What is "yellow jack"

Quarantine \Quar"an*tine\, n. [F. quarantaine, OF. quaranteine, fr. F. quarante forty, L. quadraginta, akin to quattuor four, and E. four: cf. It. quarantina, quarentine. See Four, and cf. Quadragesima.]

1. A space of forty days; -- used of Lent.

2. Specifically, the term, originally of forty days, during which a ship arriving in port, and suspected of being infected a malignant contagious disease, is obliged to forbear all intercourse with the shore; hence, such restraint or inhibition of intercourse; also, the place where infected or prohibited vessels are stationed.

   Note: Quarantine is now applied also to any forced stoppage of travel or communication on account of malignant contagious disease, on land as well as by sea.

3. (Eng. Law) The period of forty days during which the widow had the privilege of remaining in the mansion house of which her husband died seized.

   Quarantine flag, a yellow flag hoisted at the fore of a vessel or hung from a building, to give warning of an infectious disease; -- called also the yellow jack, and yellow flag.

n. 1 The illness yellow fever 2 (context nautical English) A yellow flag used by ships as a warning of disease 3 The fish (taxlink Caranx bartholomaei species noshow=1)

1. n. caused by a flavivirus transmitted by a mosquito [syn: yellow fever, black vomit]

2. yellow flag hoist on a ship in quarantine

3. fish of western Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico [syn: Caranx bartholomaei]

Yellow Jack refers to a 1934 play (see Yellow Jack (play) and a 1938 Hollywood movie by the same name. Both were co-written by Sidney Howard and Paul de Kruif (the former a Pulitzer- and Oscar-winning playwright and screenwriter; the latter a well-known microbiologist and author).

The plot line follows the events of the well-known "Walter Reed Boards," in which Major Walter Reed of the U.S. Army worked to diagnose and treat yellow fever (called “yellow jack”) in Cuba in 1898-1900. The U.S. Army Medical Corps doctors studied the theory by the Cuban doctor Carlos Finlay that the disease was caused by bites of infected Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, a concept which had been ridiculed. The dramas portrayed the soldiers who volunteered to be human " guinea pigs" by allowing themselves to be bitten and contract the deadly disease, for which no cure was then known. (See History of yellow fever).

James Stewart had his first dramatic role in the 1934 Broadway play. The experience led him to stay with acting and he first entered movies later that year.

The play and screenplay were adapted for television by Celanese Theatre (1952) and Producers' Showcase (1955), in episodes titled Yellow Jack.

The yellow jack is a species of offshore marine fish in the jack family.

Yellow jack may also refer to:

• Yellow Jack (Film), a 1938 film
• Yellow Jack (play), a 1934 American play
• Yellow jack (bacterial disease), a condition diagnosed by stool test
• Yellow Jack (terminology), seafaring term for flags representing ships infected with yellow fever
• Yellow jack (viral disease), an acute tropical viral disease

Yellow Jack is a 1934 docudrama play produced by Guthrie McClintic and a 1938 Hollywood movie by the same name. Both were co-written by Sidney Howard and Paul de Kruif (the former a Pulitzer- and Oscar-winning playwright and screenwriter; the latter a well-known microbiologist and author). The play is the work of Sidney Howard and is based on a chapter in Paul de Kruif’s 1927 book Microbe Hunters.

James Stewart in his first dramatic role stars as Pvt. John O'Hara, a role reprised by Robert Montgomery in the 1938 film. Stewart later stated this role convinced him to continue his acting career during a time he recalled that "From 1932 through 1934...I'd only worked three months. Every play I got into folded." The experience led him to stay with acting and he first entered movies later that year in The Murder Man. Caricaturist Al Hirschfeld while covering the play for the New York Herald Tribune drew his first of 13 drawings (and only one from a play) he made over the course of Stewart's career.

The play opened at the opulent Martin Beck Theatre on March 6, 1934, and ran for 79 performances. The Martin Beck was renamed in 2003 for Al Hirschfeld, who drew the caricature for Yellow Jack. Prior to its debut, Herman Bernstein's Jewish Daily Bulletin covered the play, thereby giving it approval for not containing anti-semitic elements.

Due to the high cost of repertory production, in 1947 New York's American Repertory Theatre revived Yellow Jack for a four-week run at the International Theatre.