing, cooking and so on.) Well, of course she did--so she saw that all her girls finished college! And she was a life-long reader with an appreciation of art, literature, music, the domestic arts and all of that. She never worked outside the home in her life.

After my own Mother passed away in 1999, I got in touch with my Grandmother's baby half-sister, in her 80's by that time. She shared a sweet little memory (and a little scary, too): when the young couple, my Grandparents, went to the City Hall to obtain a marriage license in that cold winter of 1918, she about about 4. For whatever reason, they took her with them on the errand downtown, riding in his car--probably a Model T or similar.  As they were driving, the little girl fell out of the car onto the pavement in traffic! (The world had no idea about baby seats or seat belts at that time). She was an intrepid little person all her life, modern--so she "bounced", she laughed about it as she told me the story.  

Could they have waited and married later in 1919? Sure. Probably, she would not have gotten the flu, but who knows? What I do know: I wouldn't be here today if they had waited. Not my Mother or our entire branch of the family--since Mom was born in October of 1919. So, here's another of those cases you learn about in Family History Play: someone changes a plan, goes one way, not another---somewhere in some alternative universe or dimension maybe there is a place for results of all those "what if's", dead children, sudden world events that make us do something different???