Ohio History Journal

THE PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO:

THEIR LIVES AND THEIR

CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE DEVELOPMENT

OF   THE    STATE, 1788-1835.*

 

THE LEGAL REQUIREMENTS FOR MEDICAL

PRACTICE--AN ATTEMPT TO REGULATE BY LAW

AND THE PURPOSE BEHIND THE MOVEMENT

 

By DONALD D. SHIRA, A.B., M.D.

 

In discussing the legal requirements for medical practice dur-

ing the period from the first official settlement of the Northwest

Territory to the repeal of all laws designed to regulate the prac-

tice of physic and surgery in Ohio, it seems appropriate to sketch

in, first of all, an historical background. The various factors and

influences which were responsible for the enactment of the first

laws should be well understood.

Immigration into the Northwest Territory during the time

it was owned by England was discouraged for various reasons.

Even in the interval between 1783, when it was ceded to the United

States, and the enactment of the Ordinance of 1787, there was

very little inducement to settlement. However, passage of the

Ordinance with its provision for civil administration and for

acquisition of valid land titles gave a powerful impetus to immi-

gration. Prior to the settling of Marietta, April 7, 1788, the white

population consisted for the most part of squatters and itinerant

traders and trappers. The boundaries of Ohio were not yet de-

 

* The eight papers under this heading were read before the Public Session of

the Ohio Committee on Medical History and Archives, Ohio History Conference,

Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society Library, Columbus, April 7, 1939.

(181)

• 1
 

182   OHIO ARCHEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

fined. There was not a single civilian physician in the entire

Northwest Territory. In the early summer of 1788 Jabez True

put in his appearance at Marietta and became the first practicing

physician in Ohio.¹ Dr. True was a native of New Hampshire,

had served as a surgeon on a privateer ship during the Revolu-

tionary War, and, after his arrival in Ohio, was appointed a

surgeon's mate in the Indian war at $22 per month. After the

close of hostilities he resumed his practice which took him as far

as thirty miles up and down the Ohio River. He traveled by canoe

and was usually accompanied by two armed guards as a protection

against Indian attack. True died in 1823 at the age of sixty-three,

having practiced in Marietta for thirty-five years.

It was quite natural that the first settlements should be along

the waterways. Water transportation was easier, the bottom lands

were more fertile and such locations were safer from Indian attack

since most Indian villages were inland. The first settlements of

any size were the Muskingum colony (Marietta), the Miami colony

(Cincinnati), the Steubenville colony (Steubenville), and the

Scioto colony (Chillicothe). Because of the difficulty of return

transportation against the current of the Ohio River, the Govern-

ment, in 1796, commissioned Colonel Ebenezer Zane to cut a semi-

circular road from Martin's Ferry to a point at Aberdeen on the

Ohio River. This was known as Zane's Trace. At first it was

scarcely more than a trail, but was soon widened to a passable

road. It soon swarmed with home seekers from the East. Hamlets

sprang up along its course some of which later grew into cities--

St. Clairsville, Cambridge, Zanesville, Lancaster, Kingston, Chilli-

cothe and West Union. At the same time another tide of immigra-

tion was sweeping in from the South, having gained access to

Kentucky by way of the historic Cumberland Gap. The two on-

sweeping waves commingled in the Ohio country. What was the

result? The population of Ohio, which in 1800 was about 45,000,

jumped to about 230,000 in 1810, and by 1820, in one short decade,

had leaped to over half a million.2

 

 

1 Samuel Prescott Hildreth,Biographical and Historical Memoirs of the Early

Pioneer Settlers of Ohio . . . (Cincinnati, 1852), 329.

2 Roderick Peattie, Geography of Ohio (Columbus, 1923), 116.

• 2
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                183

 

Whence came the physicians to minister to the ills of this

swelling horde? They did not come in sufficient numbers. But

ailing flesh cries out for surcease from pain. The ill were com-

pelled to turn to whatever source held promise of relief. As a

result quacks, mountebanks and charlatans, like a plague, soon

infested the entire state.

At last a self-appointed Moses, in the person of Dr. Samuel

Prescott Hildreth, arose to lead the medical profession out of

the wilderness of chaos. Hildreth, a practicing physician at

Marietta, was elected to the state legislature in 1810. He took it

upon himself personally, to draft and to steer through the General

Assembly the first act designed to regulate the practice of physic

and surgery in Ohio.³ The preamble of this first law reveals

clearly the incentive for its origin. It reads, "Whereas the prac-

tice of physic and surgery is a science so immediately interesting

to society that every encouragement for its promotion should be

given, and every abuse of it, so far as possible, suppressed--

Therefore. ... ."4

This first law (January 14, 1811) provided that the state be

divided into five medical districts. In each district three censors,

or examiners, were appointed by the General Assembly whose

duty it was to meet at designated towns twice each year for the

purpose of examining candidates for the practice of medicine,

and to issue licenses. The law required that the candidate should

satisfy the censors that he was a person of good moral character

and also that he had "attended three full years to the theory and

practice of medicine under the guidance of some able physician

or surgeon, or a license from some medical society shewing his

having been admitted as a practitioner, and give satisfactory

answers to such questions as may be put to him by the censors,

or examiners, on anatomy, surgery, materia medica, chymistry

and the theory and practice of medicine." It further specified that

licenses should "be either printed on smooth, handsome paper, or

written on parchment in a fair, round hand." The censors were

allowed $5.00 for each license granted, and were required to pub-

3 H. Z. Williams & Bro., pub., History of Washington County, Ohio .. . (Cleve-

land, 1881), 408-10.

