The True Story Behind The 1925 Nome Serum Run

Publish date: 2024-05-07

In January 1925, the tiny village of Nome in west Alaska was home to fewer than 1,500 people, including Indigenous Alaskans and European immigrants. That month, there was an outbreak of diphtheria, a disease that spreads through respiratory droplets and creates a deadly toxin. Diphtheria is especially contagious and dangerous among young children — several children had died before Nome's government realized they had an epidemic on their hands.

Nome's supply of the serum needed to treat diphtheria had expired the previous summer. The town's doctor, Dr. Curtis Welch, had ordered more, but the port froze over before the medicine arrived. In the midst of winter, Nome was inaccessible by ship, plane, or train. Nome was put into quarantine, but there were still 20 confirmed diphtheria cases and 50 more suspected. Without the serum, anyone who caught the disease would most likely die.

A callout for antitoxin located a supply 1,000 miles away in Anchorage. Local officials decided that the serum would travel by train to Nenana, where one dog sled team would pick it up and take it to Nulato, where they would hand it over to another team, who would take it back to Nome, a total distance of 674 miles.

Typically the route from Nenana to Nome took dog sled teams working for the postal service an average of 25 days, according to the BBC. The record was nine days. But in the extreme cold, the serum would last only six.

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