In 1878, a particularly virulent strain of yellow fever traveled north from New Orleans to Illinois and killed about 18,000 people along the way. Memphis was particularly hard hit: more than half of the city evacuated, trying to out-run the disease. Of those who remained, two-thirds contracted the fever and more than 5,000 died in just a few months. Jeanette Keith recounts the story in her new book Fever Season: The Story of a Terrifying Epidemic and the People Who Saved a City.
Then, writer Megan Mayhew Bergman moved with her husband to Vermont to help run the family veterinary clinic in 2009. A stand-out from the writing programs at Duke, Bennington, and Breadloaf, Bergman has used her years in Vermont to write a beautiful collection of short story titled Birds of a Lesser Paradise. [Broadcast Date: November 26, 2012]
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