![]() Yellow fever threw a bright light on economic inequality in the affected cities: families with the means to do so, like Irving’s, fled the “miasmic” urban environment for more healthful climates. The epidemics exacerbated post-colonial racial prejudice and encouraged xenophobia Philadelphia built the nation’s first quarantine station in response to a 1793 outbreak. They even pointed the finger at the luggage of foreign sailors. They blamed West Indian refugees and shipments of rotten coffee. Medical professionals speculated that it was caused by slum conditions in city centers (including landfill and stagnant water-this was closest to the mark). Yellow fever, which is spread by mosquitoes, was poorly understood at the turn of the 19th century. ![]() Irving, a native New Yorker, made his first trip up the Hudson River to Tarrytown in 1798, at age 15.Īt that time, New York City was in the grip of its tenth epidemic of yellow fever, a viral disease that killed 5,000 residents of Philadelphia in a single year and was on track to do as much cumulative damage in New York. ![]() Sound familiar? It did to Washington Irving, too. ![]() An indiscriminate infection that holds a community captive. ![]()
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