Authorities Quarantine ?Typhoid Mary' Mallon

• Author: Allen Pusey
• Pages: 72-72

PHOTOS COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA COMMONS, ASSOCIATED PRESS

Authorities Quarantine ‘Typhoid Mary’ Mallon

In late August 1906, while vacationing in a sprawling rented home in Oyster Bay on Long Island,

the family of New York City banker Charles Henry Warren was stricken with typhoid fever. Including

the Warrens and their servants, 11 people occupied the house; and between Aug. 27 and Sept. 3, six

came down with the disease.

Typhoid fever, a particularly virulent

form of salmonella, was not u ncommon.

In 1906, New York City reported 3,467 cases

and 639 deaths. But this cas e, occurring in

a well-to-do environ ment like Oyster Bay,

was cause for alar m. When health o cia ls

could not determine the source , the owner

of the house employed an epidemiologist to

investig ate.

George A. Soper wa s at fi rst mystifi ed,

fi nding nothing th at earlier investigations

might have missed. When potentia l sources

—the well, cesspool, bathroom a nd food

supplies—turned up clean, he began to ex amine the

family and sta  .

His focus rested on Mar y Mallon, a cook hired through

an agency for the vacation st ay. An Irish immig rant,

Mallon was known for ha rd work, stubbornness, hearty

cooking and peach ice c ream. She was not known for

fastidious hygiene, and S oper became convinced that

the dessert, made f resh with unclean hands, was t he

likely source of the outbreak.

With help from the employment agency, he discovered

other families who had hi red Mallon and experienced

typhoid—the earliest in 1900 in Ma maroneck; the latest

in a house on Park Avenue in Manhattan. There were

seven such families, includi ng that of New York lawyer

Coleman Drayton, who ha d paid Mallon a $50 bonus for

her care of his household while they coped w ith typhoid.

By the time Soper met Mallon on Park Avenue, two

people—including her employer’s daughter—had taken ill.

Soper told Mallon that she was likely a t yphoid carrier,

a host for the bacteria who could i nfect others without

herself becoming ill. When Soper o ered to help her in

exchange for blood, urine and fec al samples, she came

after him w ith a carving fork. Several more at tempts

at reason drew simi lar disdain. When police

and health o cers showed up to detain her,

she climbed through a kitchen w indow,

vaulted a fence and was fi nally found in a

closet at a nearby house.

Mallon was taken to W illard Parker

Hospital, where her various specimen s tested

positive for Bacillus ty phosus, probably lurk-

ing in her gallbladder. When Soper told her

that if she allowed its removal she would be

free to leave, Mallon simply gla red at him,

refusing to spea k.

After months w ithout cooperation, Mallon was taken

on March 20, 1907, to Riverside Hospital on North

Brother Island, situated in the Ea st River between the

Bronx and Rikers Isla nd. There, she lived in isolation.

A writ of habeas c orpus fi led after two yea rs of

quarantine was denied , despite her never having been

charged with a cr ime. But after nearly three years in

custody, she was released on her promise not to ha ndle

food for others, to follow a few simple hygiene rules, a nd

to report to the healt h department every three months.

Instead, she fl ed and worked under assumed names

in the kitchens of hotels and in ns, a restaurant and

even a sanatorium. She was fou nd and rearrested in

1915 at the Sloane Maternity Hospital. A s a worker in

the kitchen there, she was joki ngly known to the sta

as “Typhoid Mary.” She was identifi ed by Soper when a

physician sought his help after a nother outbreak.

Mallon was retur ned to her solitude on North Brother

Island, where she lived until her death on Nov. 11, 1938.

Though granted unac companied releases periodically,

she never again fl ed.

There was no formal invest igation, but over 15 years,

“Typhoid Mary” Mallon wa s linked by Soper to 53 cases

of the disease, including t hree deaths. Q

72 || ABA JOURNAL MARCH 2018

Precedents || By Allen Pusey

Mary Mallon , an Irish immi grant, was know n for her hard

work, stubbor nness and peac h ice cream, whi ch helped

spread the typh oid she hersel f was immune to.

March 20, 1907

For 26 years, Mall on

was confi ne d to this

bungalow on Nor th

Brother Islan d.