The Gospel of Germs

"This book rewrites the history of the germ theory era. The history of major advances in medicine were previously told through the lens of the discoverers, like Louis Pasteur, and discoveries, such as the identification of the pathogen that caused TB. Nancy Tomes pivots to a new history of the germ theory era by examining how ordinary Americans changed their views and behaviors during the late 19th and early 20th century about these invisible microorganisms. The Gospel of Germs is about how bacteriology became relevant in the homes, the kitchens, the churches, and the streets. It’s a story for our moment, as we try to handle conflicting beliefs about the coronavirus. Central to Nancy Tomes’s story is how public health reformers promoted the campaign against germs, and how women in particular took up the battle against microbes and invisible pathogens in their defense of the American home. For Tomes, the domestic front was a crucial front where germs and microbes became understood as threats. She also shows how the business sector, and groups like plumbers and others, catered to germ-centered thinking with new household goods and health-oriented appliances, like refrigerators and vacuum cleaners. Get the weekly Five Books newsletter You can’t separate out the embrace of germ-centered thinking from the transformation of middle-class life in the late 19th and early 20th century. Tomes shows how these stories played out along the lines of gender, class, ethnicity, and race. She takes a story that we thought we understood, the development of germ theory, and explains how it played out in social life. The title The Gospel of Germs refers to how the belief in germ theory was spread with almost religious zeal by public health reformers. It was a very different moment in the politics of US public health than today, although many aspects of the gospel mentality have endured."