Gencove Review

Some of the apps Gencove offer

UPDATE: Gencove no longer accept uploads from other companies.

Gencove sells DNA tests for $59.99, but they also offer a free upload of your raw DNA data if you tested elsewhere. With the free upload, you get all the same options you do if you tested with them, namely an ethnicity report and matching with DNA relatives.

They also offer "apps", some from third parties. There is even a Promethease app for $10, though it would be cheaper and probably easier to just upload directly to Promethease (see a full review of Promethease here). There's also an app for GenePlaza, which was also previously reviewed here. Though the app is free, GenePlaza's reports each cost a small fee. Clicking on the GenePlaza app in Gencove merely takes you to GenePlaza's website. The other apps are free too, but they aren't particularly useful. They include:

• Discover your microbiome - Bacteria and viruses that live in your mouth
• My Genome - Info about your genomic data
• Sleep - Are you a morning or evening person?
• iobio.io - Compare your genome to ClinVar
• YouGenomics India - Help improve genomics for South Asia
• Gencove Mobile App - Compare results with friends on iOS or Android
• Open Humans - Contribute to research and citizen science

When I tried Microbiome it simply said "Microbiome not available" with no explanation as to why, so that was totally useless.

My Genome is just that - it's where you find your raw DNA data. You can download your raw data, you can view which apps on Gencove you've given permission to access your data, and you can view and manage your consent to participate in research.

The Sleep app is interesting but the results claimed I'm a morning person, which I have never been. The app asks you a few questions about your sleep habits before showing your results and it did note "It seems that the genetic score and questionnaire results don’t match - an interesting outlier! That's probably because the genetics of sleep is not very well understood yet."

iobio

The iobio app loads your DNA to gene.iobio.io which is a little bit of a technical app that will tell you if you have any variants of certain medically related genes. For example, it includes a report on BRCA1 and BRCA2, which are genes associated with breast and ovarian cancer. Despite the technical looking nature of the site, it will tell you, in plain English, if you carry any variants of the genes included in the report or not. Hovering over each gene will pop up a brief summary of what it is associated it. Most of them are likely somewhat rare, since I had no variants for any of them. There are 40 in total: PTEN, BRCA1, BRCA2, TP53, STK11, MLH1, MSH2, MSH6, PMS2, APC, MUTYH, VHL, MEN1, RET, RB1, SDHD, SDHAF2, SDHC, SDHB, TSC1, TSC2, WT1, NF2, COL3A1, FBN1, TGFBR1, TGFBR2, SMAD3, ACTA2, MYH11, MYBPC3, MYH7, TNNT2, TNNI3, TPM1, MYL3, ACTC1, PRKAG2, GLA, MYL2, LMNA, RYR2, PKP2, DSP, DSC2, TMEM43, DSG2, KCNQ1, KCNH2, SCN5A, LDLR, APOB, PCSK9, RYR1, CACNA1S, ATP7B, BMPR1A, SMAD4, OTC. If you have reason to check on any of these and want a quick, free way to do this, this is a good option, but it can also be easily accessed independently of Gencove, just go to http://iobio.io, however, it's not very user friendly and I couldn't find a way to upload my data, so going through Gencove may actually be the better option.

YouGenomics India, recently renamed "Genavli Biotech", is a research project for South Asia, attempting to improve ethnicity reports for people with South Asian ancestry. Naturally, it wouldn't be useful for anyone who is not South Asian but if you are, you should look into this. As far as I can tell, Gencove's app simply links to the YouGenomics India website.

The Gencove Mobile App doesn't really offer anything that the website doesn't apart from some surveys which I presume are for research purposes. It allows your to see your ethnicity report and the unavailable microbiome report, and connect with or invite your friends. That's about it. 

The Open Humans app merely takes you to openhumans.org, which is an open research project. Gencove does not load your data there, so there's really no need to go through Gencove if you wish to participate in this project.

