NEW! - From Your Education & Recreation Resource (as of April 23, 2020)
Members of the Washingtonville Chapter of the American Red Cross at the Monell Firehouse decorated for a Liberty Bond Parade, circa 1918Washingtonville Fire House decorated to commemorate essential workers on April 19, 2020
WASHINGTONVILLE YESTERDAY & TODAY
As our community comes together in response to the COVID-19 Pandemic, it is worth noting how our community was affected by two global events that took place over 100 years ago. On February 26, 1919, Blooming Grove resident Marcus C. Sears wrote to David Hudson, who was serving on the Western Front of the First World War:
"I have been shut in with the influenza & pneumonia since Christmas & have been thinking more about friends & my old group of boys who used to meet so often with Mr. Wilcox & me. I have been down stairs for a week but have not been out doors for 2 months. A great many have been sick about here from the influenza & many of the younger people have died. The influenza has taken many many more from this community than the war and the toll throughout the nation has been greater than the American Casualties in France. "
However, as the 1918 Flu pandemic took many lives at home, others in our community came together to provide aid and comfort to those affected at home and abroad during the First World War. In this series of articles, originally published in 2017, join our Local History Librarian Matt as we learn how our area reacted to the shocks of these major events!
