Covid-19 Vaccinations in 2021

Old glass pharmacy bottles with gold labels

Just as many other people are, I’m anxiously waiting for a Covid-19 vaccination. How fortunate we are to live now when so many vaccines are available to prevent deadly diseases that regularly dispatched people at a young age. As I read in Bill Bryson’s book The Body: a Guide for Occupants, vaccines for smallpox, diphtheria, polio, and measles saved the lives of millions. Better sanitation, improved diets, and fresher foods also helped in a major way. 

In the early 1800s in Alta California, there were no doctors and little medicine. Smallpox caused virulent epidemics in the Native American population, but occasionally the vaccine was available to inoculate some of them. Because Captain Richardson had some medical experience during his service in the British merchant marines, he helped the friars at the California missions when he could. For common illnesses, most medicines were made from plants. Blackberry syrup was used to treat coughs. Indigenous people in California drank a tea made with the leaves of a native shrub, now known as mountain balm, as a remedy for coughs, colds, asthma, and bronchitis. After they taught Spanish settlers to use it, the Spanish called the herb yerba santa, meaning “holy or sacred herb.” Chemicals in the leaves are effective in loosening phlegm. Chumash people in Southern California probably taught Richardson to use the leaves in a poultice to relieve pain from sprains, bruises, and arthritis. When doctors or naval surgeons visited California, they might provide doses of medicines such as laudanum, mercury, or calomel. Some of these proved to be worse than the illnesses they were supposed to cure. Laudanum was addictive, and mercury, used to treat syphilis, could kill the patient.

What is a “sea shanty”?

I recently heard the late night TV host Stephen Colbert say that 2021 is the year of the sea shanty. These jaunty work songs are suddenly popular on TikTok and other social media. During the age of the sailing ship, sailors sang a shanty such as “The Drunken Sailor” in unison while they were aloft reefing (rolling up) sails or hauling up the anchor:

“Way, hay, and up she rises,

Way, hay, and up she rises,

Way, hay, and up she rises,

Early in the morning.”

Naturally I included sea shanties to Captain William Richardson’s story. From his life in the British merchant marine and on whalers, he’d collected a repertoire of songs. He possessed a marvelous voice and loved to entertain dinner guests with spirited sea shanties. His audience joined him on the chorus, stamping their feet and clapping in time to the lively tune. In one dinner scene, I describe him with a glass of aguardiente in one hand and his arm around his wife, as he sang this folk song:

“I’ve been a wild rover for many’s the year,

And I’ve spent all my money on whiskey and beer,

But now I’m returning with gold in great store,

And I never will play the wild rover no more.

And it’s No, Nay, Never

No, Never no more

Will I play the wild rover, 

No, Never, No more….”

Why sea shanties are suddenly popular again is a mystery. Perhaps because we are all in this Covid-19 crisis together and the cheery tunes help to alleviate the monotony of quarantine just like the monotony sailors dealt with, toiling at sea and confined to a small ship.