Gencove's populations for their ethnicity report

Most people will likely be most interested in the ethnicity report. There are 26 populations available, some of them are broad, large regions, while others only cover a small region. They include: Northern and Central Europe, Northern Italy, Northern British Isles, Southwestern Europe, Middle East, Eastern Mediterranean, Bengal, Central Africa, Eastern Africa, Northern Africa, Central Indian subcontinent, Southern Indian subcontinent, Oceania, Southeast Asia, Northeast Asia, Anatolia-Caucasus-Iranian Plateau, Central Asia, East Asia, North-central Asia, Northeast Europe, Scandinavia, Finland, Southern Africa, Western Africa, Ashkenazi Jewish, Americas. A map showing what these populations cover is shown left/above.

My personal results were not particular accurate, although I did note that if I added together all my results in populations probably associated with my Italian ancestry versus those from my Northwest European ancestry, the numbers were consistent with what most other companies say. Here are my Gencove results:

My Gencove ethnicity report

48% Northern and Central Europe

21% Northern Italy

15% Northern British Isles

7% Southwestern Europe

6% Middle East

3% Eastern Mediterranean

My Italian ancestry is southern, not northern, but if you add up the results for Northern Italy, Southwestern Europe, Middle East, and Eastern Mediterranean, you get 37%, which is very similar to the 36% from AncestryDNA and 38% from FTDNA. While my results in more specific regions may be all over the place across different companies, the divide between northern Europe and southern seems very distinct with me so when an ethnicity report is consistent with that, I know there's at least some reliability to it. 

Lastly, Gencove offer the "Relative Radar" which finds people you share DNA with. Unfortunately, there must not be very many testers/uploaders in their database because it found none for me so all I can say about it is that it seems to use a visual display, plotting relatives who share more DNA with you closer to your profile icon.

Conclusion: Since it's free, there's really no harm in checking out Gencove (unless you have concerns about research participation). Because some of their "apps" simply link to other sites, it looks like they offer more than they really do. The ethnicity report, sleep app, and iobio data were the only really interesting or useful options, but even with those, don't expect too much. I definitely wouldn't pay $59.99 to test with them, although the low price point in comparison with other testing companies may be appealing, you would get more out of your money by testing with AncestryDNA or 23andMe and then uploading to Gencove for free.

Interesting Clippings #18: Leprosy

When we think of leper colonies, we tend to think of medieval times but actually, there was no effective treatment for Leprosy until the 1940s and leper colonies were still in use well into the 20th century. The clipping to the right is from March 15, 1925 in which a woman who was infected with Mycobacterium leprae moved from Reading, PA to a federal leper colony in Carville, LA. Though the article says she remains hopeful of a cure, she probably didn't recover for another 20 years, if she lived that long. Though leprosy isn't fatal, we don't know how old she was at the time.

Although leprosy is very treatable today and only effects about 5% of people who come into contact with it anyway, much like many diseases, it can still be found untreated in underdeveloped countries.

Source:

• "Leper Woman Happy; Expects To Have Health Restored." Reading Eagle 15 Mar. 1925: 6. Google News Archive. Web. 16 Aug. 2013.

Interesting Clippings #17: Historical Uses of Cod Liver Oil

Ambler Gazette
Nov 3, 1898, p8

Cod liver oil is high in omega-3 as well as vitamin A and D. The health benefits of omega-3 are a relatively modern discovery, it's popularity skyrocketing only in the last couple decades. But historically, the vitamin content of cod liver oil was understood and it's for this reason that cod liver oil was often marketed as cures and treatment for a number of different ailments with varied results.

Today, cod liver oil is still used to aid in the treatment of arthritis and multiple sclerosis and one study has even suggested that it may also aid in the treatment of cancer, though this is not to say these diseases can be treated with cod liver oil alone! Cod liver oil is also recommended to be taken during pregnancy as it's believed to reduce the risk of diabetes.

Ambler Gazette
July 30, 1896
page 4

Historically, it was marketed to treat or cure anything from the common cold and poor digestion to tuberculosis and pulmonary problems but how effective it was is really open to debate. We know today that tuberculosis is a bacteria that is easily treatable with antibiotics and therefore has been nearly eradicated from the developed world. So could omega-3 and vitamins really cure a bacterial disease? Probably not but they could have helped boost one's general health and immune system, which may have aided in one's natural recovery.

