Renovation reveals Poster from 1918 flu pandemic

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Renovation reveals relic from 1918 flu pandemic

City-authorized poster told of 'BEST WAY' to stop influenza's spread

BY A.J. HOSTETLER

TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Oct 7, 2005

The poster spotted on the side building on Main Street was likely put

up in October 1918.

During a lunchtime stroll with one of his pals down Main Street,

lawyer Harry Cohn spotted the brown, tattered poster on the exposed

side of a building under renovation.

Stepping past the concrete blocks left outside the former Supply Room

Co. building, he peered at the bold letters that read: " BEST WAY To

STOP the SPREAD of INFLUENZA. "

" SEGREGATE Those ALREADY INFECTED, so as to PREVENT " further

infection, he saw. " This can be Done ONLY with Co-Operation of

Citizens. "

It was an original poster from the 1918 influenza pandemic, he said

yesterday. Born in 1925, Cohn grew up in Roanoke hearing stories

about the worldwide deadly spread of influenza in 1918 from his

father, who served in the Navy during World War I. His father told

him of the disease's terrible toll he saw while working in the

quartermaster's office in Norfolk, so Cohn recognized the poster's

place in Richmond's history.

He also recognizes the poster's warning for today's Richmond

residents.

" We all have got to be looking out for what can happen, " he said.

Cohn, world health officials and now President Bush are worried that

a pandemic like the 1918 epidemic, which eventually killed an

estimated 50 million people worldwide, could be on the horizon.

Researchers this week determined that the 1918 flu was an unusual, if

not unique, virus that jumped from birds straight to humans and then

spread rapidly among a population with no immune defenses against the

virulent microbe that shredded its victims' lungs and left them

drowning in their blood.

The avian flu spreading now through Asia has killed about 60 people,

but so far it has not spread from person to person. If it does,

health officials expect a pandemic to rival the 1918 outbreak.

The poster was authorized by Dr. Lawrence T. Price, who was the

city's director of Emergency Influenza Work. It's plastered to the

eastern wall of the brick structure built in 1893. Apple Hospitality

REIT Cos. now occupies the space.

Apple's president and CEO, Glade M. Knight, said he purchased the

adjacent building housing the Supply Room early this year. In late

spring, construction workers began renovating the storefront.

Knight said it appears that the original front had been replaced with

a 1950s-style storefront. When that front was removed in mid-August,

a portion of the adjacent wall's brickwork and the poster was

revealed.

" I knew that it was a part of history, " said Knight, adding that he

was old enough that he " realized that there was a time when there

were flu epidemics. "

The poster was likely put up in early October 1918, when an estimated

195,000 Americans died of influenza.

On Oct. 2, 1918, The Richmond Virginian newspaper published on its

front page that the " Spanish Flu " was headed toward Virginia. Within

a week, Richmond health officials reported about 3,500 cases and also

banned public gatherings, including weekend parties and neighborly

visits. By Oct. 10, Price -- just appointed director of the

Marshall High School Emergency Hospital to handle flu cases was

himself stricken and replaced by Dr. E.C.L. .

Nearly 600 Richmonders died of flu in that one month.

Price survived his bout with one of history's deadliest plagues. He

died in 1939 after suffering a fatal heart attack and falling from

his fifth-floor office window at Fifth and lin streets.

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