Carson City daily appeal. [volume] (Carson City, Nev.) 1907-1930, 1915-07-22
The Tonopah Plague
Continued from page II

case all right, tor when Tom Gunn
died the same way a week or so later.
it was found, at the autopsy, that his
had enlarged so that the her
internal organs were smothered, and
the heart, itself, forced out of place
and practically strangled.
Elmer Dunlap was the next to go
Gown the Canyon, and in a week zen
or twelve men were dead and .he
scare was on.
Stages out were overloaded; but
who cared? Might as we'll get killed
On the road as die in the town.
Frightened men bought and hired at
any price all the private rigs chat
could be found, and then the &C
wagons and freight outfits were
drafted into service, until the roads
cut from Tonopah began to look like
the stampede from the first battle Of
Bull Run; and while we who stayed
sneered and called the others cow
ards for leaving, most of us would
have done the same thing if we could.
For the mysterious death was Ike
tie bugaboos of a child's darkness
we couldn't see it mol say what it
was.
perhaps your friend or bed fellow
would look, startled, over his should
er; and there g%r'inning and leerlng
was that devilish thing, the 'Torc-
pah Sickness" Then your friends
head would ache and his side would
get painful, and his lungs would get
creaky and his heart rusty, and in j
few hours he would gurgle in your
face and die.
Then his corpse would commence
10 turn black and spotted, and it
would puff UP with the foul gases,
and you would have to bury it hur-
riedly. And perhaps you would be
the next.
""Somebody thought the water was
tc blame, but as it was hauled in from
Buffers wells four miles out, it
couldn't be contaminated from the
town, and a test proved that it was
more than commonly good.
Then to add insult to injury, some
scoundrel writing in an outside news
paper said our whiskey was bad; and
one Frisco paper even sent a venture
some young reporter in to collect
samples for analysis. This young
daredevil did his duty thoroughly,
but he commenced Analysing on the
stage out, and the analysis was COM
lcte when he reached Sodaville. AS
lie survived the personal application
test, we knew that the booze was al
right, though it is a wonder that the
a~nalyzation of SO many different
kinds didn't kill him.
Il shall always think the weather
had something to do with the sick
ne SIS. The days were pleasantly warm
f(r that time OF the year. with a kind
of crawling, sweaty heat, that sucked
tic moisture Of previous SHOWS, and
tire sewerage that it had take. with
il 10 the surface of tie ground
where it seemed to hang around ana
poison the air with it's sinking
breath.
And the nights were cool encuet
to bring colds and pneumonia, with
out being cold enough to purify the
air.
"And like the Ancient Mariner with
"a painted ship on a painted ocean,,
there was no breath of wind.
Not for three weeks did the wind
blow strong enough to toss a woman's
hair; and on early mornings before
the sun would dissolve it, we could
see from the higher hills around the
camp a white pail of mist like a Chi
reese shroud hanging over and chok-
ing the town.
1.-The prayers of the righteous
availeth much,' but ours, though Sill
cere, were unheard; and the wind AMI
snow came not and the plague on
tinued.
For it seemed that Nature robbed
of the treasure she had boarded fer
centuries, exacted in exchange the
lives of men; for strangely enough,
no woman or child died, or even, s.
far as | remember, took SIGH.
IRE and two and thee Il day we
bufnG, and when there wei. no more
ton:ns we made more.
Anybody who had a white shirt
gave it up to put on a deal man, and
| lave seen men take the buttons ont
CT a shirt they had on 20 button the
collar of a corpse.
Tile care of the sick and tie dead
seemed to fall naturally into the
hands of the Miners Union; and
Tonopah will never forget the Union
Tor that service. Its officers were al
ways on deck for this gruesome duty,
and its hospital, the only one in camp,