4 Ohio Laws, Statutes, etc., Acts, 9 Assemb., 1810/11, p. 18.

• 3
 

184   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

lish the names of the successful candidates in some newspaper of

general circulation.

A unique feature of the law was that while it did not pro-

hibit a person without a license from practicing medicine, it did

stipulate that no person so practicing could invoke the law to

collect fees for services rendered. Not much in the form of teeth,

to be sure, but as much perhaps as one should expect in a medical

legislative infant still in swaddling clothes.

A little more than a year later (February 8, 1812) Hildreth's

law was repealed and an act to incorporate a medical society was

passed.⁵ It specified that the society be officially known as the

"President and Fellows of the Medical Society of the State of

Ohio." The names of 120 physicians eligible to membership were

written into the law. Whoever drafted this law certainly had only

a casual knowledge of the state's physicians since many of them

were placed in wrong counties. For example, the celebrated Daniel

Drake was listed as from Franklin County, and Samuel Prescott

Hildreth as from Champaign County.

This law divided the state into seven medical districts and the

physicians residing in each district constituted a medical society.

From each of these societies not less than two, nor more than

three, members were to be chosen by ballot to represent the society

at the state convention, the first of which was to be held in Chilli-

cothe on November 1, 1812. It was stipulated that ten delegates

present at the convention should constitute a quorum. The law

required that component district societies should "communicate

information to each other," and that district societies should

relay to the state convention "such curious cases and observations

as may come to their knowledge." On the other hand, it was the

duty of the state convention "to cause to be published such ex-

traordinary cases, and such observations on the state of the air,

and on epidemical and other disorders as they may think proper,

for the benefit of society and citizens in general." So here was

the first attempt in Ohio to elevate medical standards through

the dissemination of knowledge. The convention was empowered

 

5 Ibid., 10 Assemb., 1811/12, p. 58.

• 4
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              185

 

to expel members for misdemeanors; to appoint an examining

committee for each district; to "confer honorary degrees on such

members of the faculty as they may from time to time find of

distinguished merit;" to purchase and to hold property up to

$12,000; and to levy a tax not to exceed $2.00 per annum upon

all members of the society; which tax could be collected through

suit before any justice of the peace.

Real teeth were put into this law. It stated any male person

(either there were no female practitioners or they were not worth

considering) who was guilty of practicing without a "licence"

not only could not invoke the law to collect fees for services

rendered, but was subject to a fine of "not more than one hundred

nor less than five dollars for every offense." But here were the

real fangs. One-half the fine imposed was to go to the person

instigating the suit, and one-half for the use of the local medical

society. No doubt it was thought that splitting the fines would

appeal to the cupidity of the laymen and thus stimulate whole-

sale suits against the quacks. `Inquiry into the practical results of

this method would make an interesting study.

Another feature of this law was the strict prohibition of

price fixing by the society. Evidently fear of monopolistic prac-

tices existed then even as now.

In passing it is interesting to note that, pursuant to this law,

an attempt was made to hold a convention in Chillicothe in 1812,

but only five delegates put in an appearance. They were: Dr.

Daniel Drake, Cincinnati; Dr. Samuel Parsons, Columbus; Dr.

Joseph Canby, Lebanon; and Drs. Joseph Scott and John Ed-

miston, Chillicothe.⁶ Since ten delegates were required for a

quorum no business could be transacted and the convention ad-

journed sine die. Nine years elapsed before the next convention

was held in Columbus in 1821.

The next change in the laws occurred in less than a year,

January 19, 1813,⁷ precipitated no doubt because of the failure to

assemble a state convention. Without a state convention no dis-

trict examining censors could be appointed since the convention

 

6 Western Journal of the Medical and Physical Sciences (Cincinnati, 1827-1888),

VII (1834), 479.

7 Ohio Laws, Acts, 11 Assemb., 1812/13, p. 28.

• 5
 

186   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

had been invested with that power. Without censors no candidates

could be examined nor licenses issued. As a result the principal

objective of the law had been defeated. In the new law the num-

ber of districts remained the same, seven. The General Assembly

named seven physicians in each district to act as censors. The

sponsors of the law, who must have been medical men, were per-

sistently trying to get some sort of action--to devise some means

of curbing the activity of medical charlatans.

This act must have been reasonably satisfactory since there

was no more tampering with the laws until January 28, 1817, and

then only for the ostensible purpose of making the district societies

self-perpetuating by empowering them to select a board of censors

to serve for each ensuing year.

An amendment to the then existing medical laws was passed

January 30, 1818. Here for the first time was given legal recog-

nition to formal medical education because it provided that "any

person having received the degree of Doctor of Medicine in any

university or other medical institution within the United States

. . . shall, on application be entitled to a license . . . without an

examination."

