__NOTOC__ The Chicago 1885 cholera epidemic myth is a persistent

urban legend An urban legend (sometimes contemporary legend, modern legend, urban myth, or urban tale) is a genre of folklore comprising stories or fallacious claims circulated as true, especially as having happened to a "friend of a friend" or a family m ...

, stating that 90,000 people in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

died of

typhoid fever Typhoid fever, also known as typhoid, is a disease caused by '' Salmonella'' serotype Typhi bacteria. Symptoms vary from mild to severe, and usually begin six to 30 days after exposure. Often there is a gradual onset of a high fever over several ...

and cholera in 1885. Although the story is widely reported, these deaths did not occur. Lake Michigan was the source of Chicago's drinking water. During a tremendous storm in 1885, the rainfall washed refuse from the

Chicago River The Chicago River is a system of rivers and canals with a combined length of that runs through the city of Chicago, including its center (the Chicago Loop). Though not especially long, the river is notable because it is one of the reasons for ...

far out into the lake. Citizens feared that sewage run-off from the storm would reach the intake cribs of the

Chicago lake tunnel The Chicago Lake Tunnel was the first of several tunnels built from the city of Chicago's shore on Lake Michigan two miles out into the lake to access unpolluted fresh water far from the city's sewage. Waterborne disease in early Chicago In the ear ...

s (built in 1866 and 1874) and pollute the city’s drinking water. According to the legend, typhoid, cholera and other waterborne diseases from the contaminated drinking water killed up to 90,000 people. The Chicago Sanitary District (now The Metropolitan Water Reclamation District) was said to have been created by the Illinois legislature in 1889 in response to a terrible epidemic which killed thousands of residents of this fledgling city. However, analysis of the deaths in Chicago shows no deaths from cholera and only a slight rise in typhoid deaths. In fact, no cholera outbreaks had occurred in Chicago since the 1860s. Typhoid deaths never exceeded 1,000 in any year in the 1880s. The supposed 90,000 deaths would have represented 12% of the city's entire population and would have left numerous public records as well as newspaper accounts. Libby Hill, researching her book ''The Chicago River: A Natural and Unnatural History'', found no newspaper or mortality records and, at her prompting, the ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television a ...

'' issued a retraction (on September 29, 2005) of the three recent instances where they had mentioned the epidemic.

Actual deaths

An outbreak of cholera in 1849 killed 678 persons, 2.9 percent of the city's population, and an 1854 outbreak killed 1,424 people. Another cholera epidemic hit the city in 1866 and 1867.Chicago Public Library (Web Archive)
/ref> In the late 19th century, typhoid fever mortality rate in Chicago averaged 65 per 100,000 people a year. The worst year was 1891, when the typhoid death rate was 174 per 100,000 persons.

References

External links

Sources repeating myth

"History of Lake Michigan Diversion"
PDF—''In the 1885 epidemic, 90,000 people were killed.''
"History of the Chicago Diversion and Future Implications"
''Journal of Great Lakes Research'', Volume 22, Issue 1, 1996, Pages 100-118.
Reversal of the Chicago River
''The Traveling Cableway and Some Other Devices Employed by Contractors on the Chicago Main Drainage Canal''. New York: Lidgerwood Manufacturing Co., 1895. —''...and killing almost 12 percent of the population with cholera and other diseases.''

—''...epidemic kills 90,000 Chicagoans...''

—''Over 80,000 people died.''

* ''

The Ghost Map ''The Ghost Map: The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic – and How it Changed Science, Cities and the Modern World'' is a book by Steven Berlin Johnson in which he describes the most intense outbreak of cholera in Victorian Londo ...

: The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic—and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World]'' (2006) by Steven Johnson (author), Steven Johnson. —''Cholera would continue to terrorize Western cities .... One such outbreak hit Chicago in 1885 .... Ten percent of the city's population died...'' * ''

The Devil in the White City ''The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America'' (Crown Publishers, ) is a 2003 historical non-fiction book by Erik Larson presented in a novelistic style. It tells the story of the 1893 World's Colu ...

'' (2003) by Erik Larson. Claims ten per cent mortality.

Rebuttal

Did 90,000 people die of typhoid fever and cholera in Chicago in 1885?

Chicago Tribune Retraction
''Tribune archives and public health records do not note such an occurrence, and the number of purported deaths—80,000 to 90,000—would have been far too many not to have been noted.''
Review of Hill's book
{{Authority control 1885 in Illinois 1885 in the United States Cholera outbreaks 19th-century epidemics History of Chicago Pseudohistory Typhoid fever Urban legends