To write a finis to this tale simultaneously with that out 120 

 of Wherry's Anaconda days, a sentence is taken from a later 

 letter by McEachran: "So the big suit was squarely fought and 

 honestly won! A strange judgment, won it was, by expert 

 testimony." 



BY April of 1908, Wherry's activities as bacteriologist to 

 San Francisco's health board had so effectively com- 

 mingled with those of the United States public health and 

 marine hospital service that they could not longer be ignored. 

 Also, plague had appeared in California far from San Fran- 

 cisco's shores. Why, was not known ; but the need to widen the 

 territory in which plague suppression measures were necessary 

 was obvious. Wherefore the city of Oakland was asked to bestir 

 itself; also, the state's central health council in the capital city, 

 Sacramento. The U S service opened quarters in Oakland and 

 sent John D Long there as chief. (He was thirty-four, a Penn- 

 sylvanian, by strange coincidence an A B out of Washington 

 and Jefferson college as was Wherry, at twenty, and an M D 

 three years later out of the state's university; now a passed 

 assistant surgeon, he was in two years to become assistant 

 surgeon-general!). Through his urging Wherry received the 

 following communication from the Treasury department, in 

 Washington: 



As recommended by Passed Assistant Surgeon Carroll Fox on 

 the 20th ult . . . you are hereby appointed a temporary act- 

 ing assistant surgeon in the public health and marine hospital 

 service in the United States for duty in Oakland, California, 

 in connection with the suppression of bubonic plague with 

 compensation at the rate of two hundred dollars ($200.00), 

 beginning April 15, 1908. 



Anticipating this new responsibility, Wherry had already 

 moved his scientific belongings back to Oakland. Two one- 

 storeyed shacks in the red-light district that bordered on the 

 city hall had been made over for him into a laboratory. After 

 the entire floor of the one and the middle half of the other had 

 been cleared for animals, a kitchen remained for assignment to 

 Venzke, and a bay window for assignment to Wherry and his 



