Over here you can trace an individual by the census from 1860 on when all persons in a household were listed by name, age, "colour," whether free or slave, occupation, country of birth and country of parents' birth, or it may have been just the father's on that last bit. From there it is usually easier to follow any of the children listed every ten years and see where they'd got up to...don't know if yours is like that or not, though.

Mortuary records are helpful on cause of death, too, as well as cemetery records, sometimes.

There were two great influenza epidemics in 1918 and 1923; I lost great-grandparents to both.