The State Library of NSW has launched a new podcast unearthing the rare first-hand accounts of the deadly 1918-1919 influenza pandemic.
The Library said the podcast, The Gatherings Order, ran over five episodes and featured commentaries from historians, public health experts and scientists.
“The Spanish flu, as it was known, claimed more lives in 1918-19 than the First world War, yet we know very little about the people who were tragically impacted … until now,” the Library said in a statement.
“[The podcast] unearths first-hand accounts of the then world’s deadliest pandemic while tracing its startling familiar story of social distancing, quarantine blunders, dubious cures and mask wearing,” it said.
“Senior Curator Elise Edmonds rakes through the State Library’s archives with historians, public health experts and scientists to piece together lost personal stories of those ‘sacrificed to duty’ and those who succumb to the battle with the Spanish flu at home.”
The Library said that one of the stories featured was of Annie Egan, 27, who died after contracting the deadly virus during her first nursing post at Sydney’s Quarantine Station.
“The unknown story of Sydney’s Butler family, whose 14-year-old son Keith died on 9 July 1919, is revealed through a rare collection of letters recently acquired by the State Library,” it said.
Senior Curator at the State Library, Elise Edmonds said there were almost no public memorials to those who died in 1919, so the condolence letters and cards sent to Keith’s parents and older sister were incredibly valuable.
The State Library’s The Gatherings Order podcast can be accessed at this PS News link.
