It can be said that the Lehigh Canal and Asa Packer's Lehigh Valley Railroad brought cholera to Carbon County in 1854. It could be told that cholera helped bring Garrett Brodhead Linderman here, who eventually married Packer's daughter Lucy, producing the only descendants of the Asa and Sarah Packer line.

So amid the distress of those days, love bloomed here long before ever entering the vernacular with Gabriel Garcia Marquez's novel.Distress indeed, for after the outbreak killed two of the three practicing physicians (Drs. Thompson and Righter), it was fortunate that the community was not swept under and thus lost in a panic-stricken chaos. The community was lucky that two brothers, Drs. Garrett Brodhead Linderman (only 25 at the time) and Henry Richard Linderman (only 29), selflessly answered the community's call to duty.The cholera plague was the middle of three grave disasters that befell Mauch Chunk: The Fire of 1849, Cholera in 1854 and the Great Flood of June of 1862.On July 27, 1854, The Mauch Chunk Gazette reported -"Cholera Mark - That cholera is not apt to prevail in the elevated regions is very certain...If this be so, we suppose Mauch Chunk may be considered a safe retreat at the present time. Those, however who prefer a still greater altitude, will find ample accommodations at White Haven, Beaver Meadow, Hazelton or Summit Hill."Our rapidly developing transportation system was partly to blame. The papers pointed a veiled finger toward the canal men and rail workers who had become sick as the culprits who brought the disease to our little elevated sanctuary. Final work on Packer's Lehigh Valley Railroad was halted due to the 1854 cholera outbreak.The First Reported Carbon County Cholera Death -The July 27, 1854 Mauch Chunk Gazette continued -"One death by disease occurred at Connor's Hotel, Mauch Chunk last Thursday. Mr. Lewis Lewis, a Welchman, employed by Belford, Sharpe & Co as a boss on the North Penn RR arrived in the Allentown Stage late in the evening, was attacked in the night, and died the next morning..."Acts of courage and compassion were certainly part of the tragedy as well. Bishop John Neumann, the father of the parochial school system, paved the way to his eventual sainthood by arriving here from Philadelphia just ahead of the outbreak in the summer of 1854. He set up quarters in the basement of the new Immaculate Conception Church on Broadway. Both he and the new Father Coffey answered the calls of the sick and dying both day and night.The August 17, 1854 of the Mauch Chunk Gazette reported -"Sickness and death - Since our last some ten or fifteen persons have died in this vicinity of Cholera and Cholera Morbus. Among them Mr. and Mrs. Jacob West, Mrs. Leonard Blakeslee, Mr. Joseph Hunter, Catherine Keen and child...Many more remain sick, two of our most skillful physicians among the number. Mr. West died Tuesday night and Mrs. West on Wednesday morning, leaving a large family of orphan children. We have not time to dwell further upon the mournful subject this week. Every precaution has been taken to prevent the spread of the disease."Dr. John Thompson was attended by both of the Linderman brothers as well as Drs. McConnel, Longshore and Brass. He died on August 19, 1854. Dr. William Righter though stricken with the illness in mid-August didn't succumb until October 11. Various reports by others estimate the total coast in local lives to be in the 30 to 50 person range.Two years after the cholera epidemic, "G. B." married Lucy Packer on August 21, 1856. Lucy Packer Linderman was the only Packer child to bear children.Of those descendents only members of the Frick family carry on.It appears no amount of wealth could prevent the Lindermans from entering an early grave. Henry went on to become director of the U.S. Treasury died of heart disease in 1879 at the age of 53. Garrett ran Packer's affairs in Bethlehem, died at the age of 59 in 1883. Perhaps the years of toil and a predisposition to heart disease were the culprits.A complete unabridged version of this story can be found at

culturedcarboncounty.blogspot.com.