UPCOMING
EVENTS
May 29 (Saturday): Annual Plant Sale from
8:30-Noon. Early bird sale on Friday May 28 from 6-7 pm.
May
30 (Sunday):
Museum opens for the season-Covid dependent-on Sundays from 2-4
June
19 (Saturday):
Midsummer Night’s Eve Cavendish Village Ghost Walk. Meet at the Museum at 8 pm.
July
31 (Saturday):
11th Annual Cavendish Town Wide Tag Sale. 9-2.
September
12 (Sunday):
Annual Phineas Gage Walk & Talk, meet at the CHS Museum at 2 pm. Walk
portion is about a mile and a half and includes a visit to the accident site.
BETWEEN
TWO MILLSTONES: BOOK 2
In the Fall issue of
the CHS newsletter, we included an excerpt from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s memoir
Between Two Millstones, Book 2: Exile in America 1978-1994 which was
recently translated into English.
CHS
has received a generous donation from Pieter van Schaik: Having just
completed reading Between Two [Millstones] I am eager to contribute to
an effort to get local residents to actually read this book. His donation is
meant to enable the CHS to acquire and distribute copies to interested
individuals …and request each reader relay their thoughts about the book to you
upon reading it so that the local feedback will become part of the historic
record.
CHS
has copies of the book to share with locals who wish to read it and comment on
it. To obtain a copy, please call 802-226-7807, e-mail margocaulfield@icloud.com or mail PO Box 472, Cavendish VT 05142.
LEARNING
FROM HISTORY: Characteristics of Epidemics/Pandemics
In
less than twelve months, CHS has given three talks on pandemics/epidemics
and written various articles for the newsletter (Cavendish & Vermont Flu
Pandemic 1918, Summer 2020 edition) as well as at the CHS blog. Clearly it’s a timely topic.
During
events like Covid-19, people become curious about the past in the hopes that it
can explain the present and what the future might hold. With that in mind,
below are characteristics that apply to epidemics/pandemics that started
occurring about 10,000 years ago with the domestication of animals in Europe,
Asia and Africa
"All of the great
diseases from smallpox to measles to influenza ... [did not] exist in the
Americas because they didn't have any domesticated animals. When the Europeans
came over, it was as if all the deaths over the millennium caused by these
diseases were compressed into 150 years in the Americas. The result was to wipe
out between two-thirds and 90 percent of the people..It was the worst
demographic disaster in history." Charles Mann 1491 1493:Uncovering
the New World Columbus Created
This has happened
before, yet all pandemics end at some point. As noted by Marcus Aurelius,—the same
plot from beginning to end, the identical staging.
Every storm runs out of
rain
(Maya Angelou).
Pandemics/epidemics don't last forever but new
ones will need to be faced.
The
immediate reaction is Fear, which can result in panic-fight, flight, blame,
despair, conspiracy theories, civil unrest and cruelty.
As
much as possible, people flee where the outbreak is happening to a place
perceived to be safer. This can help spread disease.
They also will “fight”
in an effort to have some sense of control over a situation that is very much
out of their control. The outbreaks of plague in Renaissance Europe sparked
rumors of malicious plague spreaders, that ranged from high-ranking officers
and doctors to the lowest levels of workers –cleaners, cartmen and gravediggers.
They were singled out for a variety of reasons including self-interest and gain.
Jews were blamed during various bouts of
plague, resulting in full scale persecution.
In
Vermont (VT) second home owners and tourists are frequently blamed for Covid. While
the VT Department of Health demonstrated that the fall outbreak was due to Vermonters
going out of state, contracting the virus and bringing it back to families,
co-workers and social gatherings (Halloween parties), the comments persisted.
 |
The Great Dying
|
People also turn
inward. During the pandemics that devastated the Native Americans after the arrival
of Columbus, as well during the Antonine Plague that contributed to the fall of
Rome, people looked at it through the lens of their gods and cosmologies. The
belief that their gods had forsaken them caused some to despair and commit
suicide.
While
the extremes seen in past epidemics/pandemics are not as pronounced during
Covid, they are none the less at play. Without normal routines and jobs,
dwindling finances, the mandates to “stay at home” and reduce travel, combined with fear and anxiety, people can
act in ways they normally wouldn’t. The influx of calls to suicide hotlines,
protests, riots-now occurring all over the world, and even “cancel culture,”
are very much in line with how people respond during pandemics.