The next major change in the medical laws was made January

15, 1821.8 In this new law nine medical districts, to conform with

the circuits of the Court of Common Pleas, were set up. Five

censors were named for each district. It created a Medical Con-

vention of Ohio "to be holden" in Columbus once each year begin-

ning with June, 1821. The convention was to consist of one dele-

gate from each district. Since there were nine districts the con-

vention could have a maximum of only nine members in atten-

dance. In effect the convention was equivalent to a central licensing

board with power to "prescribe the periods and methods of study

and qualifications of candidates." The convention was also directed

"to elect annually two of its body to attend as visitors, the com-

mencements in the Medical College of Ohio; join with the faculty

of that institution in the examination of candidates for degrees,

vote on their admission, and subscribe their diplomas on behalf of

the convention, and for their services they shall be paid two dol-

 

8 Ibid., 19 Assemb., 1820/21, p. 28.

• 6
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              187

lars per diem." Joseph Canby of Warren County, and John Ed-

miston, of Ross County, were designated as the visitors to the

ensuing commencement of the Medical College of Ohio.

That the members of the first Medical Convention of Ohio,

held in Columbus, June 4, 1821, took their responsibilities seriously

is attested by the stringent rules which they adopted governing

the qualifications of candidates for the practice of physic and sur-

gery. Among the principal stipulations were: that the candidate

be of good moral character; that he have a competent acquaintance

with the Greek and Latin languages; that he be well informed in

"Mechanical Philosophy;" that he shall have "read the various

branches of the profession, with, and attended practice of some

regularly educated and reputable practitioner for the term of two

years;" that he "shall have obtained the information contained" in

the prescribed text-books; and that he shall have attended one

course of medical lectures on all the branches taught in some "re-

spectable Medical Institution."⁹

One is tempted to speculate as to the familiarity of the august

convention members themselves with the formidable array of books

listed, not to mention their knowledge of Greek, Latin, and

"Mechanical Philosophy." No doubt it gave "the faculty" con-

siderable satisfaction as well as an added sense of dignity thus to

impress the humble neophyte with the profundity of their wis-

dom. One cannot help wondering how many prospective medicos

may have been shunted off into some less exacting but more

lucrative vocation.

An interval of six years appears to have elapsed before the

second convention was held in Columbus, December 10, 1827.10

In the interim repeal of old, and the enactment of new laws had

divided the state into twenty-two medical districts, the general plan

of organization, censorship and licensure remaining essentially

the same. The third convention of the General Medical Society11

was held in Columbus, January 5, 1829. The fourth convention

was held in 1831 and the fifth in 1833. Unfortunately no printed

9 Worthington (Ohio) Franklin Chronicle, July 2, 1821, p. 4.

10 Medical State Convention, Proceedings . . . Columbus, December 10, 1827

(Zanesville, O., 1828).

11 General Medical Society, Proceedings . . . Columbus, January 5, 1829 (Colum-

bus, 0., 1829).

• 7
 

188   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

proceedings of either of the last two conventions have been dis-

covered.

This brings us to the end of the legal phase of medical organi-

zation. In 1833, the state legislature, discouraged at the futile

attempt to suppress quackery by law, gave up in despair and re-

pealed all existing laws pertaining to the practice of physic and

surgery.¹² This action met with the approval of the medical pro-

fession generally which evidently had reached the conclusion that

the only effective way to exterminate quacks was to elevate the

educational standard of physicians, somewhat on the theory per-

haps, that "virtue is its own reward." They reasoned that the

automatic operation of the law of the "survival of the fittest"

would eventually weed out the quacks. A vain hope, for quacks

and cultists have flourished the world over since the "memory of

man runneth not to the contrary," and probably will continue to

thrive, regardless of restraining laws or of any transcendental

heights to which medical enlightenment may soar so long as the

sucker birth-rate remains at status quo. At the very moment of

the repeal of the medical laws one of the most stupendous systems

of quackery this country has ever known--the Thomsonian sys-

tem--was approaching its zenith. Thus, after twenty-two years of

persistent effort, it seemed that the more legislation that was

adopted to discourage the growth of the multi-headed hydra of

empiricism, the more gargantuan it became.

So from the time of the repeal of all medical practice laws in

1833 to the enactment of the medical practice act in 1896--a period

of sixty-three years--any person so inclined, regardless of his

qualifications or his knowledge of medical subjects, could hang out

his shingle and practice medicine in the state of Ohio.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

12 Ohio Laws, Acts, 31 Assemb., 1832/33, p. 27.

• 8
 

THE PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION OF PIONEER

OHIO PHYSICIANS

 

By FREDERICK C. WAITE, PH.D.

 

The early location of physicians for practice in Ohio was

coincident with the establishment of settlements, and since these

settlements began on the Ohio River, it was in that region that

were found the first resident physicians late in the eighteenth cen-

tury. The northern part of the state was settled somewhat later,

the northwestern area last of all. In the Western Reserve of north-

eastern Ohio, the first resident physician came in 1800.

In 1800, Ohio, with a population of 45,365, ranked eighteenth,

but by 1840 the population had increased to 1,519,467, and the

rank advanced to third, being exceeded by only New York and

Pennsylvania. With this great increase in population there came

a proportional increase in physicians.

Whence came these physicians of Ohio before 1835, and how

were they professionally educated? In southern and central Ohio

they came chiefly from Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania;

in northern Ohio mainly from New England and up-state New

York. The number graduated from Ohio medical schools before

1835 was small. The Medical College of Ohio graduated its first

class of seven members in 1821 and the total graduates up to and

including 1835 was 239. More than half of these graduated after

1830. There was no other regular medical school in Ohio that

had any graduates prior to 1836. The irregular (Botanic) Worth-

ington Medical School graduated about thirty men from 1831 to

1835 inclusive. Accurate statistics are lacking. There was no

medical school west of Ohio prior to 1840. A few graduates of

the Transylvania Medical School of Lexington, Kentucky, settled

in Ohio prior to 1835.

