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The Barbary Plague: The Black Death in Victorian San Francisco
“San Francisco in 1900 was a Gold Rush boomtown settling into a gaudy middle age. . . . It had a pompous new skyline with skyscrapers nearly twenty stories tall, grand hotels, and Victorian mansions on Nob Hill. . . . The wharf bristled with masts and smokestacks from as many as a thousand sailing ships and steamers arriving each year. . . . But the harbor would not be safe for long. Across the Pacific came an unexpected import, bubonic plague. Sailing from China and Hawaii into the unbridged arms of the Golden Gate, it arrived aboard vessels bearing rich cargoes, hopeful immigrants, and infected vermin. The rats slipped out of their shadowy holds, scuttled down the rigging, and alighted on the wharf. Uphill they scurried, insinuating themselves into the heart of the city.”
The plague first sailed into San Francisco on the steamer Australia, on the day after New Year’s in 1900. Though the ship passed inspection, some of her stowaways—infected rats—escaped detection and made their way into the city’s sewer system. Two months later, the first human case of bubonic plague surfaced in Chinatown.
Initially in charge of the government’s response was Quarantine Officer Dr. Joseph Kinyoun. An intellectually astute but autocratic scientist, Kinyoun lacked the diplomatic skill to manage the public health crisis successfully. He correctly diagnosed the plague, but because of his quarantine efforts, he was branded an alarmist and a racist, and was forced from his post. When a second epidemic erupted five years later, the more self-possessed and charming Dr. Rupert Blue was placed in command. He won the trust of San Franciscans by shifting the government’s attack on the plague from the cool remove of the laboratory onto the streets, among the people it affected. Blue preached sanitation to contain the disease, but it was only when he focused his attack on the newly discovered source of the plague, infected rats and their fleas, that he finally eradicated it—truly one of the great, if little known, triumphs in American public health history.
With stunning narrative immediacy fortified by rich research, Marilyn Chase transports us to the city during the late Victorian age—a roiling melting pot of races and cultures that, nearly destroyed by an earthquake, was reborn, thanks in no small part to Rupert Blue and his motley band of pied pipers.
From the Hardcover edition.
The plague first sailed into San Francisco on the steamer Australia, on the day after New Year’s in 1900. Though the ship passed inspection, some of her stowaways—infected rats—escaped detection and made their way into the city’s sewer system. Two months later, the first human case of bubonic plague surfaced in Chinatown.
Initially in charge of the government’s response was Quarantine Officer Dr. Joseph Kinyoun. An intellectually astute but autocratic scientist, Kinyoun lacked the diplomatic skill to manage the public health crisis successfully. He correctly diagnosed the plague, but because of his quarantine efforts, he was branded an alarmist and a racist, and was forced from his post. When a second epidemic erupted five years later, the more self-possessed and charming Dr. Rupert Blue was placed in command. He won the trust of San Franciscans by shifting the government’s attack on the plague from the cool remove of the laboratory onto the streets, among the people it affected. Blue preached sanitation to contain the disease, but it was only when he focused his attack on the newly discovered source of the plague, infected rats and their fleas, that he finally eradicated it—truly one of the great, if little known, triumphs in American public health history.
With stunning narrative immediacy fortified by rich research, Marilyn Chase transports us to the city during the late Victorian age—a roiling melting pot of races and cultures that, nearly destroyed by an earthquake, was reborn, thanks in no small part to Rupert Blue and his motley band of pied pipers.
From the Hardcover edition.
276 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2003
52 people are currently reading
4618 people want to read
About the author
Marilyn Chase
2 books10 followersI'm an author, journalist and teacher at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. I love telling stories never told before!
(Author photo by Laura Duldner.)
(Author photo by Laura Duldner.)
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 133 reviews
March 6, 2017
The City of San Francisco (we always cap the "C" in City) has always had an air of naughtiness, which is why it was known as the Barbary Coast. Before the discovery of gold in California, Yerba Buena was just a nice hilly area with a fantastic harbor, the "Golden Gate". But once the Gold Rush began, the settlement became a very big deal indeed, with few laws, much corruption, and a reckless lifestyle that came from knowing the ground underneath one's feet could disappear at any moment.
"The people and the place here are a law unto themselves..."
The Plague first reached San Francisco in 1900, via the sailing ship, Australia, which plied the sea trade between the Hawaiian Islands and the West Coast. Although it was quarantined, due to the news of the Plague issues in the islands, no one thought about the rats which scampered off the ship and into the raucous boomtown. The rodents ran toward the rotting wooden wharves and the crowded wooden Chinatown, where the first victims of the Barbary Plague began to die. When the quake and fire of 1906 obliterated San Francisco, the assumption was that the rats had been fried also. But it was not to be, and the post-1906 epidemic was even more worrisome as it displayed symptoms of the Black Death, with pneumonic infections crossing all racial lines.
This entire book, from descriptions of the City itself (brine-scented fog with undercurrents of beer and sewage) to the political machinations of the governor and mayor, is fascinating. Not only did the Plague take hold here but the refusal by the politicians and business entities to fight it when they first had the greatest opportunity, allowed the bacteria to be spread to California wildlife, which in turn spread it across the Rockies and into the Great Plains, where the greatest carrier is now the simple all-American Prairie Dog. Scary.
...when man begins to fight the rat it is a battle between the intelligence of the one and the instinct of the other with the advantage not always on the side of the former.
The peak season for Plague in California is April to September, as that is when the balmy weather provides the perfect breeding conditions for the flea which spreads the bacterium Yersinia pestis. One family of rats can produce 800 more rats in less than one year. If anyone thinks the Barbary Plague went away, they are mistaken. The odds favor its ongoing presence somewhere beneath the skyscrapers and public transit tunnels.
