Innocence and ignorance opened the door to death. It is almost poetic that the same home, the same household, the same family even, would open and close the door to the worst cholera epidemic ever seen on England’s shores. How could the Lewis family have known?
On a blustery English morning in 1854, an infant girl was born to Thomas and Sarah Lewis. Baby Lewis was rosier, hardier, and—as her parents prayed—more determined to stay within the realm of the living. The previous year the Lewis’s suffered the loss of their infant baby boy. This baby girl showed promise.
In late August, healthy Baby Lewis developed diarrhea. During breaks in her daughter’s illness, Sarah dutifully cleaned her diapers in tepid water, and slung one bucket out the back window and the worst of it she took to the cellar and threw into the cesspool. Not an unusual practice in Victorian London’s Soho neighborhood.
On the 28th, after suffering three straight days, Baby Lewis began to show signs of improvement. Sarah thought to give her chap-lipped baby a little water from the refreshing pump just 10 feet from the Lewis’s front door on 40 Broad Street. Four hours later the baby’s symptoms violently returned. The doctor was called, but it was too late for Baby Lewis; her last diaper was filled with clear liquid and little pieces of rice.
In the late summer air of London’s Victorian streets, many professionals believed miasma to be the culprit. Dr. John Snow had his doubts. Snow had worked with gases, becoming the first professional anesthesiologist to use ether safely. He believed for a gas to be effective it must be delivered to the lungs in concentrated doses.
Before microbes were discovered, poisoned miasma was blamed for many a disease. For instance, the mosquito born malaria was thought to be caused by “bad air” for it derives its name from the Italian “mal aria.” It was the same year as England’s cholera plague that an Italian discovered the comma shaped microbe “Vibrio cholera.” Unfortunately, the Italian’s paper on the microscopic parasite went unnoticed.
Snow, along with another amateur sleuth, The Reverend Henry Whitehead, proved the disease to be waterborne. Both men went door-to-door during and after the tragedy ministering and asking the question. Did you drink water from the Broad Street pump?
The Ghost Map: The Story of London’s Most Terrifying Epidemic and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World by Steven Johnson will have you unraveling the mysteries of a Victorian enigma.
Note: Fifth book for Joy's Non-Fiction Five Challenge.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
The Ghost Map (copy)
Friday, April 25, 2008
I'm Challenged!
First, I joined Joy at Thoughts of Joy for her 2nd annual Nonfiction Five Challenge. I vow to read 5 nonfiction books between the months May - September. Not really a challenge (I love NF) but a chance for me to gain a sense of accomplishment. You know, build my self-esteem. :D
Secondly, I joined a new (to me) blogger, Jeff at BearCastle, for his Science Book Challenge. For this challenge one has all year to read three science books. Jeff has been very helpful and his Book Notes section is excellent.I've not spoken of this, but I'm a committee member of the Outstanding Books for the College Bound and Lifelong Learners for American Libraries Association. Within this committee I am on a smaller Science and Technology subcommittee which will pick 25 S&T books for the list. So far we have 5 books we are considering, and we pick in June. Please, if you have any suggestion, leave a comment.
Monday, October 08, 2007
Non-Fiction Five Completed!
Sorry, this took so long, Joy! I finished the Non-Fiction Five Challenge before the end of 
September, but am just now getting around to posting my participation. I loved the challenge and am thankful Joy hosted such an immensely thought-provoking genre.
Out of the five original books, I read none! Bah! It is just impossible to stay to a list of books. When I sit down to type my article for the newspapers, usually on a Wednesday morning, I have a hard time getting started if the book doesn't already match a seasonal, topical theme. Why? Well, I'm no writer; I'm a librarian.
This limits my challenge participation as earlier mentioned. Thankfully, Joy approved my 
modification of the rules, and I got to read some damn good books. My favorite, Rats by Robert Sullivan, gave the hubby and I an added adventure during our trip to New York City. Here is a picture of me under the sign to Eden Alley. We have pictures of dead rats in the alley, too. Not sure y'all would appreciate them though?!?
Oh, Hubby thought I should tell you about our encounter before finding the alley. We, dressed as wrinkled tourist, kept looking around corners and walking blocks looking for the alley. Finally, an older white haired gentleman wearing the latest in brooks brothers, asked if we needed directions. Our temporary tour guide must have thought we wanted to see something in the financial district and he was eager to please. Well, that is, until we said Eden's Alley. He abruptly frowned and said he never heard of it and literally scurried away! Bah!