(189)

• 9
 

190   OHIO ARCHEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

The professional training of early Ohio physicians is related

to the growth of American medical schools. Up to and including

1800 there had been granted medical degrees in the United States

to a total of 312 individuals by three successive schools in Phila-

delphia, three in New York City, and one each in Cambridge,

Massachusetts, and Hanover, N.H. However, deducting the hon-

orary degrees to older men leaves about 250 men who graduated

under instruction. No record has been found that any of these

men came to pioneer Ohio. It is unlikely that they would do so,

since a medical degree then gave distinction and its holders would

be likely to remain in the older and more populous states.

The number of medical schools increased in the early nine-

teenth century. In the first decade three new schools, in the second

decade six schools, in the third decade eleven schools, and in the

first half of the fourth decade five more schools. Only four of

these twenty-five were south of Virginia, so that most of them

became potential, if not actual, sources of supply to the rapidly

growing state of Ohio.

What is more important is that nine of these twenty-five

schools were founded in small towns and known as country medical

schools. Several of them had large attendance and they drew

their students almost exclusively from country towns and rural

areas. The medical care of rapidly growing western states was

supplied far more by the country boys who had attended country

medical schools than by those who attended the schools in the

large cities. The country boys had grown up under pioneer con-

ditions and were willing to endure the hardships of a new country

which was scorned by city-bred boys.

The number of medical college graduates among practicing

physicians in the pioneer period of Ohio was far less than the

number of non-graduates. No statistics are available and only

conjecture can be offered. A conjecture is that in the first decade

considerably less than ten per cent of the practicing physicians

in Ohio held a medical degree. By 1835 this proportion had

probably risen to nearly twenty per cent.

The use of the term practicing physician excludes the Botanics,

or Thomsonians, who comprised a large proportion of those who

• 10
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              191

were treating the sick in Ohio. This state was a stronghold of

Thomsonianism and in 1835 the followers of this cult claimed

that one-half of the people of Ohio relied upon their system of

practice, and men of the regular school conceded a proportion of

one-third.

The small proportion of medical graduates in early Ohio can

be illustrated by a few specific instances. A contemporary list of

all licensed physicians in Portage County, published by the county

medical society in 1831, contains thirty-six names. A checking

of these names against lists of graduates of all medical schools

up to that time identified only five as graduates.

The Willoughby Medical School was established in 1834. Its

first faculty consisted of ten men and only three of them held an

M.D. degree. Four of the others had attended a medical school for

one session, but had not continued to graduation, while three of

these ten had probably never attended a medical school. Seven of

these ten men were dismissed at the end of the first session. How-

ever, these figures show the difficulty of securing holders of a

medical degree in 1834, even for the faculty of a new country

medical school, in northern Ohio.

In the first directory of Cleveland, published in 1837, there

are listed twenty-four physicians and surgeons. I have been unable

to identify more than six of them as having a medical degree.

Among the most prominent physicians in the state in 1835,

as indicated by their efforts in the beginning of organized medicine

in Ohio, and in holding of office in the medical conventions, were

men who were not graduates of a medical school, although some

of them received honorary degrees later. Among them may be

mentioned David Long, Cleveland's first physician, Peter Allen

of Kinsman, William M. Awl of Columbus, and Samuel P. Hil-

dreth of Marietta. Hildreth had attended one session at Harvard

Medical School.

Since it is evident that so small a proportion of Ohio physi-

cians prior to 1835 held medical degrees, the question arises as to

how the majority of physicians secured their medical education.

It was by the preceptor system solely, or, in a minority of cases,

• 11
 

192   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

with the addition of attendance at one session of lectures in a

medical school.

In colonial America the apprentice system was used in medi-

cine with the traditional seven-year period, but after the Revolu-

tionary War there came a change by which the time was reduced

to three years, the instruction limited to medical subjects, and the

terms master and apprentice changed to preceptor and student.

This became practically universal by 1800.

Under this reduction in the length of the program the boy

was expected to secure his general education before coming to

the preceptor. This consisted on the average of completion of

the course in one of the typical village academies. Often it was

less, and occasionally more, extending even to college graduation.

There were two varieties of "reading medicine with a doctor."

In one type the youth lived in the family of the preceptor, and

his duties included anything that a son would be expected to do,

such as some manual labor, and chores of various types. In such

case no fee was paid the preceptor, or only a small fee.

In the other type the student lived with his parents or rela-

tives, or boarded and attended the preceptor during the day, and

perhaps part of the night. A fee was charged, usually of one

hundred dollars a year. This type gradually replaced the first.

In this second type, the duties of the student were limited to

things connected with medicine, but this included the care of his

preceptor's conveyances, including the horses, saddles, and harness,

and chaise or buggy, and driving the doctor. Long drives gave time

and opportunity for much personal instruction. He also had care

of orderliness and cleanliness in the office. He was called upon to

grind with mortar and pestle the crude drugs from which the

physician compounded his medicines, and in time to help compound

these medicines, make pills, and put up powders.

The preceptor furnished the text-books and usually a skeleton

for the study of osteology, which was much emphasized. The

student had the use of the preceptor's meager library. The pre-

ceptor assigned lessons and heard daily recitations, except Sunday,

usually early in the morning, or in the course of driving to see

patients. If recitations were missed by reason of excessive pro-

• 12
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              193

 

fessional duties or illness, or absence, of either preceptor or student,

the preceptor was expected to extend the standard three-year

course to compensate for these omissions.