But it's still a really cool City.
Book Season = Year Round (Rattus Rattus)
"The people and the place here are a law unto themselves..."
The Plague first reached San Francisco in 1900, via the sailing ship, Australia, which plied the sea trade between the Hawaiian Islands and the West Coast. Although it was quarantined, due to the news of the Plague issues in the islands, no one thought about the rats which scampered off the ship and into the raucous boomtown. The rodents ran toward the rotting wooden wharves and the crowded wooden Chinatown, where the first victims of the Barbary Plague began to die. When the quake and fire of 1906 obliterated San Francisco, the assumption was that the rats had been fried also. But it was not to be, and the post-1906 epidemic was even more worrisome as it displayed symptoms of the Black Death, with pneumonic infections crossing all racial lines.
This entire book, from descriptions of the City itself (brine-scented fog with undercurrents of beer and sewage) to the political machinations of the governor and mayor, is fascinating. Not only did the Plague take hold here but the refusal by the politicians and business entities to fight it when they first had the greatest opportunity, allowed the bacteria to be spread to California wildlife, which in turn spread it across the Rockies and into the Great Plains, where the greatest carrier is now the simple all-American Prairie Dog. Scary.
...when man begins to fight the rat it is a battle between the intelligence of the one and the instinct of the other with the advantage not always on the side of the former.
The peak season for Plague in California is April to September, as that is when the balmy weather provides the perfect breeding conditions for the flea which spreads the bacterium Yersinia pestis. One family of rats can produce 800 more rats in less than one year. If anyone thinks the Barbary Plague went away, they are mistaken. The odds favor its ongoing presence somewhere beneath the skyscrapers and public transit tunnels.
But it's still a really cool City.
Book Season = Year Round (Rattus Rattus)
August 18, 2008
The premise is interesting: bubonic plague strikes turn of the century San Francisco, Chinese immigrants are unfairly blamed and persecuted. If it was an article in Vanity Fair, or the New York Times Sunday Magazine, I would read it, the whole thing (even to the the continued page at the back, where some really long VF articles lose me). But when I started this late Saturday night, I found it to be so horribly over-written that I just didn't care enough to keep going.
Example: "Cable cars scaled its hills on chains that jingled like the necklace on a vaudeville soubrette." Really? 'Cause life's too short for shitty writing like that.
Example: "Cable cars scaled its hills on chains that jingled like the necklace on a vaudeville soubrette." Really? 'Cause life's too short for shitty writing like that.
January 10, 2016
The spread of disease is part virulence, part human imperfection and ignorance, as conveyed elegantly by Chase's text. The book carries the story like a journal scrawled by an observing physician, with thick detail, atmosphere, and technical comprehension of the public health issue at hand. The serious nature of the body clashes somewhat with a few occurrences of inflated and flourished language in an attempt to add color to a potentially dry subject, but Chase does an excellent job of turning history and medicine into material for the public eye.
I'm a public health and journalism student and can only aspire to someday initiate a project like Chase's. In terms of public records and historical documentation, she does a breathtaking job at incorporating dense research into a real, relevant, and critical example of human nature to learn from.
I'm a public health and journalism student and can only aspire to someday initiate a project like Chase's. In terms of public records and historical documentation, she does a breathtaking job at incorporating dense research into a real, relevant, and critical example of human nature to learn from.
January 11, 2020
Extremely interesting book well worth checking out.
August 28, 2014
I am a huge fan of books about fighting disease, so this was a great book. Plus, it is more than a micro-history of plague at the turn of the century in San Francisco. It also includes a brief history of the evolution of our understanding of the plague (and some huge discoveries about the disease occurred in the ~8 years that this book covers), a history of San Francisco, a history of Chinese immigration into the area (and the resulting xenophobia), a history of public health and how it evolved, a brief discussion of the 1906 earthquake, an exposé of government corruption, etc, etc. It was fascinating and interesting.
I am giving it five stars because the subject matter was interesting, and the book was very readable (and not too technical in nature - sometimes books about disease can get bogged down in technical detail). If you like reading books about the history of disease, you will definitely like this one. If you are coming to this book hoping for it to be like "The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston (about ebola), you will find that the pace is not quite as brisk. Plague is a terrible disease, and its eruption in San Francisco in 1900 was definitely considered an epidemic, but since it is spread by rat fleas and not as easily by person-to-person contact (though some forms of the disease are highly contagious), some of the edge-of-your-seat fear is not present the same way it is in a book about, say, ebola or smallpox. But I still loved the book and would recommend it to other armchair medical enthusiasts or history buffs.
I am giving it five stars because the subject matter was interesting, and the book was very readable (and not too technical in nature - sometimes books about disease can get bogged down in technical detail). If you like reading books about the history of disease, you will definitely like this one. If you are coming to this book hoping for it to be like "The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston (about ebola), you will find that the pace is not quite as brisk. Plague is a terrible disease, and its eruption in San Francisco in 1900 was definitely considered an epidemic, but since it is spread by rat fleas and not as easily by person-to-person contact (though some forms of the disease are highly contagious), some of the edge-of-your-seat fear is not present the same way it is in a book about, say, ebola or smallpox. But I still loved the book and would recommend it to other armchair medical enthusiasts or history buffs.
June 25, 2010
Describes the plague outbreak in San Francisco at the turn of 20th century. Scientists were still figuring out how plague passed from person to person. This book describes some of the discoveries related to how it is transmitted. Fascinating read. Great case study in epidemiology.
For those who think life 100 years ago was cool, read this book, you will come away with a different view. Parts of San Francisco were quite filthy, The Hunter's Point area was crawling with ten's of thousands of rats.
