Person:Grace Newquist (1)

Died of flu epidemic at 18 months of age. (Bud Newquist 8/02)

The twentieth century saw its own version of the Plague, in the form of the 1918-1920 influenza epidemic. Carried to all corners of the globe by soldiers returning from World War I, "the Influenza," as it came to be known (again with a capital letter to distinguish it as the greatest outbreak of a particular disease), killed 20 million people—more than the war itself.

The 1918-1920 influenza pandemic didn't follow the usual pattern: the victims were disproportionately among young and otherwise healthy people between the ages of 20 and 40. There are all kinds of reasons posited for this - among them the fact that you had millions of young men gathered in trenches at the end of WWI to spread the virus around plus troop movements to make sure it went to many, many countries.