HOW MY GRANDMOTHER WHIPPED THE 1918 FLU

This is the story my grandmother told to me.  In 1918 World War I ended and everyone was glad to have peace.  The world would again enter its pre-war peace and prosperity.  They had a future to look to and could get on with their lives. My grandmother, Lillie Scurry, was born in “18 and 98” (this is how she would say the year of her birth).  Therefore she would be the 20 year old wife of Morgan Scurry.  She would help anyone who was hungry, sick or in need.  Most people lived by that rule in those days.

In the fall of 1918 something very dark began to happen in the world.  People in her neighborhood were coming down with chills, high fever, coughs, and dysentery.  The time honored remedy of hog huffs soaked in gin on rock candy, were not helping.  The Palm of Christian leaves were not able to cool the high fever.  Even prayers were unanswered.  What would they do?  Everyone was scared and fearing that they or their loved ones would get sick.  It was more  likely that no one would survive.  Then people began to die.  The men driving the "dead" wagons would stack people on the back as if they were logs. Day after day  new names were added to the list of those dead or dying.

My grandmother, Lillie, heard over and over that when someone became ill with the fever, they had stopped eating and soon died.  So she decided to eat and eat she did.  She weighed 98 pounds when the epidemic began and when it was over, she weighed over 200.  She literally ate her way through the rage of the Flu Scourge and survived.  She was able to cook, clean and even bathe her neighbors.  So, that is how my grandmother survived the Spanish Influenza of 1918. SHE WHIPPED IT BY EATING.!  She died when she was 86 old with the knowledge that in 1918 she hit upon a stragety to conquer the Flu.  The doctor said that there no was apparent reason for her to die that day, except the fact that she was old and satisfied with life.  She won. 

She kept her Victory Weight for some 70 years.  She finally gave it up by going on the Cookie Diet.!  That is another story...


Earthene Fleming
As told to me by Lillie Scurry
In my childhood
Article written May 4, 2009