For those who think life 100 years ago was cool, read this book, you will come away with a different view. Parts of San Francisco were quite filthy, The Hunter's Point area was crawling with ten's of thousands of rats.
May 18, 2025
In 2003's The Barbary Plague, journalist Marilyn Chase revisits the San Francisco bubonic plague outbreak that lasted for nearly a decade at the turn of the 20th century. (Yes, the same bubonic plague caused by a bacteria called Yersinia pestis that affected Eurasia and Northern Africa in the 14th century and killed an estimated 25-50 million people -- the pathogen isn't instinct and there are several hundred cases reported annually around the world.)
Chase narrates the varied successes and failures of two famed American epidemiologists tasked with managing and controlling the outbreak, Joseph Kinyoun (the namesake of the Kinyoun stain, for my fellow readers who've dabbled in microbiology, but who didn't fare well) and later Rupert Blue (whose success in the role would propel him to a tenure as US Surgeon General under presidents Taft and Wilson). She also describes the complicated factors in controlling the plague, including prejudice and discrimination toward Chinese-Americans (as the outbreak was believed to have originated from Asian merchant ships and many early cases were in neighborhoods with large Chinese populations).
This is a well-written albeit detailed read; however, my enjoyment was somewhat tempered in that I recently read a newer book on the same topic, David Randall's 2019 Black Death at the Golden Gate: The Race to Save America from the Bubonic Plague (see my review and similar recommendations here); I would say I think Chase did a better job of presenting the big picture and showcasing Rupert Blue, while Randall's take is more modern (both books were published before the Covid-19 pandemic, and so contemporary readers are sure to draw many parallels between both outbreaks and the social factors influencing response).
My statistics:
Book 150 for 2025
Book 2076 cumulatively
Chase narrates the varied successes and failures of two famed American epidemiologists tasked with managing and controlling the outbreak, Joseph Kinyoun (the namesake of the Kinyoun stain, for my fellow readers who've dabbled in microbiology, but who didn't fare well) and later Rupert Blue (whose success in the role would propel him to a tenure as US Surgeon General under presidents Taft and Wilson). She also describes the complicated factors in controlling the plague, including prejudice and discrimination toward Chinese-Americans (as the outbreak was believed to have originated from Asian merchant ships and many early cases were in neighborhoods with large Chinese populations).
This is a well-written albeit detailed read; however, my enjoyment was somewhat tempered in that I recently read a newer book on the same topic, David Randall's 2019 Black Death at the Golden Gate: The Race to Save America from the Bubonic Plague (see my review and similar recommendations here); I would say I think Chase did a better job of presenting the big picture and showcasing Rupert Blue, while Randall's take is more modern (both books were published before the Covid-19 pandemic, and so contemporary readers are sure to draw many parallels between both outbreaks and the social factors influencing response).
My statistics:
Book 150 for 2025
Book 2076 cumulatively
March 21, 2016
I found this book to be quite informative, as author Marilyn Chase utilized her skills as a veteran Wall Street Journal science reporter to describe how during the first decade of the 1900's San Francisco fell victim to bubonic and pnuemonic plague. I was never aware of how hard the disease hit my beloved city, nor even that California has been host numerous times to outbreaks.
San Francisco during the beginning of the twentieth centure was feeling growing pains much like other young cities, as it developed from a Gold Rush boomtown to an ecomonic powerhouse competing with Seattle and Los Angeles for goods and services.
Many saw the thriving port as one of the biggest assets for the city as it opened trade with Asia and Latin America. Unfortunately it was also the entry way for unwanted diseases. Because of this the U.S. Surgeon General sent a representative of the Public Health Services to check each vessel that entered port and its passengers. This was especially important as bubonic plague had been found in India, China, and later Hawaii.
On March 6, 1900 the first case of the plague was discovered in Chinatown. This caused political and racial problems. Many politicians did not want to admit that the city was looking at a possible epidemic, so they denied its existence and would not fund scientific research to battle the disease. Also, at this time anti-Chinese feeling ran strong, and the first step taken was to quarantine Chinatown. The Chinese objected, and so did the business community. They didn't care about the rights of the Chineses, but because it was bad for business to have people thinking there was plague in their city or state. The battle between business and science escalated through the governors office, and finally to Washington DC where the Surgeon General got permission from President McKinley to enact antiplague regulations. By April 1901 a clean-up camplaign of Chinatown was undertaken, scouring almost 1,200 houses and 14,000 rooms. In February 1904 the last victim of this first wave of plague died. There had been 126 cases in the San Franisco Bay area and 122 deaths.
Unfortunately just two years later when the 1906 earthquake rocked the city, it also stirred up an infected rat population. By this time the local Public Health representative, Rupert Blue, realized it was the rats who carried the diseased fleas. He offered a bounty on rats, so he and his staff could test them for the disease, and chart areas where breeding was taking place and outbreaks occurring. This epidemic was much worse than the first; because of the lack of housing, fresh water, and avaliable food while the city was being rebuilt. By 1909, because of the efforts made by Blue and his staff the disease was contained.
I STRONGLY recommend this book to anyone interested in California history.
San Francisco during the beginning of the twentieth centure was feeling growing pains much like other young cities, as it developed from a Gold Rush boomtown to an ecomonic powerhouse competing with Seattle and Los Angeles for goods and services.
Many saw the thriving port as one of the biggest assets for the city as it opened trade with Asia and Latin America. Unfortunately it was also the entry way for unwanted diseases. Because of this the U.S. Surgeon General sent a representative of the Public Health Services to check each vessel that entered port and its passengers. This was especially important as bubonic plague had been found in India, China, and later Hawaii.
