Measles

February 27, 1935  9° cold [12° F.] and south wind.  Corney and I fixed the plow.  John has measles.  Jacob and Corney are sick.  Mama is busy taking care of the sick.  In the evening C. Dalkes came over.

Measles used to be one of the common childhood illnesses.  It usually involved four days of fever, cough, head cold, red eyes, and itchy rash that covered the body.  There was no prevention, and it spread easily.  Most people had measles once in their lives before a vaccine became available in the 1960s.  Usually measles is just a miserable experience for the children who get it, but it can have complications such as pneumonia, scarring of the cornea, and encephalitis and caused 6000-8000 deaths of children annually in the United States before the vaccine became common.

John must have gotten measles somewhere, probably at school since he was the only one in school.  Usually children got it at a younger age, but the boys must not have had it before because by the end of the day Jake and Corney were coming down with it.  So Margaret had three sick children to nurse.  Mary did not get it.  What would have been especially scary for the Siemens was that they had three little children whose immune systems might not be as strong. 

Families tried to isolate themselves when they had measles, but the Cornelius Dalkes came over because they had no children at home who could catch measles.