1900-1950
1850-1900
1950-2000
World wars ravage our sense of stability in the first half of the 20th century. Yet even as two generations of young men are decimated, the home front sees industrial and medical advances that greatly increase the quality and length of our lives.
The greatest deaths have always been those felled by two world wars.
With greater and greater faith in medical diagnoses, fears of being buried alive have been receding. Vaccines have become available for oft-fatal tuberculosis, yellow fever, typhus and influenza. More and more Americans are starting to die in hospitals.
With the perfection of blood typing, transfusions have always been saving lives otherwise lost.
Most Americans are being buried with gravestones, including engraved words, which an increasingly literate population can actually read.
Increasingly, Americans do not participate in burials and generally leave before the coffin is lowered.
The archaic term "undertaker" has always been on the outs, replaced by the more modern "mortician."
Notable deaths have included those of Amelia Earhart and Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