On March 6, 1900 the first case of the plague was discovered in Chinatown. This caused political and racial problems. Many politicians did not want to admit that the city was looking at a possible epidemic, so they denied its existence and would not fund scientific research to battle the disease. Also, at this time anti-Chinese feeling ran strong, and the first step taken was to quarantine Chinatown. The Chinese objected, and so did the business community. They didn't care about the rights of the Chineses, but because it was bad for business to have people thinking there was plague in their city or state. The battle between business and science escalated through the governors office, and finally to Washington DC where the Surgeon General got permission from President McKinley to enact antiplague regulations. By April 1901 a clean-up camplaign of Chinatown was undertaken, scouring almost 1,200 houses and 14,000 rooms. In February 1904 the last victim of this first wave of plague died. There had been 126 cases in the San Franisco Bay area and 122 deaths.
Unfortunately just two years later when the 1906 earthquake rocked the city, it also stirred up an infected rat population. By this time the local Public Health representative, Rupert Blue, realized it was the rats who carried the diseased fleas. He offered a bounty on rats, so he and his staff could test them for the disease, and chart areas where breeding was taking place and outbreaks occurring. This epidemic was much worse than the first; because of the lack of housing, fresh water, and avaliable food while the city was being rebuilt. By 1909, because of the efforts made by Blue and his staff the disease was contained.
I STRONGLY recommend this book to anyone interested in California history.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 27, 2020
Back in March just before the US really shut down, a friend of mine did a display of books on pandemics at her library, and this was one of the ones she chose. I immediately put a request in, but since my library didn’t have it, I had to wait for it to be sent down. And then libraries shut down. Fast forward to July, and finally books have started to move between libraries again. So reading this book after a period of quarantine was quite interesting.
I’ve always been fascinated by pandemics in general and the Black Death in particular. In fact, my daughters and I watched a Great Courses lecture series on the Black Death during lockdown. But I never really thought about how a disease like that would end up here in the US. In 1900, a ship docked in San Francisco, unknowingly carrying infected rats, and it set off an epidemic that initially started in Chinatown, but then spread to the entire City of San Francisco after the 1906 earthquake. The first man put in charge of the epidemic in 1900, Joseph J. Kinyoun, felt it was basically a disease that only Chinese would suffer from, and his policies were rooted in racism and prejudice. His successor, Rupert Blue, realized that bubonic plague affects people of all races and classes, and figured out that the plague was transmitted by rats and the fleas that lived on them. Blue began an aggressive rat eradication campaign to try to halt the spread of plague, but by the time he started it, it was too late to contain the bacteria. To this day, areas of the southwestern US will see cases of plague stemming from infected wildlife and vermin.
Some reviewers have not cared for Chase’s prose, but I appreciated it. I like non-fiction books that lean a little into description and vivid imagery; it makes the information being presented far less dry, and really brings the history to life. A lot of us wish we could go back in time to see various places for ourselves, but San Francisco before the quake was a rather filthy and smelly place to be. Chase does a fabulous job of showing the reader how unsanitary conditions were.
It’s amazing to me how little things have changed since the turn of the 20th century. Some of the officials in San Francisco wanted simply to blame the plague outbreak on the Chinese (much like today’s politicians calling COVID-19 the “Chinese virus”), or to ignore it totally since it didn’t seem to affect people they cared about (ie, white citizens). And it was disheartening to see that once Blue became Surgeon General in 1913, he lobbied for a national healthcare plan, and it was struck down.
Highly recommended, even in the midst of a global pandemic.
I’ve always been fascinated by pandemics in general and the Black Death in particular. In fact, my daughters and I watched a Great Courses lecture series on the Black Death during lockdown. But I never really thought about how a disease like that would end up here in the US. In 1900, a ship docked in San Francisco, unknowingly carrying infected rats, and it set off an epidemic that initially started in Chinatown, but then spread to the entire City of San Francisco after the 1906 earthquake. The first man put in charge of the epidemic in 1900, Joseph J. Kinyoun, felt it was basically a disease that only Chinese would suffer from, and his policies were rooted in racism and prejudice. His successor, Rupert Blue, realized that bubonic plague affects people of all races and classes, and figured out that the plague was transmitted by rats and the fleas that lived on them. Blue began an aggressive rat eradication campaign to try to halt the spread of plague, but by the time he started it, it was too late to contain the bacteria. To this day, areas of the southwestern US will see cases of plague stemming from infected wildlife and vermin.
Some reviewers have not cared for Chase’s prose, but I appreciated it. I like non-fiction books that lean a little into description and vivid imagery; it makes the information being presented far less dry, and really brings the history to life. A lot of us wish we could go back in time to see various places for ourselves, but San Francisco before the quake was a rather filthy and smelly place to be. Chase does a fabulous job of showing the reader how unsanitary conditions were.
It’s amazing to me how little things have changed since the turn of the 20th century. Some of the officials in San Francisco wanted simply to blame the plague outbreak on the Chinese (much like today’s politicians calling COVID-19 the “Chinese virus”), or to ignore it totally since it didn’t seem to affect people they cared about (ie, white citizens). And it was disheartening to see that once Blue became Surgeon General in 1913, he lobbied for a national healthcare plan, and it was struck down.
Highly recommended, even in the midst of a global pandemic.
January 17, 2018
It was okay, but I agree with other reviewers who said that the prose is overwrought. I also thought that the narrative wasn't as gripping as I would have liked.
