yellow fever — Bunk History

Newspaper lithograph of people fleeing the yellow fever epidemic on a boat in Mississippi.

The Sick Society

The story of a regional ruling class that struck a devil’s bargain with disease, going beyond negligence to cultivate semi-annual yellow fever epidemics.

by Malcolm Harris, Kathryn Olivarius via n+1 on September 2, 2022

Illustration of yellow fever victims in pain on park bench while another man flees

How Yellow Fever Intensified Racial Inequality in 19th-Century New Orleans

A new book explores how immunity to the disease created opportunities for white, but not Black, people.

by Kathryn Olivarius, Karin Wulf via Smithsonian on April 19, 2022

Richard Allen (above) and Absalom Jones' "A Refutation". book cover

How the Politics of Race Played Out During the 1793 Yellow Fever Epidemic

Free blacks cared for those infected with yellow fever even as their own lives were imperiled.

by Alicia Ault via Smithsonian on March 3, 2021

Illustrated 18th century man with hands on him

The Fever That Struck New York

The front lines of a terrible epidemic, through the eyes of a young doctor profoundly touched by tragedy.

by Carolyn Eastman via Smithsonian on February 26, 2021

Patients and Patience: The Long Career of Yellow Fever

Extending the narrative of Philadelphia's epidemic past 1793 yields lessons that are more complex and less comforting than the story that's often told.

by Simon Finger via The Panorama on May 18, 2020

A woman videochats on her phone

During Epidemics, Media (And Now Social Media) Have Always Helped People to Connect

In a devastating 1793 epidemic people transformed their newspaper into something like today’s social media.

by David Paul Nord via Made By History on April 27, 2020

America's Devastating First Plague and the Birth of Epidemiology

In the 1790s a plague struck the new American nation and killed thousands. Noah Webster told the story of pandemics and invented a field.

by Joshua Kendall via TIME on April 4, 2020

Benjamin Rush

Yellow Fever Led Half of Philadelphians to Flee the City. Ten Percent of the Residents Still Died.

Schools closed, handshaking ceased and people wore handkerchiefs over their faces as the virus ravaged what was then the nation’s capital.

by Michael E. Ruane via Washington Post on April 4, 2020

New Yorkers including Hasidic Jews walk by an outdoor tent erected as a waiting area for an urgent care clinic.

Deep Political Fissures May Worsen the Coronavirus Outbreak

If partisans see problems and potential solutions through a political lens, it will weaken our response.

by Jordan E. Taylor via Made By History on March 29, 2020

How One Federal Agency Took Care of Its Workers During the Yellow Fever Pandemic in the 1790s

Today's coronavirus pandemic has echoes in the yellow fever pandemic of the 1790s. Then, workers struggled with how to support themselves and their families.

by Julia Mansfield via The Conversation on March 23, 2020

Politics of Yellow Fever in Alexander Hamilton's America

Yellow fever ravaged Philadelphia in 1793, touching nearly everyone in the city.

by Ashley Bowen via U.S. National Library of Medicine on December 12, 2018

How Yellow Fever Turned New Orleans Into The 'City Of The Dead'

Some years the virus would wipe out a tenth of the population, earning New Orleans the nickname "Necropolis."

by Leah Donnella via NPR on October 31, 2018

The Stranger Who Started an Epidemic

A huge expansion of the population of New Orleans created the perfect environment for the spread of yellow fever, and recent immigrants suffered most.

by Anna Faherty via Wellcome Collection on June 15, 2017

An 1878 illustration from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, depicting hungry citizens in Memphis.

The Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1878

A primary source set and teaching guide created by educators.

by Samantha Gibson via Digital Public Library of America on April 7, 2016

The edifice of the Lazaretto, Philadelphia's old quarantine station.

The Philadelphia Lazaretto

Quarantine at the Lazaretto met many migrants when they arrived in 19th-century Philadelphia.

by David S. Barnes via Perspectives on History on December 8, 2022

Vaccinations in Senegal

Sending Vaccines to African Nations is Crucial. But They’re Rightly Wary About Foreign Medical Aid.

How medical humanitarianism helped facilitate exploitation of Africa.

by Gregg Mitman via Made By History on August 13, 2021

Artistic graphic of a woman holding hands with two other people

‘Solidarity, Not Charity’: A Visual History of Mutual Aid

Tens of thousands of mutual aid networks and projects emerged around the world in 2020. They have long been a tool for marginalized groups.

by Ariel Aberg-Riger via CityLab on December 22, 2020

Pandemics Go Hand in Hand with Conspiracy Theories

From the Illuminati to “COVID-19 is a lie,” how pandemics have produced contagions of fear.

by Frederick Kaufman via The New Yorker on May 13, 2020

Thomas Jefferson, Yellow Fever, and Land Planning for Public Health

Jefferson envisioned land-use policies that he hoped would mitigate epidemics – and other urban evils.

by M. Andrew Holowchak via HNN on April 19, 2020

Quarantine in Nineteenth-Century New York

As COVID-19 races through New York, we asked Lorna Ebner to tell us about previous attempts to mitigate disease in the city.

by Lorna Ebner via Books, Health and History on April 14, 2020

Trump at a press conference.

Covid-19 Needs Federal Leadership, Not Authoritarianism from Trump

Official responses to the yellow fever epidemic of 1793 shows that the refusal to accept responsibility can have catastrophic consequences.

by Grace Mallon via Made By History on April 14, 2020

Why You Should Stop Joking That Black People Are Immune to Coronavirus

There’s a fatal history behind the claim that African Americans are more resistant to diseases like Covid-19 or yellow fever.

by Brentin Mock via CityLab on March 14, 2020

Sign reading "Is your child vaccinated?"

Contagion

How prior generations of Americans responded to the threat of infectious disease.

via BackStory on February 19, 2016

Political Construction of a Natural Disaster: The Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1853

The conversation around race after Hurricane Katrina echoed discourse from another New Orleans disaster 150 years before.

by Henry M. McKiven Jr. via Journal of American History on December 1, 2007

A painting of a Staten Island harbor filled with boats, captioned "View of the Marine Hospital and Quarantine Grounds, Staten Island, New York."

Quarantine Scenes in Staten Island History

Staten Island's long battle against quarantine restrictions, from yellow fever to COVID-19.

by Carlos A. Santiago via The Gotham Center on March 19, 2025

The statue Sons of St. Augustine depicting Alexander Darnes and Edmund Kirby Smith.

The Doctor and the Confederate

A historian’s journey into the relationship between Alexander Darnes and Edmund Kirby Smith starts with a surprising eulogy.

by Cynthia R. Greenlee via Smithsonian on January 10, 2023

A blood bag

What the History of Blood Transfusion Reveals About Risk

Every medical intervention—even one with a centuries-long history—brings dangers, some of which become clear only later.

by Paul A. Offit via The Scientist on September 1, 2021

Paper Products. Powder Rooms. What Past Pandemics Left Behind Forever.

Disease reshapes our lives in surprising ways.

by Rebecca Onion via Slate on March 23, 2021

Repairs being made at the site of a water main break

What Early American Infrastructure Politics Can Teach the Biden Administration

Infrastructure plans are always political. The key is being inclusive and focusing on the public good.

by Keith Pluymers, Harrison Diskin via Made By History on March 16, 2021

Vienna’s plague column; the AIDS quilt; Mexico City’s Memorial to Victims of Violence; Berlin’s Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe

How Will We Remember This?

A COVID memorial will have to commemorate shame and failure as well as grief and bravery.

by Justin Davidson via Curbed on March 15, 2021

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