re: #136 Anymouse

My maternal grandmother was only five at the time, and her mother twenty-two.

It never occurred to me to ask my great-grandmother about it (she died in 1993), because I was unaware of the Spanish Flu’s existence at the time.

She lived in what was then deeply rural lower Michigan, miles from a town.

That is what’s frustrating in hindsight. We learn more about the past as we grow older and yet our links to the past fade. My dad’s mom was six in 1918. I really wish I could have asked her more questions. I really feel my family research keeps my memories of my older generations still alive and even the generations I never knew. None of my family died of the flu pandemic as far as I know but the one grandmother did lose her mother quite young.