That summer of 1854 was particularly hot. The 60 workers at the Lion Brewery drank all the malt liquor they were given as part of their wages every day. And thanks to that, they were saved. They had the Broad Street well close at hand, a much-loved source of water in the area, but they preferred to drink alcohol. Nearby, dozens of workers at the Eley Brothers war supply factory died from the cholera outbreak that arose from that well after quenching their thirst. The brothers who ran the factory had a couple of buckets collected from the well each day to quench their employees' thirst and sent a bottle to their mother, Susannah Eley, who decided to move far away, to Hampstead, after becoming a widow. A beautiful detail that would change the history of public health and is considered the cornerstone of epidemiology. The Widow of Hampstead was the exception that proved the rule, and even today, in pandemics like the coronavirus, she is used as a metaphor for the need for atypical cases to confirm patterns.