After a time the student was permitted to be present at the

treatment of patients calling at the office and to assist in dressing

wounds and doing independently minor operations such as lancing

abscesses and extracting teeth.

Sometime in the early part of the course, and in the cold

weather, a cadaver was obtained by resurrection in some quiet

country churchyard, and in the preceptor's barn loft he and the

student dissected it. The student would clean the skeleton and

keep it as the first item in the equipment of his future office. Later

in the course a second cadaver was obtained and a series of surgical

operations, mostly amputations at various levels, were carried out.

These phases of instructing the student permitted the preceptor

himself to revive his knowledge.

After about a year and a half the student was permitted to

enter the sick room with his preceptor and see examinations and

treatment, and on the ride to the next patient the preceptor would

discuss the case and give his reasons for what he had done. These

sick room visits were restricted to men and children patients. The

entry of the student into the sick room of an adolescent or adult

woman was unusual. Only very rarely did the student see an

obstetrical delivery. Such privilege was restricted to delivery of

negro women. As a result the student, on completion of his course,

was woefully deficient in knowledge of diseases of women and in

obstetrics. Toward the end of his courses the student made calls

independently upon convalescing patients.

The standard length of preceptorship was three years without

vacations, i.e., thirty-six months of private instruction--actually

more months of instruction than our present-day medical schools

require. When that was completed, if the work of the student

had been reasonably satisfactory, the preceptor would issue a

certificate of proficiency and on registration of this with civil

authorities the former student became "a legal practitioner." There

was usually agreement that the student should not begin inde-

pendent practice in the immediate neighborhood of his preceptor.

• 13
 

194   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

The young practitioner might apply to a district medical society

for examination by the censors of the society and if passed, a

certificate was issued which was called a license and the holder

became a "licensed practitioner."

The next step was to seek membership in a medical society

and if granted he became a "society member." There were then,

in public opinion, three grades of physicians who did not hold a

medical degree, namely, legal practitioners, licensed physicians, and

society members.

The man who held a medical degree always displayed it on

his office sign. When drug stores came in he signed all his prescrip-

tions with M.D. after his name. In registering at a medical meet-

ing, he signed M.D. after his name to differentiate himself from

those individuals who could only place Dr. before their names.

The editor of the local paper knew that in news items he should

put M.D. after the name of any holder of the degree. The high

regard in which the degree was held by physicians is shown by

the fact that the initials M.D. are found on the tombstones of all

holders of the degree who died prior to about 1870.

There was variation of this program of study under a pre-

ceptor in which the student attended a medical school during one

session of lectures. The time attending lectures was counted as

part of the standard three years service under the preceptor.

It was recognized that attendance on one session of lectures

was highly desirable, but cost and distance of schools, when there

were few schools, prevented most students from attending lectures

until medical schools were established in Ohio.

If the student attended a second set of lectures at the same

school or another school and was reasonably diligent and passed

the examination, he would receive a medical degree.

The preceptor system had its advantages and its disadvantages.

Its major advantage was in the acquiring of the art of medicine

and contact with patients.

The great disadvantage of the preceptor system was the wide

variability in the proficiency of the preceptors, both as to knowledge

of medicine and facility in teaching. Some physicians acquired a

• 14
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              195

 

reputation as capable preceptors and had more applications from

boys who wished to study medicine than they could accept, but

many men served as preceptors whose general and professional

education was grossly deficient and who had no facility or experi-

ence in teaching.

The preceptorial system was less efficient in a pioneer country

than in the states that were older. The better educated men tended

to stay in the older states. When the less well-educated men reached

the pioneer area they had less contact with superior physicians and

so continued to degrade. They bought fewer medical books and

fewer of them took the few medical journals of that era. There

were fewer medical societies. In the older states many physicians

each year visited a medical school for a week or two and listened

to lectures. In Ohio the greater distances and fewer schools pre-

cluded this. Moreover, in a pioneer country a physician's profes-

sional duties were more burdensome and time-consuming, and he

had less energy and time to devote to a student for whom he was

a preceptor. Hence, on the average, a preceptor in Ohio gave

less efficient training to his students than did a preceptor in Ver-

mont or Massachusetts or eastern Pennsylvania. This differential

became cumulative in succeeding generations of men educated en-

tirely under the preceptorial system, but as pioneer conditions dis-

appeared, the efficiency of preceptorial education gradually im-

proved under the influence of medical societies.

It was appreciation of these conditions that led the abler

physicians of Ohio early to organize district medical societies and

later the state medical convention. In these the improvement of

preceptorial teaching was a frequent topic of discussion. This ap-

preciation also led them to encourage the founding of medical

schools in Ohio and to welcome the establishment of medical

journals.

In the first two decades of the nineteenth century the practi-

tioners of Ohio were practically all men who had come from

eastern states where the great majority had studied medicine

solely under a preceptor. The influx from eastern states continued

with the growth of the population until the middle of the century,

to supplement those who were locally educated.

• 15
 

196   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

In the first decade of the nineteenth century the Ohio boys

who were growing up began to study under physicians in Ohio.

This initiated medical education within the bounds of Ohio. It

was not until later that there was any noticeable going of boys

from Ohio to eastern medical schools. The schools in their student

lists gave the state from which the student came, so that these

can be identified.