Granted, I'm certainly no medical expert but I recently read Germs, Genes, & Civilization: How Epidemics Shaped Who We Are Today which talks a lot about how our resistance to certain infectious diseases grew over centuries and in addition, how infectious diseases were forced to become weaker so that they might spread more easily and survive. Because of both of these natural occurrences, many diseases which were once extremely fatal had a relatively low mortality rate later in history, despite a lack of effective medical treatment. Therefore, it's somewhat understandable how and why people of the past believed in treatments which we now know probably did little to nothing. Over time, it could have been said "since the use of cod liver oil, mortality rates for tuberculosis have dropped by x%" when in reality, they were just seeing a natural decline over time. This is why we still shouldn't jump to conclusions when we see all these statistics about modern medical treatments too - it's difficult to know for sure when we're seeing a direct cause and effect rather than there being other influences at work.

Scott's Emulsion, as seen advertised in these historical newspaper clippings, is actually still in production, although I imagine they no longer market it as a cure for tuberculosis!

The Tragic Family of James Addison Smith

James Addison Smith, unfortunately
I don't have any photos of his wife or
children.

James Addison Smith is not one of my ancestors but I am related to him. He was one of the many sons of my ancestors Robert Hawkins Smith and Octavia M. Wood, who I detailed in an earlier post regarding their premarital love letters. I am descended from their son, Robert Louis, James' brother. Descendants of James might be interested to know that this family was plagued with tragedy and scandal. His son Olaf was killed young in a train accident, his daughter Mary suffered from Schizophrenia while his other daughter Marjory and his wife Maggie (Margaret Peay) both became drug addicts, dependent on morphine.

Mary Ryland Smith was born January 25, 1896 in Logan County, Kentucky to James Addison Smith and Margaret "Maggie" Peay. Sometime between the ages of 14 and 24, her family moved to Tennessee. This would have probably been around the same time she started experiencing symptoms of Schizophrenia since it's onset typically occurs during late adolescence or early adulthood. Initially, the family lived in Memphis but by 1930, they had moved to Nashville and so it was at the Central State Hospital for the Insane in Nashville on Murfreesboro Pike that Mary finally found herself by 1935. Presumably, her parents had grown too old to care for her (they were in their 70's) or perhaps her mental condition had deteriorated beyond what they could handle.

Central State Hospital for the Insane, courtesy
Asylum Projects

The Central State Hospital for the Insane is what it was known as when Mary died in 1957 but it was previously named the Tennessee Hospital for the Insane and after Mary's time there, Middle Tennessee Mental Health Institute. After 1963, it was also home to the Tennessee Neuropsychiatric Institute. And it had originally been called the Tennessee Lunatic Asylum when it was at a different location on what is now Twelfth Avenue South and Division Street. It had been plagued by financial problems almost from it's opening in 1840 and so it was rebuilt on Murfreesboro Pike in 1851, long before Mary was admitted. It moved locations again in 1995 to Stewarts Ferry Pike and the building on Murfreesboro Pike was demolished in 1999, a Dell computer assembly plant now sits there. The image immediately below is labelled "Central Hospital for the Insane" which is the nearest name to what is was called when Mary died, and that suggests this was how it looked while she lived there. Further below is an image which may have been how the building looked prior to modifications and expansions.

Central State Hospital for the Insane, probably how it looked at the time
Mary lived there, courtesy Asylum Projects

In 1940, the hospital was home to 1788 patients and at least 133 staff, of which only three were nurses. Most staff were attendants but there were also several superintendents, two cooks, a baker, many staff who worked in the laundry department, one night watchman, two stenographers, a telephone operator, an accountant, a few clerks, general workmen, and more. There were three physician assistants, a couple of student interns, and presumably physicians too, although they are not listed on the census.

Tennesse State Hospital for the Insane, possibly
a pre-modified version on Murfreesboro Pike.
Courtesy Library of Congress.

Mary suffered from what was then known as a chronic undifferentiated type of Schizophrenia, now simply known as undifferentiated type which means that the patient shows two or more of the symptoms of all three of the main types of Schizophrenia - paranoid, disorganized, and catatonic - but none prominently enough to categorized it as any one type in particular. This meant Mary probably had some delusions or hallucinations, disorganized speech or behavior and/or may have been catatonic at times.

