The power of town-gown, past and present

The year has been filled with change and fear at times, or in other instances, just a combination of confusion, stress and a craving for the proverbial normal. Yet within the daily community-campus juggling and bungling (at my end), there has been one everyday thought: What a privilege, on the town-gown front.

Sometimes, folks in Ithaca will describe current events in the extreme on any given topic, i.e., “It’s the worst it has ever been,” or “This has never happened before,” to which I reply (if it’s helpful), “There is never anything new in Ithaca. It’s just versions of new.”

Case in point: Reflecting on the global flu pandemic of 1918, when Ithaca-Cornell partnerships on shared interests were essential for the common good, there are similarities to today.

Excerpts from a Cornell Chronicle story in 2006:

“The first cases hit campus in the last week of September 1918, just prior to classes starting, and with the World War I armistice still nearly six weeks away.

“Within weeks, the number of cases skyrocketed. By Oct. 8, the day The Ithaca Journal ran the front-page headline ‘Anglo-American Troops Smash Hun Defenses,’ there were 300 reported cases of the flu, also called the grippe, in Ithaca that day.

“Of the victims, 125 were in the Cornell infirmary and an untold number of ill women students were being housed in the annex of Sage College. To take the overflow, on the afternoon of Oct. 7, Cascadilla Hall was converted into a temporary hospital; by the next morning, 36 beds were filled, and the Cornell infirmary reported the first flu-related death for all of Ithaca: A male student in the vocational school had died from pneumonia.

“In the subsequent two weeks, many more died, often succumbing to pneumonia after contracting the flu.”

Then University Treasurer C.D. Bostwick wrote that during October and November, there were approximately 900 students cared for and 37 deaths. (Though Buffalo and other cities shut down such public places as street cars, schools and saloons, The Ithaca Journal reported on Oct. 9 that the Ithaca health board felt such measures were ineffective, and public areas remained open.)

At the time, most of the area’s medical personnel had been called away to war, with “a scarcity of doctors, nurses, and help of all kinds, and of equipment and supplies,” Bostwick wrote.

As a result, Cornell medical students were deputized to care for the sick in the wards, and instruction at the Ithaca division of the medical college came to a halt that October. For more than a month, juniors and seniors were devoting most of their time to the hospital, and the college’s sole instructor in anatomy Henry Davis, a Cornel alum, died in the pandemic.

Overall, there were 1,300 cases of grippe and 40 deaths in the Ithaca hospital system, in addition to the cases at Cornell. Still, in a no-Zoom era, campus and community connected, as is the case today, and East Hill was grateful.

One example among many: The minutes of the Nov. 30, 1918, Cornell Board of Trustees meeting note that the university health facilities would have “been in serious plight had it not been for the unselfish labors of volunteers from Ithaca and nearby towns, as volunteers devoted themselves for weeks, day or night, to any service, however laborious or distasteful the service might be.”

Fast forward to 100-plus years later, the connectivity and compassion of all sectors in Tompkins County, including the campuses, have rarely been stronger, and the results speak for themselves. And while there may never be a “normal” in the future, there may be a new version of better, with people of every age and station continuing to pull together for the common good, through “unselfish labors,” quietly and effectively.

We all want to be out, feeling safe and to put the masks in the glove box or in a drawer, at least for now. But until then, as we began, what a privilege to see community-campus teamwork at its best, up close and personal.

Gary Stewart is assistant vice president for Cornell’s Office of Community Relations. East Hill Notes are published the first and third Wednesdays of each month in Tompkins Weekly.