Gradually the number from Ohio increased, but at no time to

large numbers. At no time prior to 1835 were as many as forty

residents of Ohio registered in all eastern medical schools in any

one year.

There was a fairly definite geographical division in Ohio

of the choice of eastern schools for those few boys who did go.

From central and southern Ohio the students tended to go to Phila-

delphia. Twenty residents of Ohio graduated at Jefferson before

1840 and more at the University of Pennsylvania. A considerable

number went to the Transylvania Medical School in Lexington,

Kentucky. Five Ohio residents graduated at the University of

Maryland prior to 1835. The registration of Ohio residents in

Philadelphia schools begins about 1810. From northern Ohio regis-

tration in eastern medical schools begins about 1825. The majority

went to one of the country schools in up-state New York, Ver-

mont, or Massachusetts, and a few to Yale. It is noticeable that

scarcely any Ohio residents were registered in the New York City

schools before 1835 and none at Harvard.

There were, as indicated, two groups of practicing physicians

who did not hold medical degrees--those who had been educated

solely under the preceptor system and those who had attended

one session of lectures in a medical school, but had not continued

to a medical degree. Those who were educated solely under the

preceptor system were very decidedly more than those who attended

one course of lectures.

The number who had attended one session of lectures was

greater than those who held medical degrees, but up to 1835 the

number who had never attended any medical school much ex-

ceeded the total of both of these groups. The proportion who had

• 16
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              197

 

not attended at all gradually diminished, but there was not an

equalization until after the Civil War.

In all medical schools the number who graduated in that school

was less than those who attended without graduation. In the Col-

lege of Physicians and Surgeons of the Western District of New

York at Fairfield (1812-1840) the proportion was about thirty to

seventy. In Castleton Medical School of Vermont (1819-1861)

the proportion was about forty to sixty. In Willoughby Medical

School (1834-1847) thirty per cent of all students graduated. In

Western Reserve Medical School up to the Civil War (1843-1861)

and not including honorary degrees, there were 707 graduates and

1141 non-graduates, i.e., thirty-eight per cent of the students

graduated.

The average physician in Ohio who began practice in 1935

did so with much better education, training, and facilities than his

professional brother who began practice in Ohio in 1835. How-

ever, the beginning Ohio general practitioner of 1935 should not

deride the men of a hundred years ago. In some respects these

1835 men were better prepared to enter practice than those of

1935, especially in the art of medicine. They had seen in their

preparation many bed patients, not under the ideal conditions of

the modern hospital, but in the conditions in the home, from hovel

to mansion, which the physician must meet in his daily duties.

The physician of 1835 was, also, professionally more independent

and had far more resourcefulness than the practitioner of today,

because he was compelled to carry his patients through without

trained nurses, or hospital facilities.

The Ohio practitioner of today owes much to his professional

brothers of a hundred years ago, for they, especially through the

initiative and ideals of their contemporary leaders in the profes-

sion, laid the foundations of medical art and medical organization

which we enjoy today in Ohio.

• 17
 

THE EQUIPMENT, INSTRUMENTS AND DRUGS OF

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO

 

BY HOWARD DITTRICK, M.D.

 

In the equipment, instruments and drugs of the Ohio physi-

cians prior to 1835 there was exhibited a wide divergence, depend-

ing on differences in training, financial means, and on contact with

medical supplies as well as with educational stimulation. Nor is

this strange; the same factors operate today in the same directions:

it is only a question of degree. Those few pioneer physicians who

had the opportunity to attend good medical schools of the time,

to visit medical centers of the East and perhaps even to visit

Edinburgh or Paris, these fortunate ones were furnished with all

things needful for the practice they came to seek in Ohio. But

the majority of those pioneer doctors had studied only under a

preceptor, had gleaned some further instruction from a few charts

and text-books, and were familiar with only the simplest tools of

the profession. In addition to lack of broad training and almost

complete lack of means to buy equipment, most of them came from

far off Connecticut, Philadelphia or Virginia, by boat, covered

wagon or horseback, and could bring few possessions. They were

obliged to bring food, clothing, arms and tools to sustain life on the

wilderness journey. Frequently they had even to include in their

limited baggage a small store of goods to sell or barter on arrival

to provide means to live while getting established. Little room

remained for medical supplies.

Probably the origin of these pioneer doctors had a definite

influence on their training, their ability, and their equipment. There

were two distinct main streams of medical penetration into the

Ohio wilderness, the north and the south portals. They came into

northern Ohio through interest in the Connecticut Land Company,

(198)

• 18
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              199

 

usually down the Hudson, overland to Lake Erie, and then pro-

ceeded to settlements at the mouths of rivers, such as Ashtabula,

Willoughby and Cleveland. Some came across Pennsylvania by

horseback, replacing depleted baggage at Pittsburgh by additional

stores of medical supplies. Generally speaking, the group from

New England had less training and less contact with either sup-

plies or further education than had the southern group who had

stemmed from Philadelphia medical culture. They had the ad-

vantage of closer association with university stimulation, that of

Transylvania University at Lexington, Kentucky, which was then

a part of Virginia. Ephraim McDowell (1772-1830) and Ben-

jamin Winslow Dudley (1785-1871) were eminent teachers in

Transylvania, and Daniel Drake (1785-1852), founder of the

Medical College of Ohio in Cincinnati, was an outstanding physi-

cian of that time. The north was tardier in establishment of

equivalent medical instruction.