In my grandmother's genealogy notes, Mary is described as having "went crazy". Though a common, if outdated term, it probably referred to the fact that Mary was likely quite normal as a child and at least in her early teens. She may not have even developed symptoms until her early 20's so it's easy to say she "went crazy" rather than "was crazy", even if it seems to wrongly suggest something drove her to it rather than being a medical condition. It must have been distressing for a family to watch a loved one deteriorate before their eyes and be helpless to stop it. Her parents were obviously devoted to looking after her themselves since they refused to institutionalize her until they were in their 70's, though knowing that her mother Maggie was a drug addict, much of the responsibility may have fallen on James. In fact, Maggie's drug addiction may have been the only way she could cope with her daughter's tragic fate.

The layout of Central State Hospital for the Insane
on Murfreesboro Pike, courtesy Asylum Projects.
Click image to enlarge.

Two of their other daughters, Ella and Mona, remain unmarried and living with them well into their 30's, perhaps because they too dedicated themselves to caring for their sister and perhaps their mother. According to my grandmother's information, it was because James was very protective and controlling of his daughters and wouldn't let them out of the house without their mother and they weren't allowed to have boyfriends.

A third daughter Marjory, also an addict and also never married, lived at the family home into her 40's, perhaps initially to look after her sister only to succumb to her mother's fate. She did manage to complete two years of college and consistently work as a file clerk, though at various locations, first a railroad company, then a hardware store, and finally a manufacturing company. In 1940, she was working 44 hours a week, 52 weeks a year and making an annual $720. Today, this would be about $22,000. So perhaps her addiction occurred later in her life because it seems unlikely that she could hold a job with so many hours as an addict.

Ella was a proofreader, though it's difficult to tell how much she was making since she appears to have been unemployed for much of year when the census was taken. She had resumed work (40 hours a week) by this point but had only been back for 4 weeks time and made $68 in that time. Theoretically, if she worked 52 weeks out of the year at that rate, she'd make $884 annually. That's about $27,000 today.

Mona was a copy holder, someone who read an original document aloud for a proofreader (who reads the proof copy) and calls attention to errors. In 1930, she and her proofreader sister Ella were both working at a printing company so perhaps they worked together. However, by 1940, Mona was no longer working. By this point, Mary was already living in the institute so Mona was not staying home to care for her.

I do not think any of the these three daughters, Marjory, Ella, and Mona, ever had children (certainly Mary did not) but James and Maggie did have three other children, Madge Smith (b. abt. 1890), James Addison Smith Jr. (b. abt. 1901), and Laura Smith (b. abt. 1909), who may have so I'm listing their details in case any descendants Google them and find this useful. Madge manage to escape her father's oppressive rules by running away with a salesman she met at her father's store. Her father disowned her but she kept in touch with her mother and sisters. I'm not sure what happened to Laura, she either died or somehow managed to escape the house since she was no longer living there in 1940.

Mary died in the State Hospital on June 4, 1957 of a Cerebral Hemorrhage when she was 61 years old. There was no contributing or underlying cause listed on her death certificate which means her death was unrelated to her mental illness.

I must admit that I don't have documented evidence of the other tragedies of this family. I'm not even sure the drug addictions would have been documented to begin with, it may have been information that was passed down generations since I got this info from my grandmother. Margaret died in 1954 and there is no mention of her addiction as a contributing cause of death. Olaf's train accident though should be documented somewhere and I have searched but not found anything yet. I will update this if that changes and if anyone knows anything more about it, please let me know!