June 15, 2020
I figured now was a good time to read a book about historical plagues, and for some reason my public-school California history classes never mentioned that San Francisco had an epidemic of bubonic plague lasting for about ten years, starting in 1900. Like, during the 1906 earthquake there was also the Black Death. Fair warning: a whole lot of this book deals with people being extremely racist, because the plague unfortunately hit Chinatown first, and... yeah. Anyway, I don't think the book itself was all that well-written, itself, but it was definitely an intriguing topic, and I'd recommend it for anyone who wants to know more about this period of San Francisco's history.
August 11, 2014
It's a good bet that even folks who live in San Francisco may not know of the outbreak of bubonic plague the city suffered at the early part of the 20th century. Borne by infected fleas that feasted on the blood of the harbor city's large rat population, the plague claimed many victims initially in the Chinatown area, then slowly spread to other parts of the city.
This presented the city with not only a public health problem, but also a public relations one: San Francisco's wealthy merchants were wary of scaring away business. Because of this, the plague claimed many more victims than it would have if it had been fought aggressively at first. The Barbary Plague tells of two men of science and their attempts to curb the infection: one, Joseph Kinyoun, was not the diplomat the times required and was quickly replaced. The other, Rupert Blue, persevered and eventually overcame the reluctance of the city and state government to fight the plague; unfortunately, he wasn't able to do as much as he wanted to stem the tide of the plague, and as a consequence, it still claims the occasional human victim in the American Southwest thanks to infected squirrels.
At times, the author's attempts at witty turn of phrase rankle a bit, but she has obtained access to some excellent primary sources, including the city's Chinese newspapers and the archive of one of Blue's plague fighters. Overall, The Barbary Plague is an enjoyable enough read, and recommended for those interested in public health.
This presented the city with not only a public health problem, but also a public relations one: San Francisco's wealthy merchants were wary of scaring away business. Because of this, the plague claimed many more victims than it would have if it had been fought aggressively at first. The Barbary Plague tells of two men of science and their attempts to curb the infection: one, Joseph Kinyoun, was not the diplomat the times required and was quickly replaced. The other, Rupert Blue, persevered and eventually overcame the reluctance of the city and state government to fight the plague; unfortunately, he wasn't able to do as much as he wanted to stem the tide of the plague, and as a consequence, it still claims the occasional human victim in the American Southwest thanks to infected squirrels.
At times, the author's attempts at witty turn of phrase rankle a bit, but she has obtained access to some excellent primary sources, including the city's Chinese newspapers and the archive of one of Blue's plague fighters. Overall, The Barbary Plague is an enjoyable enough read, and recommended for those interested in public health.
September 5, 2018
The beginning of this book is a class in how medicine is flawed, and from the beginning contains elements of racial bias. The book outlines a tragedy of disease due to the ignorance of the practitioners. I would assign this book as a recommended read alongside "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" by Rebecca Skloot for any person of privilege entering the medical field. It is best for physicians, researchers, and other healthcare workers to understand the skepticism of their patients, the differences in their opinions, and the struggle to understand the cult of academicism that surrounds medicine.
As a medical journalism piece, I believe that this book is excellent in format, knowledge, and approach to describing the concept of medical elitism.
As a medical journalism piece, I believe that this book is excellent in format, knowledge, and approach to describing the concept of medical elitism.
July 7, 2008
From 1900 to 1909, the bubonic plague took 190 victims in San Francisco. Beginning in Chinatown (corner of kearney and jackson), the fear of plague spread throughout the city. Public health officials squabbled while the city became rife with the infectious Norway rat, exacerbated by the earthquake and subsequent fires of 1906. First Kinyoun, then Rupert Blue, established sanitary procedures that kept the plague at bay. But the greatest factor that prevented thousands of deaths was the difference in the anatomy between the European flea and its Asian cousin.
Interesting look at turn of the century San Francisco's struggle against a disease they didn't understand.
Interesting look at turn of the century San Francisco's struggle against a disease they didn't understand.
August 12, 2013
This was a very interesting account of an episode in US history that I had never heard about -- the bubonic plague epidemic in turn-of-the-century San Francisco. It may have been only through a quirk of flea anatomy and the hard work of some very dedicated public health officers that we were able to avert the large-scale epidemics that have ravaged so many other nations. While the fight against the plague would seem to be a cause everyone should have rallied behind, it was complicated by racism, cultural differences, business and political interests, financial issues and simple denial, leaving a large population of wildlife in the western US carrying the plague to this very day.
October 20, 2012
Fascinating tale of bubonic plague's entry into the United States in early 20th century San Francisco, the search for its source and containment, and the social ramifications of the outbreak. Absolutely engaging, and the author -a health and science writer for the WSJ - balances her science and journalistic expertise to write an informative but never intimidating narrative of one of history's most intriguing pandemics. And for those who wonder why plague "no longer exits"...read on.
January 21, 2019
Really fascinating look at the early days of public health, and how business can either help or hinder the cause. Also how racism literally led to more plague deaths, and the reason Western squirrels can still kill you today.
January 16, 2011
Politics, racism, and the engineering of fear in Victorian San Francisco
February 18, 2018
Chase does an admirable job with a somewhat uncooperative historical event — the plague in San Francisco waxed and waned over nine years and doesn’t provide a ready-made narrative.
September 16, 2019
Ugh. I feel itchy, and I have never hated rats more. All the same, I definitely enjoyed reading this book. You would think people would have noticed the links between trash and disease, but Victorian society was elegantly poised to ignore everything that intruded upon their highbrow society. It is horrifying how San Francisco and California sought to persecute an entire people group simply for the cause of money. Yet, it's also entirely believable. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go and wipe my entire house down with Clorox wipes, order a flea fumigation, burn my trash, and eradicate all small rodents within 50 miles.
