As Middlebury and the nation struggle with coronavirus, death and the changes to our daily lives, I am reminded that my grandfather Jacob Johnson Ross, M.D., joined the U.S. Army in 1918 and left his family in Middlebury to serve as the Flight Surgeon with the 17th Aero Squadron. War was waging in Europe and the Spanish Influenza was raging in much of the world, including Vermont. In the Sheldon archives are the letters exchanged between Dr. Ross and his wife Hannah Elizabeth Holmes Ross. They had met at U … (read more)