4. The Other Haskell
Just weeks after the March 1918 “first wave” flu outbreak at Camp Funston, the Haskell Institute in Lawrence saw a similar rash of influenza infections. Around one-third of the Native American students were hospitalized, and 17 died. In this episode, we’ll talk to historian Mikaëla Adams about this early outbreak of the 1918 flu at the Haskell Institute. And we’ll examine the larger context of Indian boarding schools in the U.S. and the failure of public health programs for Native Americans. And what can the Haskell Institute experiences tell us about medicine and discrimination in both 1918 and today?
Go Further
Curious about the sources we use and want to learn more about the topics, people, and places we discuss in this episode? Then this space is for you.
Read Mikaëla Adams’ article about the flu pandemic at the Haskell Institute: “‘A Very Serious and Perplexing Epidemic of Grippe” The Influenza of 1918 at the Haskell Institute, “ American Indian Quarterly, 44 (1), January 2020.
Copy of a letter from Charles Banks, US Public Health Service physician, to H.P, Peairs, superintendent of Haskell, about the March outbreak of the flu.
Learn more about the history of the Haskell and the indigenous cultures represented at the school at the Haskell Indian National University Cultural Center & Museum.
View the entry on “Influenza: Haskell - Kansas” from U.S. Public Health Reports, April 15, 1918, Vol. 33, No. 14, pg. 502. (Or if you want a longer read, view the entire issue at the US National Library of Medicine.)
Check out photographs and other artifacts about the Haskell Institute at the Kansas State Historical Society website.
Newspaper article in the Lawrence Daily Journal-World from April 11, 1918, “Epidemic Mystery at Haskell is Over.”