Pandemic hits UMHB 102 years before COVID-19

Frazier was the campus physician and a professor at Baylor College for Women for 40 years. According to his autobiography, From Tallow Candle to Television: An Autobiography of Dr. J.M. Frazier, on Sept. 26, 1918, he diagnosed the first two women to bring the virus to campus. The first strain hit in March of that year but wasn't particularly deadly. The second wave came in the fall and hit with a vengeance. The two students lived in separate residence halls on campus, and before Dec. 4 of that year, the flu had spread to more than 450 students and teachers.

Even though 19 of his patients developed pneu­monia and one or two had pleurisy, Frazier wrote he "counted it a blessing to report that I had not a single fatality."

"My success under Providence lay in the fact that I had absolute control of the situation," he wrote. "We removed every girl from the dormitory on a stretcher and rigidly enforced a recumbent position until the tem­perature was normal for 48 hours. Liquid nourishment, lots of fluids, lemonade, water, and buttermilk, after the preliminary mild purgative, usually castor oil, composed each patient's diet."

Pneumonia cases were treated in well-ventilated rooms with even temperatures inside Luther Hall; the patients were well-fed and kept under rigid care for a week after the crisis. No patient was discharged until she or he had a normal pulse, temperature, and respira­tion.

Just like the COVID-19 virus has proven to spread easily, Frazier wrote that the worst feature of Spanish flu was its "extreme infectiousness."

"Every nurse (16 of them), every nurse's aide (stu­dent volunteers), and every patient or friend who hov­ered over a sickbed came down with the 'flu' as it soon came to be called," he wrote.

In the first week of September, Texas newspapers, including the Temple Daily Telegram, reported that an epidemic was likely. By the third week of that month, Belton and Temple health officers began ordering school, church, and store closures, and theater perfor­mances and sporting and social events were canceled.

By mid-October, newspaper articles said Bell County was in a "deep crisis," and every precaution was being taken to get it under control. On Oct. 15, there were 100 new cases overnight, and "newspapers filed daily with obituaries and heartbreaking stories of lives gone too soon" of a virus that didn't discriminate against age, social status, or race. Even though pro­jections in the rest of Bell County were bleak, Frazier managed to keep things under control at the college.

French told his students that there were not many diagnostic tools or treatment options for the sick in 1918.

"Penicillin wasn't discovered until 1928, and lab testing was limited," he said. "Dr. Frazier was largely restricted to what he could see or hear on a physical exam and managing symptoms."

French claims Frazier was "one of those rare people who looked beyond the present to what could be and made it happen."

Frazier was captivated by the relatively new field of "preventive medicine" and taught his students about anatomy, physiology, and hygiene.

In his book, Frazier wrote that his salary was sufficient to allow him to meet with his pa­tients "not just when they were sick but also to address their overall health."

"He didn't see patients just for illnesses," French told his class. "He believed so much in preventative medi­cine, he didn't bill them at all. He very much believed that an 'ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure."

Frazier's efforts may have helped pave the way for the monumental gains researchers and physicians have made in preventative medicine. French said some of these gains include regular vaccinations for many child­hood illnesses, which previously resulted in significant injury or death for a large portion of the population.

Frazier, who lived to be 85, grew up in Central Texas and graduated in 1876 from Waco University (now known as Bay­lor University) with a bachelor's degree before heading to the University of Pennsylvania to earn his medical degree.

Working at Presbyterian Hospi­tal, he was assigned as an "assistant physician to the poor." As a young physician, Frazier recalled what he described as his "baptism of fire" when he had to handle his first serious epidemic—a scarlet fever outbreak.

Frazier found his way to Belton in 1894 when he took the po­sition of college physician and professor. He also had a private medical practice in town. Frazier had three sons and four daughters, and all of his daughters graduated from Baylor College for Women.

His bout with scarlet fever in Pennsylvania proved to be the first of many epidemics he would en­counter during his years as a phy­sician. In fact, during his 40 years of health supervision at UMHB, he experienced four serious epidemics.

The first was an outbreak of typhoid fever, which occurred soon after he arrived in Belton. From October to December, 37 cases developed, some very serious with intestinal hemorrhaging and other complications. While three rooms on the third floor of Luther Hall were set aside for sick girls with the dormi­tory mother acting as nurse, Frazier continued to search the campus for the infection source. He finally discov­ered a rusted sewage pipe near where the dining hall's milk crocks were sunned and aired. The vessels became contaminated, and all who drank milk were exposed to the disease. Over the Christmas break, workers replaced the pipes, and the ground was disinfected. When the girls returned, not another case developed.

The second sudden and near-tragic epidemic was an outbreak of scarlet fever a few years later. By working all night, Frazier was able to determine seven infected students. He immediately isolated them and closed their dormitory for disinfection.

"Another epidemic was averted," he wrote in his autobiography. "Some of these were very sick girls, but all recovered, and no new cases developed."

The third was the Spanish flu, and the fourth epidemic he recorded on campus was Vincent's Angina, or "trench mouth," as it was nicknamed during World War I.

For the first 10 days in June of 1921, Frazier treat­ed and isolated 67 cases of trench mouth among the students.

At a medical convention later that year, Frazier shared a paper of his experiences with the disease. A newspaper reporter wrote that "kissing was probably the means for the rapid transmission of the infection," and the story spread through the United Press.

Frazier later wrote that he regretted the unsought notoriety that he brought upon the student body and added that he later determined that "much kissing in farewells and greetings was the mode of transmission."

He was also happy to report that even though some cases were very sick, there were no fatalities and no ill effects from the outbreak.

"These epidemics were the highlight, and I had about every form of human ill on the calendar in between," Frazier wrote. "But fortunately, nothing that common sense and science were not able to handle."

In a letter written for the Frazier Memorial Health Center building dedication, the unknown author de­scribed Frazier as being "born a physician both to the body and to the soul."

"He had a genuine attitude of non-self-aggrandize­ment and gratitude, coupled with a humility not often found among men; an insatiable hunger for knowledge, and considered it essential that he study to show thyself approved unto God."

The letter went on to say that Frazier's "close friend­ship with Dr. Townsend, Dr. Hardy, and the loyal facul­ty saw his beloved college through many crises which involved his valued experience, not only in medicine, but in philosophy and psychiatry, and above all his un­shaken faith in God and the destiny of the school."

*Photos courtesy of the US National Archives and UMHB Musick Alumni Center and Museum at the Parker House.