Unquestionably the acute need for medical care, even such

as the most poorly equipped pioneer physician could supply, was

a factor in short cuts to training. Under the same pressure of

need, the same scarcity of medical schools, Russia is doing the

same today. The population of Ohio in 1800 was only 45,000;

however, by 1820 it was 500,000, but doctors did not increase

in proportion. Lack of adequate means of transportation and

communication made it impossible for each doctor to care for

any great number of scattered families. Hence numbers of phy-

sicians were needed. But medical schools were few, and courses

of the time inadequate, educational standards lacking. It is true

that many of the northern pioneers had had some lectures in the

medical schools of New York, Philadelphia, or New England,

in proof of which some of them kept lecture cards, such as those

of Dr. Leonard Hanna of Lisbon, dated 1827, from the Univer-

sity of Pennsylvania. Some came with letters "To whom it may

concern" from bankers, preachers, or even governors of states.

Again they came with such a certificate as the following, dated

1797, now belonging to this doctor's descendant. It reads:

This may certify that the Bearer Doctor Adam Denison has lived

with Doctor Ebenezer Wright of Plainfield about two years and with

• 19
 

200    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

myself seven Months in the Study of the Theory and Practise of Phisic and

Surgery in which he hath made more than common good Profitiency and do

recommend him with confidence to all those who have occasion to call upon

the healing Art for assistance as one that is well qualified to grant them

relief--with a Bright genius and an unblemished character and his Friendly

disposition to all that he has contact with is what I sincerely Esteem--an

acquaintance with him will prove to all that the above recommendation

is just                           This from

PHINEAS PARKHURST, M.D.

Mark you the requirements of a good physician, never more

skillfully enumerated--"a bright genius," "an unblemished char-

acter," and a "friendly disposition." Who shall say these were

not an important part of his stock in trade?

Let us look over the conditions under which they worked

and the equipment with which they met the challenge of frontier

practice. The doctor's home was his base of operations, his

equivalent of an office. He had very few text-books, because of

expense and difficulty of transport, but among those chosen by

Ohio doctors were Bell's Surgery, Cullen's Practice, Rush on

Fevers, Senac on Fevers, Brown's Elements of Medicine, Burns'

Midwifery, John Hunter on Blood, Inflammation and Gun Shot

Wounds.

Dr. Erastus Goodwin practiced in Burton which was then

in the midst of a wilderness. Although taught only by a preceptor,

one of his descendants states that he possessed a good library.

Furthermore, on his long rides it was his invariable custom to

take along a medical book or journal.

Dr. Gideon Case,¹ who died in Hudson in 1822, had books

valued at $35.25 listed in his estate. Dr. J. J. Tyler² of Warren

has discovered important data on the costs of books, equipment

and drugs used by the doctors of this era. In addition to a few

books, the doctor had usually a mortar and pestle and apothecary

balances, together with his own supply of crude drugs and herbs,

for the drug store being inaccessible, he must provide what he

prescribed.

 

1 F. C. Waite, "The Historian's Note Book," Ohio State Medical Journal (Co-

lumbus, 1905-), May, 1986.

2 J. J. Tyler, "Dr. Luther Spelman, Early Physician of the Western Reserve,"

Ohio State Medical Journal, April, 1988.

• 20
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              201

Some doctors kept a record of prescriptions issued, neatly

set forth in a special book. In account books, such as the one

used by Dr. A. H. Wheeler of Austinburg, we read of current

fees, diagnosis, methods of treatment, and prices of commodities

accepted in barter. These books are of value in learning about

medicine of the period. One neatly kept book included prescrip-

tions and recipes for man and beast, together with formulae for

whitewash, dyes, stains, paints, even methods of restoring the

hair.

Sometimes the doctor had access to pewter bedpans, clysters,

and other forms of syringes. Hot water bottles of pewter and

crockery existed, but more often any container sufficed. Or hot

applications were used, but a heated stone or chunk of wood

could be had in any cabin. For fractures the most convenient

piece of shingle, slab or board was used. However, there are in

the museum at Marietta a few specially prepared splints that

belonged to Dr. J. Cotton of Marietta, who was president of the

Medical Society of Ohio in 1830. Leeches were standard equip-

ment, used even for treatment of fistula and some forms of

blindness. The roller bandage was employed to control swelling

of the extremities and of course the tourniquet to check bleeding

in injuries or amputations.

About the end of the period under discussion, Dr. Erastus

Cushing of Cleveland, unlike Chaucer's doctor, "lovede silver in

special." In addition to his reputation for having a silver door-

bell practice, he devised a silver nipple instead of the proverbial

silver spoon in infant feeding. Such a nipple was connected with a

long slender tube of the same material, which extended down

into the bottle. Naturally it was impossible to keep clean. It was

seventy years before the tube menace was removed from infant

feeding.

Occasionally pulsometers were found. These were dumb-

bell shaped containers made of glass, about six inches long,

partially filled with colored spirits, and fitted into a plush case.

By holding one end in the closed hand, air bubbles would rise to

the other end. It had really no relation to the pulse, and was

connected with physics rather than physic. We have a replica of

• 21
 

202   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

a pulsometer in our Museum of the Cleveland Medical Library.

One such appliance was submitted to us for purchase by a lady

from Texas, who hoped to dispose of it for a sum sufficient to

purchase a home and live in ease the rest of her life.

