The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1912-07-22
innocent Looking Little Housefly Is
More Dangerous Than Snakes,
Mad Dogs and
Bcara
MUST BE DIFFERENTIATED
Either Man Must KIN the Fly or the
Fly Must XIII the Man at
end Of the Con
test.

Either man must kill the fly srI
the fly must kill the man. The above
sentence printed in blazing red letters
ION placards is being used in many
American towns and cities in the var
against the typhoid fly.
In 1900 more than $4,000 people in
this country died Of typhoid fever.
Flies killed practically all of them
Not any fanged. claved, veaonons
and singing fly that came and vent
mysteriously. The death dealers were
innocent looking little house flies that
swarm over manure heaps, alleys,
! kitchen windows and milk crooks.
That same year about 1900 folks
died of gunshot wounds. Railroad
accidents killed $3.50 during That same
twelve months. Everyone knew that
murders and railroad accidents were
helping to remove the population.
Everyone knew that some man or
woman in the next block had the
typhoid, but it didn't worry them. They
were used to typhoid.
]. A baby sat in a high-chair pushed
up close to screenless window. He
was a bottle baby" The bottle had
been scalded and the milk had been
Isterilized. Apparently the baby should
have been safe enough. A fly came up
j out of the alley filth. 1t lit on the
bottle and hands OF the baby. Ten
4 days later little white coffin was
carried out of the house and placed in
la snowy hearse drawn hv milk white
horses. Alas!
fat, the grass in the graveyards green.
L Here is typhoid as an instance. Peo-
, pie used to watch the milk supply only
when they were trying to dodge ty-
iphoid. There was house upstream
from another where half family lay
) sick with this burning disorder. Theil
, milk supplies were from diferen'
{ diaries.
f There was no chance of infected
| sewage, as water does not and will no
run uphill. The wind was blowing vi
: the valley No harm in that, as germs
!, do not ride on the wind to the dis
r lance of mile Or more. Flies do
Musca Domesticus (high-brow name
of the fy) took little saunter from
!, the polluted premises one morning
was caught in the wind current ant
!, landed in the upstream neighbor'
: open milk bottle before noon. In {
. few days there was am ther typhoid
i infected house in the valley.
Musca Domesticus is about thu
. deadliest creature that crawls, swin
. or flies. He is in the same class will
, the dog whose jaws drip hydrophobia
He ranks with the timber RATHER, wht
carries cold death in his fiat head
I He is as dangerous as a cocaine-mad
!. dened negro with an automatic re
:, volver.
\ You can crush him with tap of TIL
t finger If you can catch him, but h
multiplies by the million, the billion
the trillion and the quadrillion, an
!. every one of these quadrillions cal
: ries load Of germs around on hi
:, hairy, glairy body Catching him !
ju-t the trouble, He is SO common
! that he is looked upon as one of tn
: necessary evils of summer.
) Georgia, Florida, Louisiana an
= Texas began fighting the house a
: months ago. Tennessee is offerin
. gold medals to the champion fly mul
= derers of the state. Kansas was tn
home of the first statewide campaig
against the fly. New York City ha
started in to keep down the summe
death rate among the children b
wiping out the breeding places c
the fly.
:. Two or three years ago L. O. How
! ard, chief entomclogist of the Unite
: States department of agriculture, said
= THE insect we now call the nous
: fy' should in the future be termed tn
typhoid fly in order to call attentio
:, to the danger of allowing it to bree
9. unchecked"
= The country took him at his wore
= The term typhoid fly has come int
4. general use and much of the myster
"A that once hung over the spread Of ths
- fever has been dispelled. Filth. file
- and fever became a sort of an unhol
trinity
The house fly is the terror ths
stalketh by MONDAY. He and his mu
tiple feet dripping with germs are a
over the premises. He plants fe
! germs in your bread. He buries the
| In the butter on your table. Out in tf