Malaria Control in Tennessee, 1930-1940

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About this Exhibit

America in the 1930s is best remembered for the Great Depression, a time when poverty and unemployment skyrocketed. Somber images of demoralized men standing in long lines outside of food banks, or pictures of worn-out barns barely standing upright against a rural backdrop might come to mind. Millions of Americans had their lives upended by this economic crisis. To fight the Depression and bring widespread, multifaceted poverty relief to Americans, the Roosevelt administration enacted The New Deal in 1933. The New Deal consisted of multiple social and economic reforms, one of which was the Tennessee Valley Authority, or the TVA. The TVA was created to modernize the rural South by bringing hydroelectric power to the region. This would involve the construction of multiple dams along the Tennessee River, in turn creating thousands of jobs. The TVA has a lesser-known project, though; it spearheaded malaria control projects. Malaria was endemic in the South in the 1920s and 1930s, but by the early 1940s, malaria rates had declined drastically in the Tennessee Valley region. The TVA effectively brought the eradication of malaria in the South by the 1950s.This virtual exhibit will explore the details of the TVA’s malaria control activities, including leadership, methods, and public health reports.

Tennessee Department of Public Health Bulletin, April 1954

Creator Tennessee Department of Public Health

Publisher Tennessee Department of Public Health

Date April, 1954

Description

As malaria rates steadily declined in Tennessee in the 1930s and 1940s, focus shifted toward the more generalized field of vector control. Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) was created in 1945 and was initially sprayed in Tennessee to kill mosquitos, ending malaria once and for all. Soon after DDT’s creation, however, sanitation and vector control workers noticed it was effective at killing other insects, too. Therefore, the field of malaria control shifted into the field of insect vector control. This article from the Tennessee Department of Public Health, published in 1954, outlines the history of vector control in Tennessee.

Source History of Medicine Collections, Vanderbilt University Libraries