On 28 Dec Robin sent the interesting article about the closing of the Newark Isolation Hospital. For further information, I send notes given to me by my uncle, who was b. 1902. His mother's two oldest brothers died in the 1872 smallpox epidemic which swept Newark. "Even as a child I [my uncle]) can remember the Pest Houses to which persons were taken for isolation . . .; and with the limited medical knowledge of those days you were very, very lucky to survive. Newark's Pest Houses were down near Weequahic Park [south end of city] on an isolated piece of dry salt meadow. They were a group of 6 or 8 houses, each for a different 'pest', and were like 4-story wood tenements. This made it economic to burn one down when too 'pesty'." Twin friends of my mother's were sent to the Isolation Hospital, when they developed smallpox in the early 1900s. Fortunately, they survived and grew to adulthood. I am sure the buildings were gone before the 1930s. Muriel S. Parker Bradford, ME ___________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com/getjuno.html or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]