February 27, 2024
This was very informative. I was born and raised in California, and I don't understand why this is not something we were taught about. We were of course taught about the Earthquake/Great Fire of 1906 but this was happening at the same time. Also - given the latest epidemic, it was disheartening to see that not much has changed in reactions to disease on a large scale in the last 120yrs.
July 29, 2023
I thought i wouldn’t like it since it’s nonfiction, but it actually grew on me at the end :)
June 29, 2017
The bubonic plague outbreaks of 1900-1908 are a forgotten footnote in San Franciscan history, lost amidst the drama of the city's early Gold Rush years and the trauma of the great earthquake of 1906. Yet for those eight years, the city was in the grip of the United States' first outbreak of plague, which affected almost all life in San Francisco, exacerbating existing tensions and highlighting smouldering issues of racism, xenophobia, greed, and ignorance.
This is largely the story of the public health officers who sought to understand and combat the disease, but at the same time it serves as a history in microcosm of the prevailing issues of the era - racism and xenophobia against the Chinese immigrant community, an already-insular community turning inwards upon itself in an effort to protect its sick and dying, cultural misunderstandings and lack of compassion towards an 'alien' culture, misguided public efforts to quarantine only resulting in more prejudice and anger, a lack of medical understanding of disease transmission, the greed of tradesmen and merchants overcoming the public good.
It was a fascinating read, particularly when focusing on the early years of the outbreak, when the majority of plague cases were centred on Chinatown. Rather than investigate the causes and carriers of plague, as later public health officials were to do so successfully, the early efforts focused on quarantining the entire Chinese community, blaming poor hygiene, living conditions and different customs of the Chinese for the outbreak of disease and dangerously scapegoating an already much mistreated and vilified community.
Indeed, the legacy of those poorly handled, ignorant efforts to contain not the disease but its victims are with California still. Because of the political backbiting, greed of tradesmen and merchants, wilful denial and lack of support for the public health officials, the opportunity to contain the spread of the plague was lost. The bacteria spread from urban rats to country wildlife, and beyond and beyond. Even today plague exists across a broad swathe of the American South and West, largely borne these days by the ubiquitous prairie dog. The US is among the seven countries in the world that continue to report plague cases every year.
This is largely the story of the public health officers who sought to understand and combat the disease, but at the same time it serves as a history in microcosm of the prevailing issues of the era - racism and xenophobia against the Chinese immigrant community, an already-insular community turning inwards upon itself in an effort to protect its sick and dying, cultural misunderstandings and lack of compassion towards an 'alien' culture, misguided public efforts to quarantine only resulting in more prejudice and anger, a lack of medical understanding of disease transmission, the greed of tradesmen and merchants overcoming the public good.
It was a fascinating read, particularly when focusing on the early years of the outbreak, when the majority of plague cases were centred on Chinatown. Rather than investigate the causes and carriers of plague, as later public health officials were to do so successfully, the early efforts focused on quarantining the entire Chinese community, blaming poor hygiene, living conditions and different customs of the Chinese for the outbreak of disease and dangerously scapegoating an already much mistreated and vilified community.
Indeed, the legacy of those poorly handled, ignorant efforts to contain not the disease but its victims are with California still. Because of the political backbiting, greed of tradesmen and merchants, wilful denial and lack of support for the public health officials, the opportunity to contain the spread of the plague was lost. The bacteria spread from urban rats to country wildlife, and beyond and beyond. Even today plague exists across a broad swathe of the American South and West, largely borne these days by the ubiquitous prairie dog. The US is among the seven countries in the world that continue to report plague cases every year.
April 5, 2018
Well, it's not great. The writing is rather florid, but more than that, it's disjointed. Information is thrown in haphazardly, key facts are not explained, and everything seems subjugated to a desire to over-describe the scene with every little detail available.
I already know enough about plague that I can handle the lack of what should have been the first chapter. (Examples of things that were never covered: what the plague is, how it's transmitted, why there's an area called the Barbary Coast in america...) And I can handle mediocre writing in nonfiction, although I'm more tolerant of overly-dry than overly-sweetened. But to do that I need to be learning something about the topic. That's what got me through the first 10%, the promise of learning more beyond my basic knowledge of the plague in SF. At this point though I don't think it's worth wading through descriptors. Somewhere out there is a dry, technical, to-the-point history of the same with my name all over it.
Edit: after reading a few reviews, I think I came into this already knowing the things people liked discovering in it, which is part of why I'm less forgiving. It's distinctly possible I know too much about the bubonic plague to be considered a casual reader.
Edit: I kept reading.
It gets a little better towards the middle - the author hits a stride talking tracking the political factions in the fight, and the ace-journalist researcher shines through. Still, here, the most interesting stories (say, the lawsuits) only get brief coverage, and what could be an interesting explanation of a key development (the discovery of flea transmission) is relegated to two paragraphs - less than the death of of McKinley, which, while an important historical event, has no bearing on our topic.
This book doesn't know what it's about, and as a result not enough attention is given to any of the major plotlines. And I agree that it's a tough topic to create an action-filled narrative about, but then surely the solution would be to abandon that writing style and tell the story that's there. Alas, no.
But it does shine at times in the telling history of discrimination against Chinese Americans, which is a story worth telling in its own right.
I already know enough about plague that I can handle the lack of what should have been the first chapter. (Examples of things that were never covered: what the plague is, how it's transmitted, why there's an area called the Barbary Coast in america...) And I can handle mediocre writing in nonfiction, although I'm more tolerant of overly-dry than overly-sweetened. But to do that I need to be learning something about the topic. That's what got me through the first 10%, the promise of learning more beyond my basic knowledge of the plague in SF. At this point though I don't think it's worth wading through descriptors. Somewhere out there is a dry, technical, to-the-point history of the same with my name all over it.
