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Food Friday: Treat Yourself to Lunch

April 3, 2020 by Jean Sanders 1 Comment

Having burrowed deep into our self-isolation I am feeling a little bereft. There are so many problems in the world which are huge and looming and frightening. My little hill of beans is pretty inconsequential. After wallowing in Contagion, and skirting Chernobyl, I have opted for a little light humor and armchair travel. We are enjoying the absurdity of Travel Man, (on Hulu and Amazon Prime) where Richard Ayoade travels to glam spots around the globe and eats and drinks delightful comestibles. He does this with a cute British accent, in charming company, and on an expense account. It sounds like the perfect job assignment.

The Spy’s budget is a little more restrictive. As is my itinerary. I can sneak out a couple of times a week to tear quickly through the grocery store, which is 1.2 miles from our house. The supplies there are limited, too. But this week I was able to score a pound of bacon and some lovely vermillion slicing tomatoes. I am going to treat myself to a nice lunch, much like the ones I used to enjoy in 2019. It’s time for homemade BLTs; my fave.

I love BLTs. Bacon, lettuce, tomato, with a judicious schmear of mayonnaise is my dream lunch. Throw in a generous serving crispy wavy potato chips and a Diet Coke and you cannot possibly ask for anything more. Club sandwiches have a certain appeal, I know, but they are awkward to eat; all that bread. There are multiple layers which just yield to disappointment and crumbling. And the turkey goes sliding, and things fall apart, and inevitably you wind up using your fingers. Which is never a good look if you happen to be on a first date. But who is dating in April of 2020, anyway? Let’s stick with the tried and true; the very essentials.

Let’s start with the bacon. Since this is Friday, I say we can go wild and each have four pieces of bacon. I like cooking bacon on parchment paper on a cookie sheet. I preheat the oven to 425° F. I try to use thick-cut applewood smoked bacon. At this point in our sequestering I am very happy with the store brand, however. We must not be snobs. If you can hunt and gather thick-cut bacon, lucky you, cook it for about 15 minutes without supervision. You might want to flip it, so the juicy, crunchy, wavy nature of bacon is completely optimized. So do not go on a Twitter-rant and lose track of time. If you wind up using thinner bacon, keep an eye on the oven and check every few minutes. Bacon can self-immolate without much notice. And burnt bacon is beyond repair.

Bread is important, too. I like either Pepperidge Farm white bread, or a nice deli rye. Some people are fancy and want to use challah, or pumpernickle, or croissants. It is a personal choice, based on your childhoods, and your degree of pretense. Please lightly toast the bread, and spread each slice with a light, even coating of Hellmann’s mayonnaise, or Duke’s, if you grew up with it.

Tomatoes must be red and juicy and absolutely grown outside in good dirt with lots of sunshine. So obviously the best BLTs are constructed in the summer, with your own sun-warmed tomatoes. You might need to use your imagination in April, with whatever produce your grocery store has been able to snag from local suppliers. (I put our tomato plants in the raised-bed garden last weekend, and am hoping for the best, and that I didn’t plant them too early.) Use a couple of tomato slices for each sandwich. It really isn’t all about the bacon – you need tomato juice running down your chin and onto your pajamas to get the full experience of BLTs in the time of quarantine.

Lettuce is simple. Every refrigerator, despite the best efforts of the Bon Appétit-reading aspirational cook, has at least one head of iceberg lettuce. It’s in the back, near the baking soda and the bacon grease can. Tear off a few crunchy leaves and wash, gently, in cool restorative water. Blot carefully. Do not even contemplate substituting rocket or endive or Romaine lettuce. This is sacred.

Layering is important – toast, mayonnaise, bacon, tomato slices, lettuce, mayonnaise, toast. Slice on the diagonal. Serve on a large plate, with a towering pile of potato chips and a slice of dill pickle. Add a glass of Diet Coke, or chocolate milk is you really want to be decadent. Add a cloth napkin, and whatever book you are currently reading. I am reading an autobiography of one of Princess Margaret’s ladies-in-waiting. It is chock-full of snobs, scandal and vicious gossip; priceless commodities these days.*

If the BLT isn’t your favorite sandwich in the whole wide world I feel very sorry for you. But the idea here is to treat yourself to something nice. Maybe you would rather have a hot grilled cheese with some tomato soup. I don’t often cook lunch for myself. I usually wander into the kitchen and rummage through the fridge for last night’s leftovers, or pull out a jar of peanut butter and a sleeve of Ritz crackers. Pathetic.

If you are able to, treat yourself to an unexpected nice meal. We all need a little cheering up. And a BLT will certainly put a smile on your face.

Our lovely friends at Food52 always have great ideas. I would like you to notice that I am not suggesting you make your own mayonnaise. Sheesh! https://food52.com/blog/10855-5-tips-for-a-better-blt

Nor am I telling you to get the grill out! https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/grilled-bacon-blts

“It is more fun to talk with someone who doesn’t use long, difficult words but rather short, easy words, like ‘What about lunch?’”
– A. A. Milne

*Lady in Waiting: My Extraordinary Life in the Shadow of the Crown
by Anne Glenconner

On the Performing Arts and GCTV: A Chat with Steven Arnold

April 1, 2020 by Dave Wheelan Leave a Comment

If Spy readers immediately recognize the new director of the Garfield Center for the Arts, there is a good reason for that. That is because Steven Arnold was very well known as the head of the beloved Church Hill Theatre for many years before he left the area in 2011. And that was one of the reasons he didn’t think twice about returning the Kent County a few months ago to lead the Garfield Center.

