A mother with influenza unfortunately didn’t survive.

Overbrook, West Philadelphia.

My story is very brief, but I grew up knowing that my Great Grandmother, Mary Elizabeth Schlipf (born in 1885) and her newborn child, also named Elizabeth, died during the influenza pandemic in 1918. They lived in the Overbrook section of West Philly. They are buried in our family plot in Upper Darby. Baby Elizabeth was stillborn on October 3^rd, with Mary Elizabeth dying the following day at the Women’s College Hospital.

My Great Grandfather, Walter Schlipf (born in 1881 and died in 1965) remarried and his wife was the one I knew as MurMur, my great grandmother. They lived in Wynwood.  My parents and my immediate family grew up in Narberth. I am 55 years old.

     I had the flu in 1991 and thought I would die. I lived in Germantown at the time. I felt as if I was repeatedly run over by a Septa Bus and left to die. I vowed never to get the flu again. I have been vaccinated since that time. I always wonder about vaccinations and the Flu since my family lost so much during a time without them. Is a flu vaccine really gonna help me? I think of my great grandmother and Aunt. Am I being poisoned? Does it matter? It all goes back to my family story of the Flu from 1918-1919. 

Contributed by Dana Merkle, great grand daughter of Mary Elizabeth Schlipf.