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I am fascinated by how much class, race & gender impact the narratives around Typhoid Mary to this day. She immigrated before the Irish became white in America & it completely changes how she was approached & her story covered.
I do wonder how Mary's story would be told now. The 1917 Bath riots definitely indicate American perception of non white immigrants haven't changed, but the evolution of whiteness as a discrete identity across generations...hrm...this is a chapter isn't it?
Mary Mallon now would be perceived to have a chronic illness (apocryphal stories assert that an autopsy after she died found typhoid in her gall bladder though that may be a myth) & realistically paying her not to work was the best option. But public perception is still negative
But here is the kicker, popular perception of Mary is colored by anti Irish sentiment, classism & misogyny. From the 1900's. Mary Mallon is remembered as a dirty ignorant woman, but there's no indication she actually was. She was working as a cook for the wealthiest families.
It's almost certain that she would have been clean (for the 1900's which were filthy in general), well spoken enough to interview well, and most telling an excellent cook. Mary probably washed her hands several times a day in cheap soap. Now whether or not it was effective?
That's a whole different story. People often made soap (especially for servants) and quality purchased soap was considered a luxury. The ads of the time are what we remember, but I wonder if Mary was using someone's cheap soap that didn't actually kill bacteria.
Ooh shout out to @ImaSithDuh for finding Tony Labella who infected far more people & who we don't remember in the same way (or at all really) Got to love the inflation of numbers for those infected by Mary. 47 people not the hundreds claimed later https://news.psu.edu/story/220059/2003/05/09/whats-news-typhoid-marys-infamy-recalled-each-new-epidemic
My next book is probably going to be so weird. But history & pop culture are going to make the analysis around identity perception make sense. Probably