Sources:

• "Tennessee Lunatic Asylum." (2013) In Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, Retrieved March 5, 2013, from Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture: http://www.tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entry.php?rec=1337
• Ancestry.com. Tennessee, Death Records, 1908-1958 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011. http://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=2376&enc=1
• Ancestry.com. 1910 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2006.
• Ancestry.com. 1920 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2010. Images reproduced by FamilySearch.
• Ancestry.com. 1930 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2002.
• Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012.
• "Types of Schizophrenia." WebMD. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Mar. 2013. http://www.webmd.com/schizophrenia/guide/schizophrenia-types
• "Schizophrenia, ( Undifferentiated Type )." PsyWeb.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Mar. 2013. http://www.psyweb.com/mdisord/SchizoDis/undtype.jsp
• Measuringworth.com. "Measuring Worth - Measures of worth, inflation rates, relative value, worth of a dollar, purchase power." 1892. Web. 5 Mar 2013. http://www.measuringworth.com/uscompare/
• Asylumprojects.org. "Nashville State Hospital Image Gallery - Asylum Projects." 2011. Web. 6 Mar 2013. http://www.asylumprojects.org/index.php?title=Nashville_State_Hospital_Image_Gallery
• Loc.gov. "Tennessee State hospital for the insane. Near Nashville." n.d.. Web. 6 Mar 2013. http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2003662356/

The Automobile and It's Impact

The Philly History Blog recently posted an article titled When City and Car First Collided, which is something of a social history of the introduction and rise of the automobile in Philly and concerns about safety from the start. Fascinating read, especially because it reminded me of several issues in my own tree. First, it reminded me the 1943 car accident my great grandfather was in. It also reminded me that the family this same ancestor married into were car enthusiasts and lastly that his own father had owned a carriage shop which went out of business thanks to the automobile. So this branch of my tree was heavily influenced by the automobile in many different ways.

Ambler Gazette clipping
from October 28, 1943

On Tuesday, October 26, 1943, at the age of 60, my great grandfather Chester Harold Godshall Sr. was involved in a serious car accident which nearly killed him while driving from his home in Wyndmoor, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania to work at the Norristown Court House (he was a civil engineer). There were no other cars involved but somehow he lost control of his car while on Wissahickon Ave (now Northwestern Ave) near where it met Germantown Ave and hit several posts by the side of the road before slamming into a stone wall which launched him from the car, through the windshield. Fortunately, the accident had caused the car horn to persistently sound, which attracted the attention of the sisters of a nearby Convent, Mount Saint Joseph's (now Sisters of Saint Joseph in Philadelphia) on Germantown Ave. The sisters called the Whitemarsh Country Club (now Whitemarsh Valley Country Club), which was located on the opposite side of Wissahickon Ave, and they sent over two men, Harold Lawton and Charles Fleisher, who rushed Chester to the Chestnut Hill Hospital. He had punctured a lung, broke several ribs, and was in critical condition at the time the Ambler Gazette reported the accident two days later. Fortunately, he recovered and lived for another ten years.

Though Chester, who was better known as Harold, was a civil engineer, back in the early 20th century, he had also worked as a secretary for his father's struggling carriage business originally called Germantown Carriage Works and eventually renamed to William H Godshall Inc. William had wanted his son to take over the business and after his death in 1922, Harold did so but not for long. It eventually went out of business in light of the rise of the automobile.

Harry Fallows and his daughter Emma Sarah proudly
showing off his automobile, circa 1908, probably rankled his
son-in-law's father, the owner of a failing carriage shop.

While William was probably muttering with bitterness over the growing popularity of the automobile, his son Harold was dating his future bride, Emma Sarah Fallows, whose family were somewhat controversially car enthusiasts. Emma's father Harry was a member of the Quaker City motoring club and won the Salem Cup in the Wildwood Auto Races on July 4, 1912 when he represented the Chase Car company. Harry's brother James owned at least three cars (though not necessarily at the same time) from as early as 1906 and had one repainted at one point. He and his cars had several mentions in the Ambler Gazette and there are also many surviving photographs the Fallows showing off their cars.

These two merging families really highlight the cultural history of the introduction of the automobile into society and what it meant for so many different people. One family struggling to hold onto their livelihood, another embracing the modern marvels that came around the turn of the century. I always imagine the early 20th century must have been an exciting time to be alive but for some, also a little frightening.

 With a little reworking, I took this content from my family histories for the Fallows and Godshall families. I will be posting their full histories within the next few days, as a part of the Family History Writing Challenge.