Edit: after reading a few reviews, I think I came into this already knowing the things people liked discovering in it, which is part of why I'm less forgiving. It's distinctly possible I know too much about the bubonic plague to be considered a casual reader.
Edit: I kept reading.
It gets a little better towards the middle - the author hits a stride talking tracking the political factions in the fight, and the ace-journalist researcher shines through. Still, here, the most interesting stories (say, the lawsuits) only get brief coverage, and what could be an interesting explanation of a key development (the discovery of flea transmission) is relegated to two paragraphs - less than the death of of McKinley, which, while an important historical event, has no bearing on our topic.
This book doesn't know what it's about, and as a result not enough attention is given to any of the major plotlines. And I agree that it's a tough topic to create an action-filled narrative about, but then surely the solution would be to abandon that writing style and tell the story that's there. Alas, no.
But it does shine at times in the telling history of discrimination against Chinese Americans, which is a story worth telling in its own right.
March 15, 2013
I'm a native Californian. From the time I was young, I had a keen interest in history. The experience of Chinese immigrants was largely glossed over in school. The emphasis was, "Chinese built the railroad. A lot of them lived in San Francisco. They dealt with racism and laws prevented immigration for many years, and there weren't many Chinese women. But things are better now!"
The Barbary Plague should be required reading for any Californian. Heck, any American. This book made me so angry at times, and so sad, but it also educated me. I read it for research for my novel, and while I did get relevant data for that purpose, I came out with a whole lot more.
When the plague first settled into San Francisco in 1900, it struck Chinatown first. And almost no one cared. The federal government sent in Quarantine Officer Dr. Joseph Kinyuon. The whites scorned the plague as being an Asiatic disease, something that could only infect inferior peoples; the politicians, from the corrupt city mayor all the way to the governor of California, undermined the investigation because they only saw the potential millions lost due to quarantines and trade blockades. Some went so far as to accuse Kinyuon of planting plague evidence for the sake of his career.
The Chinese themselves thwarted medical officers at every turn. They didn't trust white doctors--with reason--and were horrified at the blasphemy of autopsies and cremation. When Kinyuon was shoved from the city, Dr. Rupert Blue came in and fought tooth and nail to stop the epidemic--and was only taken seriously when whites began to die. It was Blue who read theories from overseas and realized the plague spread by fleas on rats, and he orchestrated a massive campaign to slaughter rats and save the city from devastation. His efforts became all the more vital after the 1906 earthquake, when the ruins and refugee camps created a rodent paradise.
It's nonfiction that makes for a compelling read, as it delves into the complexities of racism, corrupt politics, and the nascent United States medical program.
The Barbary Plague should be required reading for any Californian. Heck, any American. This book made me so angry at times, and so sad, but it also educated me. I read it for research for my novel, and while I did get relevant data for that purpose, I came out with a whole lot more.
When the plague first settled into San Francisco in 1900, it struck Chinatown first. And almost no one cared. The federal government sent in Quarantine Officer Dr. Joseph Kinyuon. The whites scorned the plague as being an Asiatic disease, something that could only infect inferior peoples; the politicians, from the corrupt city mayor all the way to the governor of California, undermined the investigation because they only saw the potential millions lost due to quarantines and trade blockades. Some went so far as to accuse Kinyuon of planting plague evidence for the sake of his career.
The Chinese themselves thwarted medical officers at every turn. They didn't trust white doctors--with reason--and were horrified at the blasphemy of autopsies and cremation. When Kinyuon was shoved from the city, Dr. Rupert Blue came in and fought tooth and nail to stop the epidemic--and was only taken seriously when whites began to die. It was Blue who read theories from overseas and realized the plague spread by fleas on rats, and he orchestrated a massive campaign to slaughter rats and save the city from devastation. His efforts became all the more vital after the 1906 earthquake, when the ruins and refugee camps created a rodent paradise.
It's nonfiction that makes for a compelling read, as it delves into the complexities of racism, corrupt politics, and the nascent United States medical program.
January 22, 2015
I picked this book up second-hand because I love reading about San Francisco. Little did I know what a treat I had discovered! Did you know the plague is endemic to the US? No - neither did I. Chase illuminates a terrifically interesting period in the history San Francisco, roughly 1900-1910. At this time, the fledgling CDC was called in to arrest the spread of bubonic plague which had arrived via ships from Honolulu. Bacteriology was a very new science at the turn of the century and chase does not miss the opportunity to show us how these new scientific developments assisted the growth what we now think of as 'public health.' Still more fascinating was Chase's exploration of how racial prejudice against the SF Asian community initially hindered the battle against the disease. (The first cases were found in Chinatown.) The reader begins to get a feel for how the Chinese community tried to assert itself via the courts and for the later awkward attempts at rapprochement between mainstream SF and Chinatown as it becomes increasing clear that the disease knows no boundaries. Two unlikely MD heroes emerge in this story. Rupert Blue is an especially compelling character. His shift of the fight against plague to a focus on rats (and later squirrels) is ultimately what saves the day and is as interesting to follow as any mystery novel. Oh and did I mention the 1906 earthquake is in there, too?! A really great read - especially in light of all the politicking surrounding Ebola.
April 7, 2016
This was a part of San Francisco history that I had not known about, despite coming from a long line of San Franciscans.
I think that the Drs. Joseph Kinyoun and Rupert Blue along with their team need to have a brass plaque or some sort of commemoration to the work they did to save the City and try to prevent the spread of plague into the Western states (where, by the way it lingers still). 401 Fillmore is where "the Rattery" and the laboratory stood where Rupert Blue fought his war on the plague epidemic that was spreading through the city after the earthquake of 1906.