But a few months ago these days can mean a lifetime, and Steven, along with the staff and trustees of the Garfield, has had to think fast on how the arts center can continue its critical role in this new era of the coronavirus.

A few days ago, the Spy sat down with Steven to talk about this revised mission but also about his own background, his passion for the arts, and how the Garfield is boldly launching GCTV as one new strategy to keep connected with their patrons and the community in general.

This video is approximately five minutes in length. For information about the Garfield and GCTV please go here.

Islander’s War: A Chat with Author Don Parks

March 30, 2020 by Dave Wheelan Leave a Comment

Perhaps one of the most iconic photographs of the Eastern Shore in recent times in the frightening image of the last remaining house on Holland Island. It depicts the devastating impact of sea levels rising on the Chesapeake Bay islands but also a reminder that Holland Island once was home to three hundred residents.

The later is what Eastern Shore writer Don Parks seeks to bring to light with his new novel, entitled Islander’s War, which was the home of his father at the beginning of the 2oth century. Drawn to an island culture made up of small families, Parks tells of young men leaving the small hamlet to serve in World War I, following in love, and the hard choices they need to make of when and if they will return to their community after the conflict ends.

The Spy talked to Don before the coronavirus shutdown to learn more about Islander’s War and the life and times of Holland Island.

This video is approximately five minutes in length. To purchase Islander’s War, published by Secant, please go here

Snapshots of Daily Life: Reminiscing by George Merrill

March 29, 2020 by George R. Merrill 1 Comment

For a diversion, lately, I’ve been rummaging through closets. Ever notice how their contents multiply over time and fill with surprises?

During a foray into one closet, I rediscovered an old file box labeled 1946. It contains random papers that my mother kept. I found vintage World War II memorabilia. My father was at war in Europe, my mother on the home front on Staten Island raising three children. She volunteered as a nurse’s aide at Halloran Hospital where wounded soldiers returning from the war were treated. There’s a snapshot of her in uniform. How young she looks, I think. In the box, I found some V-mails, censored and copied by the military for national security –– letters my father sent from the front. I found pictures of relatives, all of whom are long gone, uniformed Navy and Army officers. I found a few ration stamps issued during that period, a copy of the military journal, Stars and Stripes, announcing the Bulge offensive and a copy of Up Front, Bill Mauldin’s classic documentary depicting soldiers’ lives during WWII.

Of the national crises during my lifetime, I recollect two vividly: WWII and 9/1.

WWII thrilled me. I was nine. Traveling the Staten Island Ferry regularly I saw the energy of America at war –– uniformed military personnel arriving and leaving, troop ships in the harbor, the region pulsing with vitality. America’s relative safety –– bordered by two oceans –– and my boyish sense of omnipotence combined to leave me with many fond memories of what to me was a glorious adventure, not the tragic conflict it was. As an adult, I was horrified at the carnage of 9/11 but also shaken by what had never occurred to me before: that America wasn’t invincible as I’d always believed and it had become as vulnerable as the rest of the world. I went from years of feeling omnipotent and safe to being frightened and vulnerable, just as my country had.

It’s odd how our minds’ recall some of life’s signature moments by peripheral, even absurd details associated with them.

The morning of 9/11, I’d gone to the supermarket for eggs and milk. On the news rack, I saw one of the tabloids that print sensational rubbish. There was picture on the front page of a large frog lying next to a woman in a hospital bed with the headline: “Woman Gives Birth to Frog.” Too good to pass up. So, I bought a copy thinking I’d write some kind of goofy article about it. I arrived home and, with tongue in cheek, started writing a piece about this poor woman’s discovery. My wife came to my studio, looking frightened, and told me a plane had just flown into one of the twin towers. I’ve never forgotten either the silly frog or my wife’s terrifying disclosure.

One day in August of 1945, my father returned from the war. I sat on the curb, my back leaning on a sycamore tree. I couldn’t wait to see him. It was hot and the macadam on the street had risen in small bubbles, as if boiling. I stepped on them, making them snap like gunfire. The war was over. My father finally arrived in the car and he hugged me. I remember how the stubble of his beard felt like sandpaper against my cheek, the mottled bark of the sycamore at my back and the macadam bubbles under my feet that rose in the summer heat.

Thomas Aquinas once considered our perceptions of reality in this way: there was an ‘essence’ of things and then their ‘accidents,’ incidental characteristics that are peripheral to their essence. I think when we’re not sure of the essence of something, just what the very heart of the matter is, we often get to it by following the path of its ‘accidents,’ like playing Charades or like the free association that leads us to the essence of a dream. Strange how a sycamore’s mottled bark and heat bubbles in a macadam street could become the icons of one of my life’s most exhilarating moments; and how a mindless frog became symbolic to me of the first foreign invasion of America’s homeland since the war of 1812.

