re: #349 The Pie Overlord!

My grandpa died in the Spanish Flu pandemic while my grandma was pregnant with my dad.

Grandma Bacon was working at the Navy Dept. HQ during WWI as a clerk. She knew FDR when he was the Assistant Secretary of the Navy under Wilson. She got a bad case of the flu the year before the pandemic that left her sick for a month. What she told me about the pandemic was scary! People would start a cough in the morning, but by the afternoon they collapsed and died. Corpses were stacked in school gyms and warehouses. Schools and churches were closed. Everyone went around wearing masks some had them soaked with camphor. Several coworkers including FDR’s assistant and main clerk died. FDR paid for their funerals and final expenses.

Grandma said she lived thru 2 nightmares in her life—the Spanish Flu and the Depression and she NEVER wanted to re-live either one.