Before childhood vaccines: "Our Darling" Cemetery marker (1924). Photos by elder CD Burr

 

"Our Darling" Inez Pearl Daniel

My great-grandparents buried three children who might have lived if vaccines or antibiotics had been available.  I'm not saying a lack of vaccines killed Inez at five months--a virus killed my grandpa's baby sister during one of the epidemics raging through Tennessee that year (influenza, measles, malaria). Most healthy kids today might survive these diseases without vaccines, but why risk extremely high temperatures, encephalitis, and pneumonia? Or spread a potentially deadly virus to others with compromised immune systems? Please vaccinate your children and yourself and help prevent the spread of deadly diseases.

"We Will Meet Again"  Anita Ann Daniel

"In heaven there is one angel more" Bobbie H. Daniel

Penicillin and antibiotics might have saved Bobbie, who suffered from a series of kidney infections and "bad tonsils."

All photos taken at Cedar Valley Cemetery (TN) by CD Burr

For an updated version of this essay, see Author's blog:  CD Burr 

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