Margaret Kathryn Goss 1909-1910

GOSS

Posted By: Merllene Andre Bendixen (email)
Date: 10/26/2013 at 00:21:09

The Goss Baby Dead
Strange Disease That Baffles All The Physicians
Sick Only A Short Time
Infantile Paralysis the Cause – Several Other Cases in the City – Funeral Friday
Margaret Katharyn Goss, the little seventeen months old babe of Mr. and Mrs. Chas. L. Goss, died of infantile paralysis on Wednesday, August 17th, after an illness of only a few days. So far this has been the only death from the strange and baffling disease that is spreading over the state. There are other cased in Estherville but in a much milder form. The death of the little Goss baby is indeed a sad and sudden case. She was their only child. Funeral services were held Friday afternoon in the Norwegian Lutheran church and the remains interred in Oak Hill Cemetery.

It is characteristic of infantile paralysis to afflict the patient with paralysis of some form if it lives. There have been about seventy cases of this disease in Iowa within the past few weeks, nearly half of them proven fatal. In nearly all cases the victims die within a few days, generally a few hours. Physicians do not know the cause of the disease, nor have they a remedy. The government sent a specialist from Washington to Mason City, but after spending two weeks investigating the malady he confessed he can shed little light upon it. Physicians generally claim it is contagious but there is no law requiring quarantine. (Estherville Democrat, Estherville, IA, August 24, 1910)

The entire community sympathizes with Mr. and Mrs. Chas. Goss in the loss of their little eighteen-months old daughter, Margaret, who died last Thursday after an illness of only five days. She was the pride and sunshine of one of the happiest little homes in Estherville and it is beyond human understanding why Providence works in this mysterious way. The funeral services were held at the Lutheran church Friday afternoon, Rev. Akre having charge, and the remains were tenderly laid to rest in Oak Hill cemetery. (Estherville Enterprise, Estherville, IA, August 24, 1910)