\u201c\u0007It soon became evident that Macdonald Hall must be its own hospital, as one after another the students showed symptoms of the malady and were ordered to stay in bed.\u201d \u2013 OAC Review, November 1918<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
On Oct. 2, 1918, OAC students and staff learned that a student, Geoffrey Howard Scott, had died. Training with the Canadian Engineers that summer in Quebec, the 20-year-old entered hospital in late September after appearing \u201cvery ill and delirious.\u201d Flu led to bacterial pneumonia, and he died five days later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A Pandemic Sweeps Through Campus<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
By mid-October, half of the student body of 300 people had fallen ill. Those with serious symptoms were sent to hospital, but most were tended on campus. The whole of \u201cUpper Hunt\u201d in Moreton Lodge (the predecessor building to Johnston Hall) and a few rooms in Macdonald Hall were converted into hospital rooms, with patients assessed by doctors and nurses from town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
![\"Lieutenant](\"https:\/\/www.porticomagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Lieutenant-Roy-Vining-189x300.jpg\")
OAC president George Creelman cancelled lectures for a week. Healthy students were either sent home or quarantined in residence. A few Macdonald Institute students volunteered as nurses and cooks in city hospitals. Campus events, including student-run concerts, plays, dances and athletics, were cancelled or postponed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Within a few weeks, students and faculty returned to campus, and classes and events resumed. Reporting on a postponed sophomore dance finally held in mid-November, an article in the OAC Review said, \u201cNot only was the flu a thing of the past, but the war\u2019s end came with such a grateful relief that we could well afford to make merry.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The relief was short-lived.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The flu returned in early December, coinciding with the annual provincial winter fair held in Guelph. After several OAC members began showing symptoms, Creelman again cancelled classes, postponed exams and sent students home early for the holiday break.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That winter, the flu claimed three OAC members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Roy Lindley Vining<\/strong>, a 1914 OAC graduate, had been wounded overseas with the Canadian forces. In fall 1918, he became a dairy specialist and lecturer in animal husbandry with the college. On Dec. 19, a week after attending the winter fair, the 31-year-old died of the flu at Guelph General Hospital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That month, Walter Herbert Scott<\/strong>, a 1916 OAC graduate and physics professor on campus, had volunteered to tend students with flu symptoms. Scott died on Jan. 8, 1919, leaving his wife and seven-month-old daughter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The final OAC victim of the first flu wave was student Harold \u201cLindsay\u201d McLaughlin, who died on Feb. 14, 1919.<\/p>\n\n\n\n By mid-February, it seemed that the flu had passed for good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201c\u0007At first it was rumoured and then it became only too true: the \u2018flu\u2019 was with us again.\u201d <\/p>\u2013 OAC Review, January 1920<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n In January 1920, an article in the Guelph daily newspaper reported the death from pneumonia of Murray Fallowdown, an OAC short-course student. Four days later, another college student, George James Tocher, also succumbed to pneumonia. Doctors realized that their pneumonia was only a contributory cause of death. Influenza was back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Writing about Macdonald Hall on campus, the OAC Review reported that \u201cthe drawing room was quickly commandeered and in a few hours was completely transformed into a hospital. When more cases were discovered, the library was used as a ward.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Unlike in 1918, both Macdonald Institute and OAC remained open. Lectures and exams continued, and even OAC\u2019s annual Conversat ball was held.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On Jan. 30, Macdonald Institute lost its first and only student to the pandemic. Sophomore Kate Morton Sinclair<\/strong> was admitted to hospital after developing double pneumonia and died Jan. 30.<\/p>\n\n\n\n John \u201cWalter\u201d Rutherford Dawson, a short-course OAC student, was also admitted to hospital, where he developed acute pneumonia and died Jan. 31.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Between Feb. 1 and Feb. 2, four more OAC members died: students Roy \u201cVictor\u201d Wood, Lorne Victor McGee and Douglas Edward Petty-piece; and Walter Lawton Iveson<\/strong>, a professor of chemistry and geology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Oscar Wilbur Bennett, a 1916 OAC grad, had also been wounded overseas before returning to Canada, where he became a lecturer in the poultry department. He contracted flu and then pneumonia and died Feb. 4.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Within almost two weeks, seven students and two faculty members in OAC and the Macdonald Institute died during the second wave of the Spanish flu. In all, the pandemic claimed the lives of 15 students and faculty, ranging in age from 17 to 32.