Muriel Thumm was born in Manhattan in 1903 and raised by her father and grandmother in Pleasantdale, New Jersey. She was 15 when she was stricken with the flu in 1918. Her grandmother had died the year before Charles, so her father, a lawyer on Wall Street, stayed by her bedside and nursed her back to health.
Once she recovered and returned to school, she would ask for one of her classmates only to find out that the girl or boy had died. Then she would look for another one, and was met with the same response. She said she and her remaining friends soon stopped asking.
Story and photo courtesy of Muriel’s daughter, Muriel Powers
Published by bridgingthepast
Welcome to Bridging the Past. We help genealogists connect to their colonial New England ancestors by sharing with them information about the lives of their ancestors. What did they eat? What did they wear? What was a typical day like? Did my ancestor fight in a war? What was life like for that ancestor, and for the loved ones he left at home? Why did they move? Was it part of a larger movement? By answering these questions, and many more, you can bring your ancestors to life and feel closer to them.
We design lectures to answer these questions and give genealogists the tools and resources to personally connect with their ancestors by fleshing out the lives of their ancestors so they are more than names, dates and places on a piece of paper.
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1918 Flu Epidemic Stories 