My father would periodically send packages from Europe. Receiving them was exciting. I remember one containing a German officer’s tunic, a helmet, bayonet, cartridge belt and a host of medals Nazi soldiers earned. The package also contained several K-Rations small wax covered boxes, containing basics (then) like canned chopped ham, malted milk tablets, fruit bars, sugar, instant coffee, chewing gum, cigarettes, water purifier, and packets of toilet tissue.
Toilet tissue, then, was more available on the roiling battlefields of WWII, than in today’s supermarkets.

Of the many civilian privations resulting from WWII, the consolation of touch was not one of them. Touching, recently, has been a volatile social issue. Because of sexual abuse, touching earned a bad rap. Now that abuses are being exposed, and perpetrators prosecuted, touch is returning to its venerable place in the connective tissue of human relationships. And no sooner has touching been given social clearance, and it’s been assigned sinister connotations again at a time when we desperately long to touch each other. A friend of ours who lives alone reports that, during this time of social distancing, the high point of her day is not any calls she gets, but the warmth she feels as her dog jumps on the sofa and snuggles next to her. And now we do what we can; make calls instead; it’s our ‘wartime” way of remaining in ‘touch.’

The coronavirus pandemic has been characterized as a war, indeed, a world war. Our enemy is invisible. This is a war like no other. Our enemy has no army, no tanks, no planes and not even a gun. Our enemy claims no national identity or moral purpose and is tiny like an atom; infinitesimal in size but terrifying in potency. The problem is not that our enemy hates us; the problem is that it needs us. It needs us to get a life. We see the virus as an adversary, while it sees us as rescuers. Without us, the coronavirus is lost, depending only on animals for its survival. In a strange way, it seeks the life force that vivifies you and me. It’s that life force that offers the virus a more prolific, if not necessarily, better existence.

Join me in praying that the coronavirus finds more benign ways to get a life and that we’ll all be touching soon.

Columnist George Merrill is an Episcopal Church priest and pastoral psychotherapist. A writer and photographer, he’s authored two books on spirituality: Reflections: Psychological and Spiritual Images of the Heart and The Bay of the Mother of God: A Yankee Discovers the Chesapeake Bay. He is a native New Yorker, previously directing counseling services in Hartford, Connecticut, and in Baltimore. George’s essays, some award winning, have appeared in regional magazines and are broadcast twice monthly on Delmarva Public Radio.

Food Friday: Quarantinis!

March 27, 2020 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

How are you coping during the great Coronavirus quarantine? Most of the time we feel good about keeping our neighbors safe, and ourselves, too. Other times we are feeling a little forlorn and bereft. Our social life, which hasn’t been great since our children stopped having playgroups, is about the same. We walk the dog for exercise and much-needed Vitamin D, but we have stopped going to the gym. I have broken my daily habit of running to the grocery store every time the nature abhors a vacuum in the pantry. Even the UPS guy has stopped knocking, which is a good thing because Luke the wonder dog is convinced he is a Nazi stormtrooper coming after us, and tries to claw through the front door whenever we get a delivery. Still, it was nice to shout,“Thank you!” to a human being as he ran for his life.

I miss conversation. I miss yakking about something as innocuous as the weather or the new stripes being painted in the store parking lot. I miss just yakking. I still have a reflexive urge to check the answering machine whenever we come home – keep in mind we haven’t had a land line in five years, let along an answering machine. Almost everyone has a smartphone these days. I was startled when mine rang the other day, and there was a real, live person on the other end. Not a telemarketer, or a political campaign. A person who wanted to talk with me! I am inclined to think that my bar has been set way too low lately.

One of my dearest friends from college was out for a walk, and decided to use the telephone feature of the tiny computer she carries in her pocket to connect with me. She wasn’t Googling anything. She wasn’t checking IMDB to see how old Bill Pullman was. She wasn’t taking a photo or listening to a podcast. What a brilliant concept! She touched the little button by my name in her address book while she was out getting some socially distanced exercise in her neighborhood, and we yakked for an hour about work, parents, children, dogs, television shows, knitting, books, weddings, travel, new babies and due babies. An hour flew by, and we were eighteen again. And we resolved to conquer technology, and to get together with some other friends from Washington College at a virtual cocktail party. We are going to Zoom, Skype, FaceTime, Google Hangouts, What’s App. We’ll figure it out. We are going to have a Quarantini Hour, where we will consume alcohol and laugh our brains out and see each other’s smiling faces. What a concept! Wish us luck.

But you should try it, too. Reach across the great abyss and use technology to visit the village of your college friends, or that old pre-school playgroup, or even your own kids. Plan a time to get together with your book group. Put on some lipstick, if you are so inclined; under-eye concealer is our friend. Set up your laptop or your iPad or your phone in a place where you can control the lighting. Watch the camera angle – lately some of the people on the evening news being interviewed from their improvised home studios look like chinless wonders. Have the camera be in line with your eyes. Good lighting is paramount. Don’t sit with windows behind you. Then find a neutral background. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMex-9FyljU But after the first scotch and soda, who is going to care?

