Diagnosing the Ills of American Monument-Protection Laws: A Response to Phelps and Owley's Etched in Stone

Like many other places in the United States, the town of Springfield, Kentucky, was repeatedly ravaged in the nineteenth century by cholera, a disease that is easily and swiftly communicable through feces-contaminated drinking water or food.Today, cholera is little thought of in this country—or at least it was little thought of until very recently, although it has persisted in many parts of the world through the present. But in the nineteenth century cholera outbreaks were a recurring disaster in American life, fueled by poor sanitation, medical ignorance, and racist, nativist, and religious prejudice.