Closer than any apocalyptic film produced in Hollywood, the Influenza Pandemic of 1918-1919 ravished the country and the entire world, leaving production crippled and dwindled the population. This podcast is presented by The University of Kentucky, Library Oral Projected interviewed Teamus Bartley, a Kentucky coal miner.
This podcast is a wonderful and rare example of the effects the epidemic. During this time life stopped, but the few who weren’t sick were charged in taking care of the infirm. Bartley has said, “nearly every porch, every porch that I’d look at had—would have a casket box a sittin’ on it. And men a diggin‘ graves just as hard as they could.”
It is easy to recognize why the world was reduced in production, Bartley says, “And the mines had to shut down there wasn’t a nary a man, there wasn’t a, there wasn’t a mine arunnin’ a lump of coal or runnin' no work. Stayed that away for about six weeks.”
Teamus Bartley, and his personal history, will be able to shape our understanding of a substantial and turbulent time of American and World History.
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