Unquarantined

At the end of October 1918 word came from Indianapolis that the capital was back to business as usual, having lifted its flu quarantine, and state authorities expected the quarantine could be lifted by the next weekend wherever local conditions allowed. Only 48 of Indiana's 92 counties had reported new influenza cases in the past week. Lake County had "been hit very hard with the epidemic," according to the Hobart News, "particularly Hammond, East Chicago and Indiana Harbor," but now even East Chicago planned to keep its schools, churches and places of amusement closed only through midnight on November 2. In Hobart, Dr. Clara Faulkner predicted that Hobart could do the same, as she had seen a fall-off in reports of new flu cases, though the Gazette commented that there was "still considerable sickness." Valparaiso was dealing with an outbreak of smallpox as well, but it had not spread to the Hobart area.

Dr. Faulkner's prediction was correct. On the morning of Sunday, November 3, churches were once again free to hold public services. Businesses were free to open again, and presumably the drugstores and ice-cream parlors could bring back their chairs and turn on their "electric pianos" again. On Monday morning, the schools re-opened, and those students and teachers well enough to attend had to start trying to catch up on four weeks' lost work.

If the epidemic seemed to be over, at least locally, the war effort was going full steam ahead. Dr. Dwight Mackey was well on his way to France; Edward Abel was to follow him. Stateside, George Wood left the village of Deep River, and George Smith (Sela Smith's son) left Hobart, both bound for southern aviation camps. Another four Hobart men were ordered to entrain for Camp Wadsworth at Spartansburg, South Carolina. George Sauter and Fred Rose, Jr. finally got to come home on leave from Camp Custer — but only 24 hours' leave.* It remained to be seen whether Herbert Hoover's prediction of another year of war would prove correct.

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*Perhaps that leave was the occasion of those three photos I posted earlier, since I now think the previously unidentified man with Fred Rose, Jr. was George Sauter.

Sources:
♦ "Boys Called to Service." Hobart Gazette 25 Oct. 1918.
♦ "Health Conditions Better." Hobart Gazette 1 Nov. 1918.
♦ "Influenza Epidemic Reported on Decrease Over the State." Hobart News 31 Oct. 1918.
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 24 Oct. 1918.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 25 Oct. 1918; 1 Nov. 1918; 8 Nov. 1918.