With 1.4 million confirmed cases and 81,000 deaths worldwide as of this writing, the coronavirus pandemic has become a global tragedy unlike any in our lifetimes. But, as historians remind us, this is neither our first nor our most deadly war with an infectious disease.

“Epidemics highlight the fault lines in our society,” says CU Boulder history Professor Elizabeth Fenn, a Pulitizer Prize winning writer, scholar of epidemics and author of Pox Americana: The Great Smallpox Epidemic of 1775-82. “They reveal our weaknesses, but they also illuminate the profound kindness, generosity and cooperation we are capable of. We have a lot to learn from them.”

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