Daily AncestorSpinal meningitis
Spinal meningitis on an old record meant inflammation of the membranes around the spinal cord; it might be epidemic meningitis (spotted fever) or another kind.
Webster's 1913 defines meningitis as inflammation of the membranes of the brain or spinal cord. The 1911 Census Bureau manual names spinal meningitis among returns no one could intelligently classify, and asked doctors to write cerebrospinal fever or epidemic cerebrospinal meningitis for the epidemic disease.
Its compilers filed a bare spinal meningitis under simple meningitis, while warning that this title may also cover deaths from the epidemic kind. So a death from spinal meningitis may or may not have been spotted fever.
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Daily Ancestor. "Spinal meningitis." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/causes-of-death/spinal-meningitis. Last checked 2026-10-12.