1918 Flu Pandemic

I'd like to highlight once again how you can use newspaper reports of what was going on in your ancestor's world even if there are no specific mentions of them. Recently, I wanted to know more about the 1918 Flu Pandemic that swept the world, infecting some 500 million people and killing somewhere between 20 and 50 million, and how it influenced my ancestors and their local communities. I already knew that none of my ancestors were reported in any (accessible) papers as ill during the time and none died in 1918 either. I do have one ancestor who died in Alabama in January 1919 and I am waiting on his death certificate to tell me if it was the flu. Though it was mostly waning by that point, you never know.

But for this, I focused primarily on the Ambler Gazette, a local newspaper in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, just outside Philadelphia. The Fallows branch of my tree already had numerous mentions in the society section of this paper so I knew that this paper would give me a good picture of their community during the flu pandemic.

First, some background. At the time, it was known as the Spanish Flu because this particular epidemic was thought to have come from Spain. It's now believed that it began amidst the war, at a hospital camp in Étaples, France, spreading quickly among soldiers and staff. There had been precursors among birds and pigs, which highlights how easily bird flu and swine flu can mutate to infect humans, something we still fear today. From Europe, it spread outwards to Asia, Africa, South America, North America, and even the Arctic and remote islands. On July 22, Philadelphia public health officials issued a warning about the Spanish Influenza and in August, Boston was hit hard by it, arriving first at the docks. By late September, it was spreading to the rest of the country but Philadelphia went on with their scheduled Liberty Loan Drive Parade on September 28th, in support of the war effort. Afterwards, there were 635 new cases of the flu in Philadelphia and on October 6th, there were 289 flu related deaths reported for a single day.

Philly was a stone's throw away from the Fallows' East Willow Grove Ave home in Wyndmoor, Montgomery County and their daughter and son-in-law, the Godshalls, were just across the Philly border at 227 E Durham Street. But what was going on in their neighborhood? How was the community and local government handling it? I turned to the Ambler Gazette, which was issued weekly on Thursdays. This meant that the first mentions of the flu weren't ground breaking, since people probably would have read about it first in other, daily papers. At first, there were only a few mentions of individual cases reported on September 26, before the Parade in Philadelphia, but at this point, it did not seem like a huge concern to anyone. Indeed, even as late as October 3rd, Ambler was still planning to go forward with it's own Liberty Loan Drive Parade on October 12 (left), despite reports of other, smaller, local events being postponed or cancelled in the area and the nearby town of Norristown in the "throes of epidemic" (below).

Finally, a week later on October 10th, Ambler had to admit that the parade needed to be cancelled. In the clipping below and right, also including a report from Wyndmoor, they announce:

"Owing to the prevalence of the epidemic, it has been considered prudent to cancel all plans for the public demonstration and parade in Ambler on next Saturday afternoon, Columbus day, designated by President Wilson as Liberty Loan day."

In the account of Wyndmoor, though there is no mention of my ancestors in particular, you can see there are a number of reports of illnesses and the announcement of the closure of churches and schools. This was significant for my ancestors since they were very involved in their church activities and my great grandmother (from this family) had been a teacher in Wyndmoor before her marriage and still occasionally substituted afterwards. Whether she was substituting at that specific time, I'm not sure. She did have a two year old son, (my grandpop!) at the time so I'm guessing not, but she would have known much of the staff at the Wyndmoor Public School.

The mention of Dorothy Unruh's illness is significant as well since they were neighbors of the Fallows. And yes, Unruh is spelled correctly. It's a weird name, I know, but don't laugh because they were prominent land owners in the area and pretty wealthy.

Also on the 10th, information provided by Dr. Karl Schaffle in Massachusetts was printed in the Ambler Gazette with good advice about prevention and preparation, shown below. The Red Cross made notices as well (below) about the war effort and an order for 1800 influenza masks. Although the information about the Ambler parade being cancelled had obviously not yet reached them, note how Red Cross members were expected to participate in the demonstration despite the danger.