Those
living on the margins are at risk: The reasons are varied but can include:
inability to escape from where the pandemic is occurring; poor living
conditions, including overcrowding and dense pack; more likely to have other
health issues; malnutrition; no access to information due to language and
literacy barriers; lack of access to health care; and discrimination. Women and
children are particularly vulnerable to violence during times of quarantine
and social isolation for a variety of reasons including the inability to
temporarily escape abusive household members.
Women
face heightened risk of exposure to Covid 19 as
nearly two-thirds (64.4 percent) of frontline workers are women. Center for
Economic & Policy Research April 2020 A VT State report finds women
have been disproportionately affected. The economic downturn associated with
the pandemic has also seen a uniquely large impact on women's financial
stability and economic security. VT Commission on Women 6/29/20
Civil
unrest occurs
In the journal Peace Economics, Peace Science and Public Policy 2020;
26(3):20200045 a review of protests and unrest around the time of 57 epidemics
between the Black Death in the 1300s and the 1918 Flu Pandemic, found only four
occasions where revolts were not clearly connected with the respective
outbreaks. There is evidence to demonstrate that epidemics can disrupt civil
society in three ways. Firstly, because policies to prevent the spread of
disease can conflict with people's interest; secondly because the epidemic's
impact on mortality and economic welfare can worsen inequality; and finally due
to the psychological shock that can lead people to believe irrational
narratives regarding the spread of disease, "which may result in social, racial
discrimination and even xenophobia."
People
act in their own interests/ Scammers
& Misinformation abound along with Conspiracy Theories. In the most extreme
situations, such as the Plague, surrounded by death and suffering, inevitably
people begin to question the rules of law and morality.
During the 1918s, there
were "anti-mask" meetings. When there was a polio outbreak in Vermont
in 1917, and quarantine was ordered, a civil suit was filed by Community Chautauquas. Today there are
groups who believe mask wearing is a civil liberties issue with little regard
to public health.
The
more risky the situation the more snake oil salesmen surface. With the
Internet, they're having a field day. Causes, treatments, and cures are touted
with no evidence to support their claims. Some websites are even selling
vaccines. Many do not take the time to separate fact from fiction and untold
damage is done by misinformation and the spreading of it via social media.
“Connecting
the dots” is what humans do so we can understand our lives and how we live in
the world. When we are scared, in a state of crisis, fear, uncertainty, or feel
powerless-the perfect storm that a pandemic can create- we desperately try to
make sense of things. In the attempt to make connections and see patterns, it’s
not uncommon to string random and unrelated bits of information together and
draw conclusions that not only aren’t correct, but can spin into conspiracy
theories
Politics
and Pandemics do more than start with P: They go hand in hand. Five minutes of reading
or watching current news makes this all to obvious. The 1918 flu pandemic was the worst flu pandemic in recorded history, and it was
likely exacerbated by a combination of censorship, skepticism and denial among
warring nations. Thanks to the 1918 Sedition Act, which made it a crime to say
anything the government perceived as harming the country or the war effort,
many newspapers downplayed the risk of the flu as well as the extent of its
spread.
As Marcus Aurelius, Roman emperor, noted in the 2nd century Antonine Plague, however bad the physical disease surely was,
one thing was even worse-the mental plague of corruption, vice and moral decay.
 |
Patty Stern
|
The Heroes: It’s not surprising
that people are more concerned about the damaging effects of the pandemic
rather than the incredible contributions many are making. Our brains are wired
for a negative bias, as remembering threats to safety and well-being were key
to early human survival. That noted, the incredible sacrifices and efforts
being made by front line health care workers, grocery workers, community action
organizations and beyond is amazing. As Fred Rogers often noted during
difficult times, “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my
mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people
who are helping.”
 |
PVFD
|
Note: The
picture is of Patty Whittle Stern, a Proctorsville resident who is an ER nurse
at Mt. Ascutney Hospital. She posted a “selfie” showing the importance of taking
the next step of vaccination to help end the pandemic. Members of the
Proctorsville Volunteer Fire
Department, demonstrated how they continue to care
for themselves and community by showing their vaccination cards.
Health
impacts won’t be known for decades. Research
of people born during or just after the 1918 flu pandemic found that mothers
who got sick in the first months of pregnancy, had babies who, 60 or 70 years
later, were unusually likely to have diabetes; mothers afflicted at the end of
pregnancy tended to bear children prone to kidney disease. The middle months
were associated with heart disease. Another example is “shingles,” which you don’t develop unless
you’ve had chicken pox at some point, often as a child.
