July 3, 1920. Gorgas and Georgism

Portland, Maine.  Fire Department No. 1.  July 3, 1920.

Portland, Maine, Fire Department, #2, July 3, 1920

The Surgeon General of the U.S. Army during World War One died on this day in 1920.  He was 65 years old.

William C. Gorgas.

Gorgas was an interesting character.  The son of a northern born Confederate Civil War officer, he had joined the Army as a physician in 1880.  In the Army, he'd become a specialist in tropical diseases, surviving a bout with yellow fever himself.  

His experiences in tropical areas lead him to become a Georgist, a fairly difficult to grasp economic theory which holds that a "Land Value Tax" is somehow the cure for all of society's ills.  The theory had some well known adherents, including Winston Churchill and William F. Buckley.

Connecticut College, July 3, 1920

Gorgas was 65 when he died.  He fits into a certain pattern for men who have endured the stress of command in war. They die soon after the conflicts have concluded.  An examination of the lives of officers from the Civil War, World War One, and World War Two, pretty clearly demonstrate that trend.