Julie Chibbaro
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Deadly - how do you catch an invisible killer?
A mysterious outbreak of typhoid fever is sweeping New York. Could the city’s future rest with its most unlikely scientist? If Prudence Galewski is ever going to get out of Mrs. Browning’s esteemed School for Girls, she must demonstrate her refinement and charm by securing a job appropriate for a young lady. But Prudence isn’t like the other girls. She is fascinated by how the human body works and why it fails. With a stroke of luck, she lands a position in a laboratory, where she is swept into an investigation of the fever bound to change medical history. Prudence quickly learns that an inquiry of this proportion is not confined to the lab. From ritzy mansions to shady bars and rundown tenements, she explores every potential cause of the disease. But there’s no answer in sight—until the volatile Mary Mallon emerges. Dubbed “Typhoid Mary” by the press, Mary is an Irish immigrant who has worked as a cook in every home the fever has ravaged. Strangely, though, she hasn’t been sick a day in her life. Is the accusation against her an act of discrimination? Or is she the first clue in a new scientific discovery? Prudence is determined to find out. In a time when science is for men, she’ll have to prove to the city, and to herself, that she can help solve one of the greatest medical mysteries of the twentieth century. 
Prudence likes to draw in her diary; this is one of her drawings. See more at supervillesovak.com
Ten facts about Typhoid Mary most people don’t know:
1. Her real name was Mary Mallon. She was the first known “healthy carrier” of disease. 2. She worked as a cook for wealthy New York families. 3. She worked for eight families between 1900-1907. She infected seven of those families, causing 22 people to become ill, killing one. 4. Mary passed the typhoid fever through her hands. Typhoid is carried in the feces. You get the picture. 5. She was first quarantined on an island called North Brother Island near Queens, NY from 1907-1909. 6. Released in 1909, told to never cook publicly again, she was recaptured in 1915 after 25 people became ill at Sloane Maternity Hospital in NYC. Two people died. 7. She was quarantined again to North Brother Island, where she spent the rest of her life, 1915-1938 – 23 years. 8. The island where she lived contained a quarantine hospital with mostly tubercular women. 9. Mary often baked breads and cookies for these contagious women. She never infected any of them. 10. Mary Mallon never believed she carried the typhoid fever. (Facts gleaned from Judith Waltzer Leavitt’s book, Typhoid Mary, Beacon Books, 1996) |
