When deadly disease struck 1790s Harrisburg, residents took matters into their own hands | Column
Updated Feb 13, 2021;
Posted Feb 13, 2021
The Paxton Creek flows to the Susquehanna River in Harrisburg in July. In the 1790s, Harrisburg residents blamed a stagnant pond created by a mill dam on the creek for causing a mysterious fatal fever that plagued the town for three years. Joe McClure, PennLive
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They had suffered three years of disease and death. They would not tolerate a fourth year. They simply had to do something about it.
A fever spread through Harrisburg in the fall of 1792. It struck again the following year, more severe and deadly.