The past is a foreign country. In those long ago days at Washington College when we first met, it was legal for us to drink beer at 18. We shake our heads nowadays at the notion that there was a college-sponsored beer wagon at our freshman orientation. (I can still see my mother craning her neck, reluctantly waving goodbye to me that first time she left me behind in Chestertown. She was incredulous; I had a beer in my hand!) So we grew up in a culture that believed in a cocktail hour. We often had themed parties, with the appropriate cocktail for each bash. I am glad to say that we outgrew Purple Jesus Punch. In our more recent years we decided that the Cosmo was pretty, and it was sophisticated enough for us, now that we were all grown up. We also discovered that three is our limit. It should be a glorious Quarantini. Cheers!

Cosmo à la Shirl
https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/cosmopolitan

The French 75 is now my cocktail of choice. When we used to go out, back in the day, in February, I would order a French 75. On Saturday nights now Mr. Friday mixes up one or two for me.

French 75
https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/french-75-3 That is Bon Appétit’s way.

This is Mr. Friday’s recipe:
2 ounces Cognac (he likes his with 2 ounces of elderberry cordial)
¾ ounce fresh lemon juice
¾ ounce simple syrup
2 ounces Champagne (but Prosecco works just fine!)
Lemon twist

For your Quarantini you can always have beer, pricey white wine, a V&T, Two Buck Chuck, Diet Coke, Champagne, Prosecco, coffee, tea or water. What is important is not feeling alone. Spread your love, and see how far it goes. Like good butter. Pick up your phone, and socialize.

“I’ve been homesick for countries I’ve never been, and longed to be where I couldn’t be.”
― John Cheever

The 1918 Flu Epidemic on the Eastern Shore by Angela Rieck

March 26, 2020 by Angela Rieck 2 Comments

The 1918 “Spanish” influenza (ironically most scientists believe it started in the United States) is the most famous pandemic in America. While we are living through our own pandemic, it is interesting to learn how our predecessors fared in the 1918 and 1919 influenza outbreak.

The 1918 virus differed from the current virus COVID 19. The 1918 virus was an influenza and was especially lethal for those between the ages of 10 and 30. Death from the 1918 flu came rapidly, usually within a week, some victims died the same day. Within three days, pneumonia often followed and without antibiotics and ventilators, it proved fatal in 25% of the cases. Those exposed to the spring 1918 influenza were immune to the deadly fall influenza.

Scientists still do not understand why the 1918 disproportionately impacted the young since most flu viruses’ prey on the very young and very old. There are two theories. One is that the flu produced a dangerously strong immune response called cytokine storm causing a lethal overreaction. Other scientists believe that the older generation had been exposed to other flus, thus building antibodies. Conversely, the COVID 19 virus is fatal to those with weakened immune systems and those over 60.

To learn how the 1918 pandemic impacted the Eastern Shore I researched newspaper articles, thesis papers, Public Health Statistics, the Internet and books on the 1918 Flu Epidemic. While I was fortunate enough to find local papers from 1918 and 1919 stored in the Library of Congress, none were from Talbot or Kent county. (The Star Democrat is missing digitized versions from those years.) However, there are similarities among the counties.

Overall, I was struck by how little was reported. There were few news stories; most not on the front page. Articles were devoted to the war effort, shortages, crime and local news.

The first onslaught of this flu in the Spring of 1918 was virtually ignored, and for good reason, there were no influenza deaths in that Spring in either Kent or Talbot Counties, and only 5 reported cases. There were two minor stories about a soldier’s flu, both on page 2.

“If your friend or your relative or your best beloved has a runny cold, don’t kiss him or don’t kiss her and don’t kiss them. They may have the “Spanish Flu.” Bacteriological investigation of the cases which have gotten into this country seem to indicate that there is nothing new or mysterious about this malady. Some of the cases are of what we would call grippe, some of common colds. The only serious thing about it, according to the New York Commissioner of Health, is its tendency to a resultant complication of pneumonia.” Evening capital and Maryland gazette, Annapolis, August 30, 1918.

Our predecessors could not have known what was coming. Scientists now believe that over the summer the virus mutated into a deadly strain.

Everything changed in late September and early October when the first reports about this deadly influenza came out of Camp Meade in late September. Eventually 25% of the 14,000 soldiers were infected and 800 died. Of those who contracted pneumonia, the death rate climbed to 27%. On September 27th the draft was halted.

From September 24th to October 5th, the disease spread rapidly on the Eastern Shore. By October 5th the Surgeon General proposed shutting down schools and all social gatherings. Movie Theaters and shows followed several days later. Factories remained open to support the war effort. By October there were 871 cases of the flu and corresponding pneumonia in Talbot County and 73 deaths. In Kent County there were 371 cases and 61 deaths.

INFLUENZA HAS THE COUNTRY IN ITS GRIP! MANY HUNDREDS DIE OF PNEUMONIA CAUSED BY THE DISEASE Schools, Churches, Theatres And Other Crowd-Drawing Places Closed. Spanish Influenza, or the old fashioned “grip,” is raging ail over the country and many deaths are occurring daily as a result of pneumonia developments. Influenza has been brought to the Eastern Shore from Baltimore. Philadelphia, and Wilmington by our people visiting in those cities. In some of the towns on the Shore, a number of deaths; have occurred and in other towns hundreds of the people are seriously ill. Schools, moving picture shows, churches, and all places where the public gathers in any very considerable number have been closed to prevent the spread of the disease. In Worcester County there are a great many people ill and every precaution should be taken to prevent an epidemic. Every caution against the spread of influenza must he observed by the public. The Health officers warn because of the importance in this wartime effort to keep all our industrials up to the fullest capacity of their productiveness for the national interest. Snow Hill Democratic Messenger, October 5, 1918.