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Compared with the influenza pandemic of 1918-20, wrote Burt, COVID-19 has been met with improved medical research, health care and medicine. Scientists have a better understanding of how viruses act and spread \u2013 knowledge that has led to improved medicine, hygiene practices and general preventive measures. As well, technological advancements give us up-to-date news and instant communications and the ability to continue to learn and work at home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Although no two pandemics are the same, lessons from yesterday can inform today. History warns us to be proactive against epidemics. Viruses may be invisible to us, but they can be fatal and must be taken seriously. Pandemics can overwhelm hospitals and medical professionals. Protective measures must be implemented early. Halting the spread is a shared responsibility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The 1918-20 pandemic discussed in Burt\u2019s account was hardly the last outbreak of infectious disease to upend lives on campus and off in the following century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In an article published this year in The Conversation, U of G history professor Tara Abraham wrote about how Ontario\u2019s worst polio epidemic in summer 1937 prompted school closings and left Toronto playgrounds and beaches deserted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Polio typically struck during the summer, meaning students lost just a few weeks; COVID-19 affected schooling for weeks earlier this year, with potentially more disruptions to come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1937, parents feared children risking infection. Today, parental anxiety over COVID-19 stems partly from infection fears (albeit much lower than polio infection in children) and partly from work-life stress over caring for and homeschooling their kids.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Mask-wearing was embraced by the American public as \u2018an emblem of public-spiritedness and discipline.\u2019\u201d<\/p>Catherine Carstairs<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n As with earlier disease outbreaks, wrote Abraham, back-to-school this fall has required parents to balance their sense of collective responsibility for ensuring public health and their personal responsibility for their own mental health and the health of their children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For kids returning to the classroom, masks are now as much a part of the back-to-school ensemble as backpacks and lunch bags. Mask-wearing has also become a fact of life for many of their parents in workplaces and other public spaces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Again, that\u2019s nothing new. In another article this summer in The Conversation, history professor Catherine Carstairs wrote that medical mask-wearing has a long history \u2013 going all the way back to the 17th-century plague. During the 1918 flu epidemic, cities around the world passed mandatory masking orders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Wrote Carstairs, \u201cHistorian Nancy Tomes argues that mask-wearing was embraced by the American public as \u2018an emblem of public-spiritedness and discipline.\u2019\u201d That view was hardly universal in 1918-20. Many Canadians were reluctant to wear masks and questioned their effectiveness. At the same time, Japanese embraced mask-wearing during the Spanish flu and again in the early years of this century with outbreaks of SARS and avian influenza.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In Canada today, controversies over masks continue, with complaints over lack of comfort and perceived ineffectiveness or concerns that masks impede communications for some people. As a visual representation of the threat of COVID, wrote Carstairs, masks can make people more fearful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Still, she said, support for mask-wearing appears to be growing in Canada. If earlier outbreaks from the 1918-20 flu pandemic to the 1937 polio crisis teach us anything, it\u2019s that we all must be proactive and that we all have a part to play in ensuring health \u2013 our own and that of others around us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Although COVID-19 has been a first in our lifetime, earlier outbreaks on and off campus offer potential lessons for today, from quarantining to keeping kids safe at school.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":6770,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_FSMCFIC_featured_image_caption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_nocaption":null,"_FSMCFIC_featured_image_hide":null},"categories":[2],"tags":[609,811,808,813,809,810,812],"yoast_head":"\n![\"Walter](\"https:\/\/www.porticomagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Walter-Herbert-Scott-215x300.jpg\")
Campus Turned Hospital<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"Kate](\"https:\/\/www.porticomagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Kate-Morton-Sinclair-230x300.jpg\")
Not The First Closing Of Public Amenities<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"Walter](\"https:\/\/www.porticomagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/Walter-Iveson-300x252.jpg\")
Mask-wearing Is Nothing New<\/h3>\n\n\n\n