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Pox_ An American History - Michael Willrich [222]

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Wessels Williams, Pathogenic Micro-organisms: Including Bacteria and Protozoa; a Practical Manual for Students, Physicians and Health Officers (Philadelphia: Lea Brothers & Co., 1905), 222. The contemporaneous accounts of the unfolding Camden tetanus outbreak that were published in newspapers, medical journals, and the Camden Board of Health’s official report, contain a number of discrepancies (including some conflicting dates, different spellings of the victims’ names, and differing ages for the children). I have been able to locate most of these children in the 1900 census. In my own account, I have wherever possible used information that I have been able to confirm in at least two sources. For the Camden Board of Health report, which appears to contain a few factual errors about the cases, see “Official Report of the Camden Board of Health Concerning the Cases of Tetanus Which Occurred in Patients Who Had Been Vaccinated,” Nov. 29, 1901, reprinted in Bulletin of the North Carolina Board of Health, 16 (Dec. 1901): 112–18. (Hereafter: “Camden Board of Health Report.”)

18 Mrs. Brower and Dr. Kensinger quoted in “Vaccinated Boy, Tetanus Stricken, May Recover.” Dr. Kensinger’s name is mispelled as “Kinsinger” in this newspaper story. On the Brower family, see Twelfth Census of the United States (1900): Schedule No. 1: Population, Camden, NJ, Supervisor’s District No. 6, Enumeration District No. 77.

19 “Camden’s Lockjaw Panic.” Twelfth Census of the United States (1900): Schedule No. 1—Population: Camden, NJ, Supervisor’s District No. 6, Enumeration District No. 77. “Camden Board of Health Report,” 114.

20 “Another Death from Lockjaw,” NYTRIB, Nov. 14, 1901, 6. “Camden’s Lockjaw Panic.” “Vaccination and Lockjaw,” NYT, Nov. 14, 1901, 2. “Vaccination Leads to a Boy’s Death,” PNA, Nov. 14, 1901, 3. Twelfth Census of the United States (1900): Schedule No. 1—Population: Camden, NJ, Supervisor’s District No. 6, Enumeration District No. 73. “Camden Board of Health Report,” 114.

21 “Camden’s Lockjaw Panic,” NYS, Nov. 16, 1901, 4. “Vaccination Claims Another,” NYTRIB, Nov. 15, 1901. Twelfth Census of the United States (1900): Schedule No. 1—Population: Camden, NJ, Supervisor’s District No. 6, Enumeration District No. 59. “Camden Board of Health Report,” 114.

22 Davis quoted in “Vaccination Claims Another.” Dowling quoted in “Epidemic of Lockjaw Arouses a Whole City,” NYW, Nov. 20, 1901, 6.

23 “Vaccination Claims Another.” “Camden’s Lockjaw Panic.” See Twelfth Census of the United States (1900): Schedule No. 1—Population: Camden, NJ, Supervisor’s District No. 6, Enumeration District No. 73 (Warrington); ibid., Enumeration District No. 49 (Cavallo). “Camden Board of Health Report,” 114. The unnamed victim appears to have been William J. Bauer, aged seven, who according to Camden officials was the tetanus outbreak’s first fatality: vaccinated October 12, he showed tetanus symptoms on November 1 and died two days later. Ibid., 113. On the Bauer family, see Twelfth Census of the United States (1900): Schedule No. 1—Population: Camden, NJ, Supervisor’s District No. 6, Enumeration District No. 85.

24 “Lockjaw Deaths Continue,” NYT, Nov. 17, 1901, 6. “Five Victims of Lockjaw,” NYT, Nov. 17, 1901, 3. “Camden Board of Health Report,” 114.

25 “Five Victims of Lockjaw.” “Camden’s Lockjaw Panic.”

26 “Ibid. Other newspaper accounts and medical journal articles intimated that a single maker had been involved in the tetanus cases in Camden, but refrained from revealing the maker’s identity. On Mulford see Liebenau, Medical Science and Medical Industry, esp. 57–78, 80–81.1.

27 “Camden’s Lockjaw Panic.” Cochran did not have many dollars to spare. The fifty-one-year-old teamster lived in a rented house on Mechanic Street, about a mile from the Delaware River, with his wife Sarah and their children. In their twenty-six years of marriage, Sarah had given birth to six children. Annie was their second to die. James was going to know who was responsible for this loss. Twelfth Census of the United States (1900): Schedule No. 1

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