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eBook details

• Title: Using Local History to Understand National Themes: The Yellow Fever Epidemic in Philadelphia in 1793.
• Author : Teaching History: A Journal of Methods
• Release Date : January 22, 2003
• Genre: Education,Books,Professional & Technical,
• Pages : * pages
• Size : 203 KB

Description

College teachers of American history cover national themes such as the nature of the American Revolution and the establishment of the federal government because students must understand them if they are to gain a reliable knowledge of America's past. On the other hand, local history topics can be extremely valuable when they show larger historical themes from the ground up, so to speak. In addition, local topics offer manageable and focused research projects for students taking a variety of courses. As one example, the study of Philadelphia and its people during the yellow fever epidemic of 1793 illustrates both important local issues and larger national themes. Using Philadelphia as a microcosm, students can discern race and gender at work in American society, as well as discovering how medicine and politics interacted in the early Republic's political party system. The epidemic also shows the tension between strict and loose construction of the Constitution as President George Washington struggled with constitutional problems caused by the outbreak of disease in Philadelphia. These topics provide useful material to supplement lectures and spark discussion among students and offer abundant sources and opportunities for undergraduate research. It seems incongruous that Philadelphia, the new nation's capital, its leading city, the center of the American Enlightenment, the focus of Benjamin Franklin's efforts to do good for his community, should have succumbed in 1793 to a vicious outbreak of yellow fever that killed as many as 5000 people. Since doctors had no idea of the disease's cause, they were unable to prevent its spread. People who could afford to leave fled the city to avoid contagion. National, state, and local officials abandoned Philadelphia, leaving the sick to die in squalor. Citizens were so distraught that they fired guns in the streets to clear the air of the miasmas some believed caused yellow fever, burned tar and tobacco in their houses, and carried garlic with them wherever they went. In this crisis Mayor Matthew Clarkson stayed at his desk and called for volunteers to bury the dead and succor invalids and orphans. A small band of altruistic white men and members of the free black community came forward to perform those loathsome tasks. (1)

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