On March 27, 1915, Typhoid Mary was arrested and sent back to quarantine after being on the lam for five years.
Mary Mallon immigrated to America from Ireland at age 15 in 1883. She started as a domestic servant and moved up to cook. She cooked for some of the wealthiest families in New York City. Apparently, during her years as a domestic servant she had what she thought was the flu, but was actually a mild case of typhoid. This made her a carrier. When several members of banker Charles Warren’s family contracted the disease, he brought in a sanitary inspector who discovered that 7 out of 8 previous employers of Mary had family members get typhoid. When he visited Mary at her current job and asked for urine and blood samples, she ran him off with a knife. After all, she was perfectly healthy. The inspector got the police to cart her off to a hospital where tests revealed she was a carrier. She was quarantined in a cottage on the hospital grounds. A few years later, after promising never to work as a cook again, she was freed. However, it was her only way of making a living, so she soon broke her promise. In 1915, an outbreak at Sloane Maternity Hospital led to over twenty cases and two deaths. The infections were traced to the cook, Mary Brown. When they realized Brown was Mallon, Mary was put back in the cottage for the rest of her life.
- Amazing 419-421
0 Comments