Ghost town of Midco shows Spanish Flu impact on rural Missouri

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Ghost town of Midco shows Spanish Flu impact on rural Missouri

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WHEN SPANISH FLU HIT THE OZARKS: Ghost town of Midco shows pandemic’s impact on rural Missouri
https://archive.is/BDmBh

Slideshow https://www.phelpscountyfocus.com/colle ... 7e7.html#9

https://www.thesalemnewsonline.com/dent ... 4259c.html
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Most people in Missouri have never heard of Midco, despite the city once being the largest town in Carter County and home to one of the state’s largest industrial developments. The reason why is a century ago Midco was nearly wiped out as the rural Ozark’s worst hit town by the 1918 Spanish Influenza pandemic.
At its height Midco featured a population of many thousand, dozens of community buildings, an iron mining foundry, wood-reduction chemical plant and 165-foot tall smokestack in the town’s center. The federal government further invested millions in its operations as part of its World War I production effort.
In October 1918, the Spanish Flu outbreak in Midco killed several dozen residents and infected thousands more. The impact was so severe the town never fully recovered from the ordeal. In fact, Midco was abandoned to ruins less than three years after the epidemic.
Archived historical documents provide much of the evidence that Midco ever existed. One of the best sources on the subject is a collection of contemporaneous newspaper articles collected and published by the West Carter County Genealogical Society. It details the rise and fall of Midco took place over the span of roughly five years from 1917 to 1922. Other sources available are manuscripts in the archives of the State Historical Society of Missouri as well as federal reports on file with the National Archives.
read article for details of Midco history...

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Other link regarding graveyard and piecing together info https://shannon.mogenweb.org/CARTER/cem ... /Midco.htm
Last edited by kestrel9 on Sun Oct 10, 2021 7:23 am, edited 1 time in total.
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