DAY THREE — I was sitting near the birthplace of silent film legend Buster Keaton in Piqua when Gov. Laura Kelly’s state-wide “stay at home order” came through.
The COVID-19 pandemic sweeping the nation for the past few weeks had finally hit home.
In 1886, smallpox broke out in Piqua, whereupon the town was quarantined for six weeks.
Guards were stationed on all roads leading into town. Travelers were told to drive their wagons and carriages on through Piqua without stopping.
Adults were only allowed to leave home for trade. Children were forbidden to leave their yards.
Dr. J.L. Jones, the public health officer from Neosho Falls, set up a tent on the west side of town where he cared for the sick.
Many endured the virus and were left with scars. A young man by the name of Bert McKinsey didn’t survive.
Looking southeast toward the site of the railway junction that breathed Piqua into being — April Fool’s Day, 1882 — I imagined the train cars passing while the roads were patrolled by sentries.
The thought made me shiver, like the nearby purple clover trembling in the angry wind.
Earlier that morning I had felt a rush of excitement when I discovered the rectory from the original St. Martin’s Catholic Church was still standing and had been converted into a house.
That feeling, though, quickly transmuted into dread and a sense of foreboding.
I tried to distract myself by looking for remnants of the Piqua State Bank and department store belonging to Markus and Niemann, with its well out front. Folk said the water used to taste and smell like rotten eggs.
Old-timers claimed you could chew on it, but it was probably still preferable to eating June bugs. I only mention it as a bacchanalian by the name of Heckman used to do so for a lark outside the Knights of Columbus Hall.
Granted, drinking sulfurous water and consuming insects are probably preferable to the bitterness tasted by those who lost their fortunes when the bank collapsed in the Great Depression.
Given the crushing economic impact of COVID-19 so far, though, it may be that this is another disastrous past that’s repeating itself.
Not that Piqua will necessarily notice, as financial hardships long ago turned the little town into a somber study in absence.
