Revisiting the Spanish flu: the 1918 influenza pandemic in Rio de Janeiro1 Adriana da Costa Goulart Master's in Social History from Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF); Rua Mariz e Barros, 98/401; 24220-121 Niterói – RJ Brazil; adrianacgoulart@yahoo.com.br ABSTRACT The article analyzes the political and social impacts of the 1918 Spanish flu epidemic in the city of Rio de Janeiro, then Brazil's federal capital. Through an analysis of press reports from Rio de Janeiro and of other documentation, I explore how the epidemic served as a tool for political engineering. Data sources include annals, reports, and bulletins from a federal ministry, the Mayor's Office, and the Chamber of Deputies, along with studies from the Brazilian Academy of Medicine and dissertations from Rio de Janeiro's Faculdade de Medicina. My concern is how the epidemic impacted the representation of certain political and social actors and how it reaffirmed a group of sanitarians as an intelligentsia with a vocation for political leadership–a group that came to play a key role in the process of modernizing Brazilian society. Keywords: Spanish flu; epidemic; public health; political and social history; governability; political and social representation; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.