Browse Items (37 total)

The influenza seems to have inspired many quack medicines as an easy solution. This advertisement in the Courant demonstrates that various products would have been available to Trinity students around 1918.

The Hartford Courant, too, reported that “members of the Trinity College S.A.T.C. have been ordered to remain upon the college grounds until further notice because of the epidemic of Spanish influenza in the city.” It wasn’t clear if other members of…

The Tripod first announced in its October 8, 1918 edition that by an “official order published on Saturday, October 4, all S.A.T.C. men were restricted to the college grounds until further notice as a necessary precaution to prevent possibility of…

The Tripod also covered briefly the deaths of several alumni, reporting on Hamersley in October 1918, as well as Rev. Robert S. Hooper ’15, who was “stricken with influenza, which quickly developed into a fatal attack of pneumonia” on October 6.

"Quarantine Lifted": an extract from the Trinity Tripod of November 5, 1918, reporting the end of the College's October quarantine. While the "influenza ban, which had restricted members of the S.A.T.C. [Students’ Army Training Camp] to the college…

The Tripod reported on Hamersley’s passing, recalling his “steady character and great ability—a fine example of a Christian gentleman and a Trinity man” and noting that he had been Secretary of the Board of Fellows of the College.

There were also impacts on the scholarly pursuits of students as a corollary of the pandemic. According to the Tripod, the College’s library saw an increase in attendance during the month of October 1918, with 2,750 visits versus 1,609 the year…

The Tripod also reported that one of the College’s S.A.T.C. members had been stricken with the influenza several months later: in January 1919, Paul de McCarthy had “not yet received his discharge” as he was “at the Hartford Hospital recovering from…

Dr. Jerome G. Atkinson, another alumni, was among the last Trinity men reported to die of influenza according to his obituary in the Tripod in April 1920.

This brief essay by Brendan W. Clark '21, History and Public Policy and Law major, considers the 1918 Influenza and its impact on Trinity College. The essay is divided into three sections: "The Board of Trustees and the 1918 Pandemic," "Losses 'Neath…

Aside from the S.A.T.C. incident, the College’s Board also saw a Trinity churchman and fellow Trustee called to action. The Right Reverend Ernest Milmore Stires, D.D.’01, was an Episcopal priest and later the 3rd Bishop of Long Island. In 1920,…

A portrait of President of the College, Remsen Brinckerhoff Ogilby, who oversaw the College in the years (1920-1943) following the pandemic.

Collection of archival documents, college publications, and photographs related to George Stewart Huggard (class of 1920).

The Board of Trustees meetings make no explicit references to the pandemic. Indeed, they address far more the state of military preparedness on campus and the general absence of the student body as a result of World War I. President Luther’s report…

The crisis, if it were ever considered by the College a crisis at all, had abated by June 17, 1921, at least in the eyes of newly elected President Remsen Brinckerhoff Ogilby. He was pleased to report that while “two studensts [sic] have left college…

The 1916-1917 Trinity College Student Handbook, issued shortly before the pandemic, describes the medical care Trinity students could expect to receive:

“Students who are ill are at once visited by the Medical Director. In cases of serious…

The first and only time the word “influenza” is explicitly stated in any official College publication is the January 1919 bulletin from the S.A.T.C., where the College references the quarantine and illness among the S.A.T.C. broadly:

“Trinity…

The Bulletin’s necrology for 1918-1919 reported the deaths of five alumni, the most prominent of which was William James Hamersley ’09 of Old Saybrook, late of Hartford. Hamersley was a Hartford attorney for the Connecticut General Life Insurance…

Leroy Austin Ladd ’08 of Hartford, late of Phoenix, Arizona, was elected “Chairman of the Commission of State Institutions,” though “immediately after the election…was stricken with Spanish influenza, which developed into pneumonia. After an illness…

Paul Roebling ’17 of Morris Plains, New Jersey, was the youngest alumnus casualty of the influenza noted in the Bulletin, who on December 13 was “stricken with Spanish influenza and died at Bernardsville, New Jersey December 16, 1918.”

Two Trinity students, sadly, did not see a Commencement as a result of the influenza. Among them was Lester Hubbard Church ’20 who, while serving as a third-class quartermaster on a submarine undergoing repairs in New London, “was stricken with…

Aubrey Gordon King ’22 was the youngest casualty in the Bulletin and the only who seemed to be residing on campus at the time: while still at Trinity, he was “taken ill with Spanish influenza on Tuesday, November 19, and died at the Hartford Hospital…

The Students' Army Training Course (S.A.T.C.) organized and prepared Trinity students for military service in World War I and later become subject to a quarantine in October 1918 due to the influenza pandemic.

A photograph of the Students' Army Training Corps (S.A.T.C.), which formed on Trinity's campus during World War I and was subject to a campus quarantine in October 1918 during the influenza.

Collection of ephemera and a letter written or produced by C.A. Johnson, Alumni Secretary, and distributed to alumni by the Trinity College Alumni Council.