The surgeon general distributed guidelines. Precautions included isolating the sick, cleaning their utensils in boiling hot water and soap, hand washing, wearing masks, and gargling.

HEALTH BOARD TELLS HOW TO HALT EPIDEMIC. Stop the spread of influenza and pneumonia by obeying these ten new rules issued yesterday by the Board of Health. I—Cough and sneeze in your handkerchief only. Spitting is dangerous and unlawful. 2 —Glass and eating utensils must be sterilized by washing in boiling water. Your lips must not touch the mouthpiece of a public telephone. 3—Waiters should not touch your bread, the edge of your glass, cup, plate, knife, bowl or spoon 4 Wash your hands and face several times a day. Don’t shake hands. 5. —Pneumonia and influenza germs come from mouth and nose. Wash your face. 6 —Do not kiss your child on the lips. 7 —Do not visit one who has the “flu” or pneumonia. 8 — Do not go to school or to work if you have a cold. 9 Avoid over-work, over-eating, worry, fatigue, lack of sleep. Keep your windows open, rain or shine. 10—Get a competent doctor the minute you feel sick. Report quickly all cases of either disease to the Department of Health. The Daily Banner, Cambridge MD (October 1918 & January 1919).

Imagine how it must have felt to suddenly hear about a previously unknown flu that in 10 days was killing our strongest population. While the front page was filled with obituaries about those dying from the flu, news about the influenza was relegated to inside pages. Unlike our 24-hour media cycle, there was little speculation, no summaries of deaths and frequent assurances that this was no different from other flus. Even though in some cases, entire families were afflicted.

The worst was yet to come, 25% of all deaths on the Eastern Shore were attributed to the 1918 flu, and these deaths occurred from October through December.

Conflicting messages were widespread, for example on October 11th, the Cambridge Daily Banner reported that the Philadelphia Public Health director, Dr. Krusen, pronounced that the worst was over, the cold weather would kill the virus. (He also gave permission for a large parade to sell war bonds on September 28th.) However, on page 3, The Daily Banner also announced closings for the flu.

WORST IS PAST IN “FLU” EPIDEMIC Clear Cold Weather Will Greatly Aid In Fighting Disease. Philadelphia, Oct. S. —Clear, cold weather, which Director Krusen says is the best destroyer of influenza germs, gave the city and state authorities unmeasured assistance in Philadelphia’s fight against the grip epidemic. “I feel we’ve reached pretty nearly the top now,” said Director Krusen. “Our organization is being amplified and perfected. Aid is coming from all sources and we soon will be able to be optimistic.” The Daily Banner, Cambridge, MD, October 08, 1918

That same day, another paper, The Midland Journal (Rising Sun) reported 20,000 new cases in the past 48 hours.

Obituaries of dozens of citizens who died from the flu were printed on the front page. Children, soldiers, health care workers, politicians, even Woodrow Wilson (whose stroke was believed to be caused by the influenza), succumbed to this disease.

By October 12th, the consensus was that the flu was waning, and by October 25th most schools and social gatherings had reopened. But that optimism was short-lived.

Despite the optimistic predictions, the death toll continued for the rest of 1918, by the end of 1918, there were 118 deaths in Kent County and 133 in Talbot County. All told, 9% of the population got the flu in 1918 Talbot County and 6% in Kent County.

By December 13th, a third wave appeared, and it became apparent that the reduction in cases had been due to the quarantine, not the cold weather. Reopening schools and meeting halls gave the influenza access to more victims. Schools, theaters and meeting places were closed again and did not reopen until the end of January 1919. By January, coal was scarce because coal miners had been decimated by the virus. Deaths continued to mount until February and by March, it was gone.

INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC. It seems we cannot get rid of influenza in Worcester County. Alas the disease has broken out again in several sections of the county. This is not only true in Worcester, but in many other sections of the State and the nation. Democratic Messenger, Snow Hill, December 14, 1918.

Health Notice Owing to the apparent increase in influenza among school children and teachers, I deem it best to close the schools for the present week. The moving picture theatre will also be closed for the same period of time. While there is not as great danger attendant upon children collecting in crowds in the open air, I feel that it is my duty to urge parents to prohibit their children from going in crowds to skate. If we find that crowds collect anywhere, we may be compelled to take some steps to prevent it. During this period, as well as at all times, people should be very careful when coughing or sneezing, and hold something in front of their mouth when compelled to cough or sneeze. It is in this manner that, diseases, especially influenza, is spread. Visiting should not be practiced at this time, especially where any one is sick, unless you go to offer your assistance, then in cases of influenza, a mask should be worn, when working about the patients. E. E. WOLFF, M. D. City Health Physician. The Daily Banner., January 14, 1919, Cambridge.

Of course, where there was uncertainty, there were conspiracy theories. It was rumored that the Germans deliberately brought this disease to America.