The book had a bit of a slow beginning going through the background in too much detail about the Drs. lives prior to coming to Angel Island, the Quarantine Station. Once the plague broke out in 1900 in Chinatown the pace of the story really gets rolling. Chinatown, unfortunately, was the epicenter at first due to it's close proximity to the wharves where the Norwegian Rats disembarked from the ships. The Chinese took the brunt of terrible prejudice as it was and the plague gave the white politicians even more full to vent their racial hatred on them.
It was interesting to see the steps that Dr. Blue took to carry out the plan of reducing the plague and finding the try culprit that spread it.
I think that this book is definitely a "Must Read" for anyone who wants to get a try look at how 1900 life was in San Francisco. It wasn't just the wildness of the Barbary Coast and the 1906 earthquake...it was so very, very much more.
I think that the Drs. Joseph Kinyoun and Rupert Blue along with their team need to have a brass plaque or some sort of commemoration to the work they did to save the City and try to prevent the spread of plague into the Western states (where, by the way it lingers still). 401 Fillmore is where "the Rattery" and the laboratory stood where Rupert Blue fought his war on the plague epidemic that was spreading through the city after the earthquake of 1906.
The book had a bit of a slow beginning going through the background in too much detail about the Drs. lives prior to coming to Angel Island, the Quarantine Station. Once the plague broke out in 1900 in Chinatown the pace of the story really gets rolling. Chinatown, unfortunately, was the epicenter at first due to it's close proximity to the wharves where the Norwegian Rats disembarked from the ships. The Chinese took the brunt of terrible prejudice as it was and the plague gave the white politicians even more full to vent their racial hatred on them.
It was interesting to see the steps that Dr. Blue took to carry out the plan of reducing the plague and finding the try culprit that spread it.
I think that this book is definitely a "Must Read" for anyone who wants to get a try look at how 1900 life was in San Francisco. It wasn't just the wildness of the Barbary Coast and the 1906 earthquake...it was so very, very much more.
September 1, 2018
This is one of the best non-fiction books I've read in a very, very long time.
It reads like fiction, so well told and structured to make sense of the forensic detective thriller that it is, that a reader could easily forget it is all true.
The political maneuvering, conspiracy, racial faultlines, flawed people, failed plans, masses of dead, all of it is like a bestselling novel, yet there are dates, locations and gravestones to put to every single page.
The book follows the outbreak, spread, complication, cover-up, repulsion and eventual defeat of the Black Plague in Victorian-era San Francisco. Aided and abetted by adolescent scientific knowledge, public mistrust of progress and people with their fingers in too many pies, the disease spreads and threatens untold millions. Barely kept in check yet eventually overcome, the response is a roadmap on how to and how not to handle a disease outbreak.
I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
This entire book should be adapted to a mini-series.
It reads like fiction, so well told and structured to make sense of the forensic detective thriller that it is, that a reader could easily forget it is all true.
The political maneuvering, conspiracy, racial faultlines, flawed people, failed plans, masses of dead, all of it is like a bestselling novel, yet there are dates, locations and gravestones to put to every single page.
The book follows the outbreak, spread, complication, cover-up, repulsion and eventual defeat of the Black Plague in Victorian-era San Francisco. Aided and abetted by adolescent scientific knowledge, public mistrust of progress and people with their fingers in too many pies, the disease spreads and threatens untold millions. Barely kept in check yet eventually overcome, the response is a roadmap on how to and how not to handle a disease outbreak.
I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
This entire book should be adapted to a mini-series.
November 25, 2018
This is a well-researched, well-told story about public health efforts to stamp out the bubonic plague in San Franscisco from about 1900-1910. Interestingly, did you know that the bubonic plague continues to be rampant in wildlife in the western U.S., even today?
Have you ever watched a movie or TV program where someone was warning of an imminent health threat and officials were blocking them because it'd be too high a cost to business or would tarnish the city's reputation, and you thought, "That'd never happen!" Well, it has and it probably still does. City officials and business people wanted to hush up the public health workers who were trying to eradicate the plague, and that hampered their efforts for many years until they could get the public on board cleaning up trash, making cement rat-proof basements and trapping disease-infested rats around the city. Great book, highly recommended.
Have you ever watched a movie or TV program where someone was warning of an imminent health threat and officials were blocking them because it'd be too high a cost to business or would tarnish the city's reputation, and you thought, "That'd never happen!" Well, it has and it probably still does. City officials and business people wanted to hush up the public health workers who were trying to eradicate the plague, and that hampered their efforts for many years until they could get the public on board cleaning up trash, making cement rat-proof basements and trapping disease-infested rats around the city. Great book, highly recommended.
March 21, 2017
Good historical look at how San Francisco reacted to an outbreak of plague in the late 1890's/early 1900's. The writing is good and the story has a scarily familiar ring to it--politicians deny, deny, deny, and people pretend the plague outbreak isn't happening because it's "bad for business." Racism also plays its ugly part when the first outbreak is blamed on Chinatown.
I wasn't familiar with this event at all so all of it was new to me. I liked reading about how the doctors figured out what was happening and what was causing the outbreaks step-by-step. I also liked the descriptions of Victorian San Francisco. It's fascinating how this first outbreak of plague in America is tied to its existence in the country today.
Good read.
I wasn't familiar with this event at all so all of it was new to me. I liked reading about how the doctors figured out what was happening and what was causing the outbreaks step-by-step. I also liked the descriptions of Victorian San Francisco. It's fascinating how this first outbreak of plague in America is tied to its existence in the country today.
Good read.
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