The Cholera Years: The United States in 1832, 1849, and 1866

In the Republic era of America, people were assaulted daily by their own visions of success, failure, the expectations and weaknesses of a still developing concept of democracy, poverty, and illness. One such illness, Cholera, infected America three times during this period: 1832, 1849, and 1866. In America, "Cholera represented a constant and randomly reoccurring stimulus against which the varying reactions and systems of Americans could be judged", and it caused gradual changes in social attitudes, government, religious thought, and medicine as people tried to understand and cope with the disease. Historians have recently given little attention to defining and then writing about the social changes brought about by cholera, both as a process and its final result. It is part of history's recent interest in social aspects such as family and school, which medicine is a part of because the two are linked by every day life concerns. The Cholera Years is an interesting and easy to read book. One of its strengths lies in its readability and in how it engages the reader through primary sources. Historical books that tell stories and relate true life accounts and words are more interesting than those that simply move from one fact to the next. Also, Rosenberg is very organized in his presentation of information. The sections, chopped up by cholera year, follow the same patterns as far as how information is addressed. As a result, though we are reading from one year to the next, the progressions of society and thought are easy to follow and connect together. It actually made more sense this way than if Rosenberg had approached the book topically, which would have jumped around and only confused. Unfortunately, as a weakness, Rosenberg is very repetitive. A lot of information and points are stressed repeatedly throughout the book, and in that way it sort of losses focus a few times. Rosenberg gives an annotated bibliography at the end of his book, which lists aids, manuscripts, public documents, newspapers, printed medical documents, other printed material, and secondary sources consulted. He does make note in his section on printed material other than medical literature that he has not listed all the documents consulted because they are too numerous, but instead listed those that are most interesting or relevant, which he also does with newspapers. The primary sources include such documents as hospital reports, newspapers, Board of Health and committee minutes, and religious sermons. As such, we are provided with a lot of "from the mouth" accounts of cholera to support the progressions in thought and practice that Rosenberg takes us through from one outbreak to the next. This book fits well into the genre of medical history, as well as cultural history because Cholera had a direct and distinct impact on life, the concept of a person, social equality, and medical care. You won't get the sort of copious gory details that medical history books are known f

Raising my children in Central America when the sixth world cholera pandemic reached the shores of this continent heightened my awareness as to existence of this mysterious disease. My children would bring home their cholera awareness materials from school that emphasized hand washing and clean water. Later on, I researched an incident in 1852 when Ulysses S. Grant and the U.S. 4th Infantry were devastated by cholera when passing through Panama on their way to California. However, it wasn?t until I read Rosenberg?s book that I understood how horrible a death from cholera was and yet how easy it is nowadays to treat. Rosenbery brings out so many interesting aspects of the impact of cholera on public health and the fact that the disease has only been known in the Western world for a little over 200 years. Most people think cholera is biblical. The book is an easy read for a layman and too bad it appears to be mostly used as a text book in college.

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This book is truely a classic work of history. Although I also read it for a class (Medicine and Society in America), I recommend it to anyone with an interest in medicine, public health, religion, and general social history. In three parallel sections, the book relates the details of the 1832, 1849, and 1866 cholera epidemics. This structure results in some repetition but is needed to fully seen the connections/changes over time. It is extensively footnoted (I recommend you read these too - very interesting) and has a large bibliography... without seeming "overly academic." ENJOY.

Although it was read in conjunction with an urban history class, I found this book to be very engaging and moving. Rosenberg's writing flows easily through a very disturbing subject. He sets up very fluid parallels between the epidemic's appearance at all three major years: 1832, 1849, and 1866. Of special interest is the role of the NYC Metropolitan Board of Health in controlling and defeating the epidemic.. I hope I didn't ruin the ending for any interested readers: NYC is still a healthy city, despite outbreaks like the ones that Rosenberg identifies...