Is This Mysterious Infection a New Kind of German Offensive? Is this new disease which has already killed hundreds and stricken thousands of our soldiers and civilians a new German war offensive? If not, how did it happen that this epidemic appeared so suddenly and extensively in such widely scattered cities and army camps throughout the country? Smitten as from a bolt from a clear sky thousands of Americans have been suddenly prostrated in many widely separated parts of the country, during the past ten days, by a disease which is called, apparently for want of a better name, “Spanish Influenza.” Naturally, under all circumstances, there is much speculation regarding the matter. Perhaps because there seems to be a rather natural disposition to ascribe about everything that is perfidious in the world today to Germany, some have ventured the guess that the disease may have been introduced and spread by German agents.

This theory, however, is generally considered as being hot only entirely groundless but really absurd, for it seems hardly conceivable that, if Germany undertook an offensive of this kind, she would choose such a mild and humane sort of disease. A much more plausible explanation would seem to be the simple fact that the recent cold snap caught the country entirely unprepared for such severe weather and, as a result of our unheated dwellings and other buildings and the inadequate clothing that was being worn, large numbers of people in different sections of the country contracted colds, which developed in many cases into pneumonia and resulted in an unusual number of deaths. Almost always at this season of the year colds are frequent and they often result fatally, and it may well be that, but for the high tension of these strenuous war times, this epidemic would not have attracted unusual attention. In any event there seems to be no occasion for special alarm or panic about the matter, for the disease is evidently one which the American medical profession is perfectly able to handle, and, moreover, effective measures are being taken, wherever it appears, to check it and destroy its power. The Midland Journal, Rising Sun, October 4th.

Prayer, quarantines, and hope were NOT the only alternatives available to residents of the Eastern Shore. There were advertisements for patent medicines to cure the flu. Most remedies involved a laxative. Quinine (used for malaria) was tested and found ineffective.

Spanish Influenza or Grip by Dr. Lee H. Smith. An old enemy is with us again, and whether we fight a German or a germ, we must put up a good fight, and not be afraid. The influenza runs a very brief course when the patient is careful, and if we keep the system in good condition and throw off the poisons which tend to accumulate within our bodies, we can escape the disease. Remember these three C’s—a clean mouth, a clean skin, and clean bowels, to carry off poisons from the system and keep the bowels loose, daily doses of a pleasant laxative should be taken. Such a one is made of May-apple, leaves of aloe, root of jalap, and called Dr. Pierce’s Pleasant Pellets. Hot lemonade should be used freely if attacked by a cold, and the patient should be put to bed after a hot mustard footbath. The Prince George’s Enquirer and Southern Maryland Advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) November 22, 1918

Some doctors continued to recommend whiskey.

Is Whisky Good For “Flu?” Dr. A. A. Cairns, Chief Medical Inspector of the Bureau of Health, of Philadelphia, flatly differs with Coroner William B. Knight on the statement that whisky is an essential in fighting the influenza epidemic. Giving his personal opinion of whisky as an influenza Remedy, Dr. Cairns said: “There are many physicians who do not use whisky at all in the treatment of influenza cases. In fact, whisky has been taken from the American Pharmacopeia as a medicine. Whisky is an old- time remedy that has gone out of practice.” The Midland Journal, Rising Sun, October 25th.

In hindsight it was a serious mistake to lift the quarantines so quickly. However, given that the medical treatment at the time, which lacked antibiotics for pneumonia, ventilators and oxygen; there may have been very little that could have changed the course of the disease. It was a vicious virus, and doctors, to this day, do not understand the reason for its power. People died, not for the lack of facilities, but for the lack of medical knowledge (viruses were not discovered until the 30’s). Vaccines were tried, but failed.

During this pandemic, residents were distracted by World War I. Newspapers reported on bond rallies, rationing and supporting the war effort. There was little time to ruminate on the deadly virus. Eastern Shore residents were lucky in their isolation, without the 24-hour news cycle, they were able to live their lives and pray that the deadly virus would not descend upon them.

How many people on the Eastern Shore died from the 1918 flu? The virus attacked so rapidly that some deaths were misclassified. Worldwide estimates range from 50 to 100 million people…that is a very wide range. It is estimated that over a half million Americans died. The most deaths occurred in second wave in the fall. The third and final wave from December through February was less deadly because scientists believe that the virus mutated to a less virulent form.

Ultimately the flu was devastating, in Talbot County 13% of the population and in Kent County almost 10% of the population had been infected. (This may be an underestimation, since does not include the higher incidences of Tuberculous that have been attributed to the influenza.)

Lessons for us, are fewer. We are lucky that COV19 is not as deadly as the 1918 influenza. Public health experts are advocating isolation to “flatten the curve” and hope that the COVID 19 mutates benignly. Some experts are questioning that approach because of the impact on the economy and the small population who is seriously impacted. Vaccines and treatments are being vigorously studied, but treatments are months or years away.

All that we can do is wait and hope and pray as generations did before us. While medicine has changed, humans have not.

Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs, and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.

