Tuesday, October 9, 7:00 pm at Killingworth Library. One hundred years ago, during the summer and fall of 1918, the United States was a country at war. Liberty Bonds were being sold, families were mourning the loss of soldiers in the campaigns begun when the US entered the war the previous year, and women were demanding the right to vote. This was the setting for the deadliest plague in history—the influenza pandemic of 1918.
Presenter Lucinda Hogarty will define a pandemic, give a brief history of pandemics through history, and discuss the disease influenza in the setting of WWI conditions. She will focus in on the New England experience, describing hard-hit Boston and how Connecticut fared. She will wrap up with an overview of pandemic preparation today. Ms. Hogarty has a Master of Public Health degree from Yale and a Masters in American History from UConn. She worked in public health for 30 years, spending 5 years in public health emergency preparedness for local health departments in Connecticut. She has a particular interest in the history of medicine, on which she has taught a course. The program at Killingworth Library, located at 301 Route 81 in Killingworth, is free but advance sign up is required.