 

Wyndmoor was certainly not the only town shutting down. Most nearby areas, such as Flourtown or Horsham, were also closing churches and schools. It must have been worrying just to go out for necessary groceries. Would such a simple act cost you your life? Or the life of those you loved? At first, I was surprised when I realized that one of the numerous mentions of my ancestors going on one of their many vacations was right in the midst of all this. On October 17th, the Wyndmoor section of the paper writes:

"Mr. and Mrs. Harry Fallows are spending some time at Lake Hopatcong."

In the clipping to the right, you can see how right along side this report, there are also several announcements of illness and death related to the flu and shocking accounts of hundreds of bodies not yet buried laid out in a cemetery because there was no where else to put them and they couldn't be buried fast enough. Why on earth would my ancestors go on vacation in the middle of all this? It's hardly a time to kick back, relax, and enjoy yourself. I can only imagine that were trying to escape the risk of infection. Lake Hopatcong is a rural area where there was probably less contact with people and therefore a lower threat. Indeed, people were being advised to avoid crowded, public areas and what better way to avoid that than to spend some time at a remote lake? With that line of thinking, I'm actually surprised they didn't take their daughter, son-in-law, and toddler grandson with them.

In the same week, the Massachusetts Department of Health issued information about avoidance and treatment. Some of it, as you can see to the left, is not very dissimilar to the advice circulated regarding the more recent swine flu outbreak.

Riddled throughout all these articles are countless mentions of the names of the ill and dead. The search function on the Ambler Gazette initially highlights the words you're searching for in red (example below) and after searching merely for "influenza", some of the images of each sheet of paper are literally covered in red highlight. By this point, I was definitely getting an understanding of just how much this must have influenced my ancestors in the area, even if they were not infected themselves (and it's possible they were but it simply wasn't reported in the paper - if they were, they at least did not perish from it).

By the following week as reported on October 24th, we are starting to see more mentions of improvements and fewer new cases. There are still deaths and illness but there is light at the end of a very dark tunnel. Still, the Red Cross asks for donations of soups and other foods (right) to distribute to the sick.

Also printed on the 24th was an obvious attempt to keep fears at bay and prevent panic in yet another instructional advice article, shown to the left.

"Simply the Old Grip or La Grippe That Was Epidemic in 1889-1890".

I'm sure that was a great comfort to those with dead loved ones and did not sound patronizing at all (sense the sarcasm). It is true that it was certainly not the first flu epidemic (which went by many names including the Grip) but it did wind up being a more devastating case of it. The 1889-1890 influenza comparatively caused about one million deaths.

Finally, on October 31st (below), the Ambler Gazette reports more and more improvements and the Wyndmoor section notably has no mention of any new cases of the flu. It lists names of fatalities from their town in the last couple weeks, just one of the many areas of the sprawling suburbs of Philadelphia where there would be many more names. It also announced the reopening of two churches, one of which was the Grace Lutheran Church where my ancestors were members. Life was seemingly getting back to normal but with so many gone, it would never quite be the same. Below is an account from November 14th of how the deadly epidemic made orphans out of 50,000 children in Pennsylvania alone:

Never underestimate capitalism's ability to benefit from tragedy though. Below are examples of companies advertising treatments for the flu; amusingly, one of them is for plain old whiskey! And good old Vicks, still used today, cashed in big and had to report a lack of stock.

Of course none of these things will have saved lives, they just made the suffering a little easier. On October 19, Dr. C.Y. White in Philadelphia developed a vaccine and over 10,000 inoculations were given out through the Philadelphia Board of Health. Whether this played a significant role in reducing the spread of the disease in Philly is still debated. Numbers did decrease afterwards but some believe they would have done so naturally anyway at that point as the virus had run it's course.

And remember, this epidemic was spread worldwide so it's likely your own ancestors were somehow influenced by it as well, even if it was only indirectly. Don't overlook this important yet often forgotten part of history. The hardest part is finding the right newspaper for your ancestor's local area but if you're like me and you've already got your source and are looking for new ways to use it to find new information, this should yield fascinating results. Happy searching!

Sources:
Influenza Strikes: The Great Pandemic
City Snapshots: Philadelphia. Influenza 1918
Timeline. Influenza 1918
1918 flu pandemic
Access Pennsylvania Digital Repository