Christ Church in Easton: Weathering the Storm Together

March 24, 2020 by Val Cavalheri 2 Comments

In times of crisis, it has always been the role of churches and synagogues to give people a safe place to gather and receive comfort and support. This is not possible with what the world is experiencing at the moment. With the need for social distancing, places of worship have had to come up with innovative ways of reaching their congregation to give them messages they need to hear. Christ Church in Easton thinks that the message ‘we’re weathering the storm together’ is one that needs to be told, and they’re telling it in a stirring music video.

Recorded and edited in just three days by Ray Remesch, the song Hold Us Together, is performed by a talented musical team, which includes Bruce Strazza, Justin Pokrywka, Jimmy Maguire, Sara Chapple, Greg Remesch, Ray Remesch, and Tawney Strazza.

Although the song is about being together, each musician performs alone, in the empty church, with their voices later combined in layered tracks.“The fact that we’re all experiencing this is bringing people together because we’re all experiencing the same type of separation. I just wanted to find a way to illustrate that,” says Remesch.

The message of hope has resonated within the community as thanks and praise for the video continues to pour in.

Val Cavalheri is a recent transplant to the Eastern Shore, having lived in Northern Virginia for the past 20 years. She’s been a writer, editor and professional photographer for various publications, including the Washington Post.

Maryland 2.0: A Chat with Father-Son Wilson and the Preston Motors Success Story

March 23, 2020 by Dave Wheelan Leave a Comment

Perhaps it is a coincidence that our conversation with David Wilson, and his son, David Jr, will be broadcasted during one of the most significant economic downturns in American history. But the story of Preston Motors, and its unprecedented rise to being one of the top 33 Ford dealerships in the country out of 3,400, it a tale of a father and son team that rose from the ashes of the last great recession we had in 2008.

While David Wilson had started selling cars right after high school, and within four years had purchased his first dealership several decades before, 2008 marked a landmark year when his son joined the family business. After completing Ford’s own four-year college, David Jr. returned full time, and the father-son built their very own internal marketing team. Within a few years, Preston had become so sophisticated in marketing their dealerships through the web that they climbed to the top 50 list using their beloved Frog branding and sticking by their community. They also created a national marketing firm to help other dealers using many of those same techniques under the ifrog banner.

In the Spy’s ongoing series of documenting some of the Eastern Shore’s most entrepreneur businesses and their founders, it was not hard to ignore the Wilson family and their committed associates for building an extraordinary success story from downtown Preston, Maryland with its population of 718 residents. Thus becoming a mouse, or frog if you will, that continues to roar from the middle of Caroline County.

This video is approximately seven minutes in length. For more information about Preston Motors and Ifrog marketing, please go here.

Snapshots Of Daily Life: Homebound by George Merrill

March 22, 2020 by George R. Merrill 3 Comments

I practice social distancing. I thought it would be easy. It’s not.

Being introverted –– by which I mean that engaging with lots of people drains my energy –– one would think I’d welcome any limits imposed that would spare me extended social engagements. I found I am not easy with social distancing. It unnerved me at first. I wondered why.

It’s not that I have no fear of the virus. I do. The virus is scary. I understand the wisdom in being prudent and observing the precautions, including social distancing.

No, this reaction of mine to staying home is something else, unrelated to my essential survival instincts. I’ve noticed that as soon as something which I’d normally welcome and happily indulge places limits on me, it loses some of its magic. In other words, now that I have all the free time that I might ever have wished for, I have this urge to get busy using it up by going out to shop, see a movie, to eat and otherwise mix it up with people. It’s perverse: I wish for what I don’t have and don’t for what I have. I believe that I suffer from severe case of what I have diagnosed as Americhosis ––an American male’s atavistic impulse to resist doing anything that someone else has told him to do.

Do you suppose what I am experiencing is similar to what Adam and Eve felt when they first lived in the garden? Except for the one constraint imposed upon them –– not to eat the fruit from a particular tree –– they were free to do whatever they wished. They had a blank check, a surfeit of pajama days, sans pajamas. And sure enough, with all the freedom afforded them, the forbidden fruit seemed the more attractive. What they had, although plenty, was not enough.

One change in our lifestyles imposed by the pandemic is the request by officials to stay home. As if to sweeten the pot, in some instances, there are promises of financial compensation. Under normal circumstances most people would welcome such a break. Admittedly, the shadow of the coronavirus that hangs over us is disturbing, but for an undetermined period we have free time unencumbered by obligations to do anything or go anywhere, like the snow days we had as kids.

Who among us doesn’t recall waking up as a child to learn that school had been cancelled? Snow days were common during my childhood. When one occurred, I’d feel jubilant; I had an entire day and perhaps a few more in which I had nothing to do except what I wanted. Providence had no greater gift to offer kids than school cancellations. Whenever school announced one, I felt as though I’d been delivered.

With snow days, there were no restrictions. A snow day was a freebee with no strings attached.

I’m not so sure adults feel the same about free time being imposed on them, especially American men who have a reputation for being workaholics.

Mary Catherine Bateson, in her classic book, Composing a Life, treats the matter of how men and women tend to use their “leisure” –– the time they spend outside of their responsibilities. In my day, a woman’s role in domestic life was far more eclectic than men’s were at work. The task of caring for children, managing the household, dealing with kids’ crises, large and small repairs around the house, left her little if any free time. She yearned for it. She’d typically take hold of free time and luxuriate in it, filling her days with imaginative projects she’d put on hold for the duration of the marriage. Husbands, who functioned primarily as breadwinners, performed their work typically outside the home and for the most part their tasks were defined by much tighter parameters than were women’s. When men retired, Bateson observes, they were more inclined to feel lost and restless, as if something had been taken from them –– not sure exactly what to do –– very different from women who found retirement, liberating, a gift.