The Big Bam by Leigh Montville
Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
Flower Confidential by Amy Stewart
Rats by Robert Sullivan
Teach like your Hair is on Fire by Rafe Esquith
Sunday, August 12, 2007
Challenge Challenged!
I had promised Lesley a month ago I would join her Airchair Travelers Reading Challenge and am now finally getting to it. With this post, I ask her permission to not make a list, but rather list those I read in that category as I read them. Is that unethical for any reading challenge?
My work reading must come first. I hate to be snobbish. I find the challenge of participating in these challenges, comes from integrating them into articles for the newspapers I serve. My first choice, Eat, Pray, Love, was an easy pick because of its timeliness. It's number one on the paperback bestsellers list; plus, people are really talking about it now. Thus, I read it, wrote about it, and marked it off my Airchair Travelers Reading Challenge list.
One may have noticed the original list for the Non-Fiction Reading Challenge morphed. I replaced books I did plan to read with NFs read within the allotted time period. The original list was my attempt, at looking into the future, to read timely or crowd-pleasing books. Manhunt and Mockingbird remain on the list for I think they still have people appeal.
I just hope Joy at Thoughts of Joy will forgive me.
The idea (not making a list) actually came about as a poke at Ed. The Southern Reading Challenge was countered with a mock Damn Yankees Reading Challenge by Ed at Recycled Thoughts. My reading pattern this summer was Northern as the result of an impending vacation to New York City. As I wrote articles, I noticed just as many books for Ed's challenge as for my very own. So, I thought I would give Ed a little thrill by listing the Northern books read.
Thanks to Sage (his button & title idea), Ed has enjoyed three participants in his joke.
Fellow Bloggers and Challengers, I ask you, am I a reading challenge prima donna?
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
The Big Bam (copy)
Serendipity is the art of finding something meaningful amid looking for something else; or at least, that is how I define it. It happened last week while perusing the Atlanta airport books. I was in the mood for Flannery O’Connor, a native Georgian, when I ran across his face. Who? None other than, "the Sultan of Swat, The Caliph of Clout, The Wizard of Whack, the Rajah of Rap, the Wazir of Wham, the Mammoth of Maul, the Maharajah of Mash, the Bambino. The Bam. The Big Bam." Yes, staring me in the face was The Big Bam by Leigh Montville.
Skipping down the concourse and plopping into a seat next to hubby, I smile as I reveal my manly book. Ah, I can see in his eyes, he is impressed with my decision. He then tells me he has tickets to watch the Yankees at Yankee Stadium while in New York. He wants to see a game in the "House that Ruth Built" before they move across the street.
"Babe Ruth played for the Yankees and they built a stadium for him?"
Yes, yes. Laugh away. It is a good thing this book called out to me! I obviously know nothing of the game of baseball. Maybe Babe’s ghost placed it in my ignorant hands to keep me from further embarrassing myself.
The Babe’s early life is a mystery and author Montville calls it the fog. The book opens with father, George Herman Ruth, escorting his seven year old son to St. Mary’s Industrial School for Boys. The school housed orphans, truants, and delinquents; for some reason, a place Mr. Ruth thought better than his home above the family bar. Reasons are in the fog.
It is at school Ruth learned how to pitch, hit, and field a baseball. At the age of 18, a scout for the Baltimore Orioles, Jack Dunn, stopped in for a look-see. He noticed as the large boy came to bat, "the right fielder moved so far back that he left the playing field, crossed a path, and stood in the next field, where another game was taking place." Next thing, the ball careened over the same fielder’s head.
In the early 1900s, a home run was seen as a fluke, as unexpected as an ace in golf. The book states, "The balls were not made for home runs...scuffed up, roughed up, spit upon, and used for as many as 100 pitches in a game. The bats, heavy and thick through the handle, were not made for home runs. The mind was not made for home runs." Here, standing in front of Jack Dunn, was a miracle.
For what ever reason, I’m glad I finally met Babe Ruth. Montville summed it up nicely, "He will be crude and rude and kind and approachable, sometimes all in the same ten minutes, and it all will be fine. He will be credited with miracles. Fine."
