Early Death: Mortality among Young Children in New York, Chicago, and New Orleans

The high mortality of nineteenth-century cities included excess summer mortality among infants and young children. Data from New York City, New Orleans, and Chicago from 1870 to 1917 and earlier data from New York City permit an examination of this high summer mortality and its decline during the early twentieth century in relation to changes in infant feeding practices, sanitation projects to improve water supplies and methods of waste disposal, and efforts to improve the quality of milk.