When circumstances remove us from the tasks and social networks that have traditionally defined our lives, we are left alone with ourselves. While the freedom implied in this seems attractive at first, the experience of it can be unnerving. Who am I, if I am not busy ‘doing’ something?

When I first retired, I felt this discomfort. I had all the time in the world to do as I wished. As a therapist, my professional day had been defined by hourly appointments. At retirement, I wasn’t sure how to reorient myself around my experience of time. How do I reconstruct a life? I felt unsettled for several months.

Like all crises can, whether social or medical –– in this case both –– they shake loose unaddressed spiritual matters. They surface deficits in the health of our souls.

Any crisis that forces us to be alone with ourselves for any length of time unpacks many unsettling issues. In the mid 17th century Blaise Pascal, a renowned religious philosopher and mathematician, made this prescient statement: “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” Social distancing may create opportunities, but the kind that, at first, are not welcomed.

I’d offer this thought for our troubling times: that the health of our souls requires us to manage ourselves flexibly in two ways. That we remain meaningfully connected with others while deliberately taking quiet time to be alone with our deepest thoughts, listening to what they tell us. The social distancing now being asked of us can provide the time and space we need for reflection and, the availability of an iPhone, the means of remaining connected.

Food Friday: Share and Share Alike

March 20, 2020 by Jean Sanders

It has been a long week of self-quarantining and social distancing. I have worked from home for years, and never before realized before how much I enjoy my almost-daily runs to the grocery store. I ask Alexa to turn on the local NPR. I load up a red rubber Kong toy with peanut butter. I grab a handful of re-useable cloth bags from Shenk’s Family Farm, Daunt Books, Vanity Fair and Eataly (being sure to include a wine bag, because who knows when a bargain Chardonnay is going to suddenly materialize). Then I tell Luke the wonder dog that I’ll be back in just a little while. And I am off, and free to meander through the neighborhood grocery store. But this week I have only been out to the store once.

Some days I write an extensive list, and print recipes with all the good intentions that will be paving my way straight to hell. I always leave them on the kitchen counter, next to the weekly calendar that is still opened to last week’s events and deadlines, under the coupon I meant to bring to save $1.50 on Deer Park spring water. If I remember what I have left behind in the kitchen before I climb into the car, I will go back and retrieve my aide-mémoire. Otherwise I go to the store, and just wing it. If I am attempting a tricky-woo recipe from Food52 I can easily find it on my phone, and if it means another week without fancy bottled water, so be it.

In these challenging Coronavirus times I am trying to be mindful, as should we all, she typed preachily, of my place in society. I am staying home. I am not going to infect Kevin Bacon’s mother. So far our town doesn’t have anyone infected with the virus, but there also aren’t a lot of people being tested. And last week I was still getting over a cold brought on by airplane travel, so I was aware that there was a good chance people would think I was Patient 1, spewing deadly germs all over the Chips & Snax aisle, as I coughed furtively into my elbow, and then swabbed myself down with Clorox wipes.

The last time I went to the grocery store was on Tuesday. I saw bare shelves where chicken and beef are normally displayed. (Plenty of meat substitute was still there, though.) There weren’t any Kleenex or paper towels or Clorox wipes. But that was Tuesday. Friday might be a different story. We are pretty much set for groceries for a while. I didn’t stockpile, but I actually came up with a meal plan for the week, something most grown-up food writers manage to do without an international pandemic mandating their behavior.

Our meal plan called for me to do some extra cooking, so instead of the romantic little dinners for two that I normally toss together, I am cooking for imaginary trenchermen. I am making enough to freeze and to share with my neighbors. We have a mix of families on our street. There are parents who work full time with two young children across the street, who are suddenly working from home, and are scrambling to educate, entertain and toil earnestly. I think they might like an aluminum pan of baked ziti, with a side of garlic bread one night, don’t you? And on their left is an ancient fellow, who usually buzzes up the street on his mobility scooter a couple of nights a week for dinner at country club. Maybe he’d like a pan of meatloaf, with some mashed potatoes and a side of chocolate ship cookies. Maybe he’d like a little gossip through the glass storm door, too. I can tell him how deserted the grocery store parking lot is these days. Our immediate neighbors are radical vegans. I’m bringing them a handful of just-picked daffodils and some petunias I started from seed. Let the sharing begin.

We really like this variation on baked ziti from our friends at Food52, although there was a shocking lack of garlic, which is my only criticism. Next time I will add a couple of cloves of the good stuff. If we have a zombie apocalypse next, can the vampires be far off? We must be prepared! https://food52.com/recipes/82374-best-baked-ziti-recipe

Check on your neighbors, rub your dog’s belly, take a walk, be mindful, be nice.

“The more we can be in a relationship with those who might seem strange to us, the more we can feel like we’re neighbors and all members of the human family.”
-Fred Rogers

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