On
the plus side, descendants of plague survivors seem to carry a gene that made
them more likely to be “non progressors”-don’t develop full blown disease- when
they contracted HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.
The
long term consequences of Covid won’t be known for years, but preliminary
indications are that a subset of people continue to battle fatigue, shortness
of breath, cough, joint and chest pain, as well as other symptoms, long after
their initial illness. How long this will persist is unknown.
Change follows. The Antonine plague
was the beginning of the fall of the Roman Empire while at the same time
ushering in Christianity. The black death of the middle ages made the
Renaissance possible. It also paved the way for literacy (all the clothes that
were left could be turned into paper); a middle class (they needed a work force
and the serfs demanded a living wage), and the beginning of the shift from the “old
scholars” approach to medicine to empirical based evidence.
The
flu of 1918 made major changes in the United States public health and
strategies of masking, social distancing and lock downs are once again being
used today to stop the spread of Covid.
The
AIDS epidemic revolutionized health care, from new means of treatments for
cancer and other diseases, to how the FDA fast tracks drugs and allowing
compassionate use. It also ushered in the age of HIPAA and confidentiality.
The
environment can also change. "The
Great Dying of the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas led to the abandonment of
enough cleared land that the resulting terrestrial carbon uptake had a
detectable impact on both atmospheric CO₂
and global surface air temperatures. "
Quaternary Science Reviews March 2019. Colonization
and deaths from pandemics resulted in the “Little Ice Age,”
We’re
only at the beginning of how this pandemic will change our culture and society.
The mRNA vaccines (Pfizer and Moderna) are pioneering a new field of medicine
that will result in new vaccines and treatments for diseases such as heart
failure, Cystic Fibrosis, AIDS, and
hepatitis. Telecommuting will continue to expand while education at all
levels will change. The one thing we’ll miss, and we had a preview of it on
Dec. 17 when four feet of snow dropped on Cavendish in a 24 hour period, are
snow days. Remote learning is still possible in a snowstorm. Many are
commenting about how they haven’t had a cold or flu since they’ve been masking,
so it’s likely Americans will adopt the mask in much the same way other parts
of the world have done.
No
matter the situation-war, extreme loss, devastation, crisis-the number one
response of is resiliency. This is true across the board for all cultures. It's wired
into the human DNA. It doesn’t mean that it isn’t challenging, but people have
endured a lot worse, and come through just fine minus the dire consequences
predicted by headlines to the contrary.
From 1916-1920, the
people of Cavendish had to endure, a polio epidemic, 2 different outbreaks of
measles, and the worse flu in human history. Schools were periodically closed,
and women who worked in the mills, and many did, had to try to make childcare accommodations
as best they could. Some of the epidemics were so wide spread the Mills
couldn’t operate, which meant lost wages. Death was a constant reminder of the
seriousness of these diseases. Men were being called up to serve in WWI and to
top it off there was a shortage of sugar, salt, coffee and coal, with the
latter being the worse. Yet they continued on.
The
children were not scarred for life. Instead, they learned resiliency at an
early age, an important skill they would rely on as they would grow up to
become “the Greatest Generation,” by winning WWII.
BECOME A MEMBER, RENEW
YOUR MEMBERSHIP, DONATE
If you have not joined the Cavendish Historical
Society, need to renew your membership, and/or would like to be a volunteer,
please complete the form below and sending a check, payable to CHS, to CHS, PO
Box 472, Cavendish, VT 05142. All contributions are tax deductible.
Name: _______________________________________
Address:
_______________________________________________
Phone Number: _____________________ E-Mail:
____________________________
Membership Level
__ Individual Member $10 __ Senior Member 65+
$5 __ Sustaining Member $500
Volunteer
___ I would be interested in serving, as a
volunteer .I would be interested in serving on the following committee(s):__
Program Planning __ Fundraising __ Building (Museum)
__Archives
_ Budget –– Cemetery __ Carmine Guica Young Historians
Donations are always
welcome and can be designated as follows:
__ Archaeological Activities _ Museum & Archival __ Special Events
__ Rankin Fund __
Williams Fund __ Solzhenitsyn Project
__ Other (please specify)
__ Cemetery Restoration __ Preservation Projects
Earth Day
(April 22): Earth Day is an annual event celebrated around the world on
April 22 to demonstrate support for environmental protection. First celebrated
in 1970, it now includes events coordinated globally by the Earth Day Network
in more than 193 countries. 