Pioneer doctors prior to 1835 made their visits on horseback.

Their equipment, therefore, included a good saddle and saddle-

bags. In those days saddles represented quite an outlay. Saddle-

bags were thrown over the horse's shoulders in front of the saddle,

and in them drugs and instruments were carried. Sometimes a

case of instruments was fitted into the bag. One pair of saddle-

bags in our Museum has a note attached recording that they

were made by a saddler in Allentown, Pennsylvania, at a cost of

ten dollars. In crossing swollen streams the bags were hung

around the doctor's shoulders to keep dry. If the doctor was not

able to finish his journey by nightfall he tethered his horse and

slept, pillowing his head on the precious bags. When he had ex-

amined his patient he sat down with the bags across his knees,

exploring their double pockets for appropriate medication.

By far the most important equipment of this old time phy-

sician was his horse. Not infrequently he had two in order to

rest one after a tiring journey to a remote settlement. The great-

est obstacle between doctor and patient was communication. Once

he could reach the patient's bedside with his meager equipment

he was ready to battle any emergency. His horse was the link

with his patient. It had to be a good swimmer for every spring

the trails led to washed out bridges, or the usual ford would be

found swollen in flood. The story is told of Dr. David Long,

Cleveland's first physician, that he once returned at night from

beyond Rocky River by the same road he had taken to reach

there. The next day he was surprised to learn that his horse had

brought him back in the dark over a single stringer of the bridge

which was washed out after he had gone over it on his outward

journey.

When Dr. Peter Allen of Kinsman attended the Medical

Convention in Columbus in 1835 it required more than a week

each way. Tales remain of doctors being out on a round of dis-

tant visits for two weeks at a stretch.

• 22
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              203

The pioneer's thermometer, blood pressure apparatus and

X-ray tube, were all combined in his fingers. Though the stetho-

scope was used in southern Ohio, in the early 1830's, by a few

doctors who were in touch with Transylvania University, it did

not appear in other parts of the state until after 1835. Yet types

of cough, cry, breathing and changes in the voice registered in

the doctor's attuned ear, as signs of certain diseases. Blueness or

pallor of the lips, the jaundiced sclera, the lemon tint or the

greenish-yellow hue of the skin, even the slight passing glimpse

of a rash, did not escape his critical eye. Most uncanny was his

ability to sniff cases of typhoid or measles. If he had no means

to make a chemical test, taste and even smell enabled him to

diagnose the coma of glycosuria. Yes, he lacked equipment which

we use today with such abandon, he had to meet emergencies

with few external aids. But he did have courage, perseverance

and fearlessness, and I shall presently give you an example of

that side of his character.

It is interesting to speculate on the conditions present at

the time, conditions the physician was called upon to treat, and

hence to provide for in the restricted compass of his saddle-bags.

Mothers in childbirth were just beginning to call in male

physicians. There was plenty of dental trouble, for which the only

treatment was extraction. There were bronchitis and pneumonia

in the winter, fevers and dysentery in the summer. Ague, as

malaria was then called, was present in the swampy regions.

Periodic attacks of smallpox, angina of the throat and mem-

branous croup, all required the appropriate treatment of the

period. Among the common surgical conditions were abscesses,

wounds from horse kicks, axe cuts, scalp wounds, fracture of the

skull and extremities from falling timber. In medical cases an

assortment of drugs were used which will be discussed later.

However, the popular treatment for most diseases was blood-

letting, which was accomplished by the spring and trigger lancet,

the phlebotomy knife, or the simple thumb lancet. Another lancet

of special shape was used for the incision of swollen gums. A

procedure frequently employed in this era was cupping, carried

out by a series of glasses, varying in size. A syringe which could

• 23
 

204   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

be screwed into the top of the cupping glass provided increased

suction.

Heat was applied externally in the form of poultices, some

of which were crude, even revolting, but always the means at

hand were those employed. Smallpox was a serious scourge be-

fore the days of vaccination (Waterhouse, 1800). But Dr. Peter

Allen of Kinsman used the natural virus after the manner of

Boylston, who first employed this procedure in Boston in 1721.

The thumb lancet for vaccination was carried in a small case and

was protected on either side of the blade by tortoise shell leaves

which rotated back to form a handle.

Fracture of the skull from falling timber, or even from

horse kicks, occasionally required the treatment used by some of

the Indians, namely trephining. We have in the Museum a

trephine which belonged to Dr. Horace Ackley, who came to

Akron in 1835. Scalp wounds or bad cuts were sewn up, and

abscesses opened by means of the spring lancet.

Southern Ohio physicians were doubtless familiar with the

elaborate collections of instruments illustrated in A. H. Barkley's

Kentucky's Pioneer Lithotomists.³ Ephraim McDowell and Ben-

jamin W. Dudley had enjoyed excellent training in Britain and had

visited medical centers on the continent as well as those of our

own Atlantic seaboard. Transylvania University in Lexington

where they taught must have provided inspiration for southern

Ohio men.

In contrast to such affluence in instruments, note the meager

supply which Dr. John L. Richmond4 had at hand when he per-

formed the first successful Caesarian section in Ohio, in Newton,

April 25, 1827. The patient had been in labor over thirty hours,

because of a stenosis in the upper part of the vagina. The story

is best told in his own words.

She had fits and the pains did no good. To prevent the convulsions

and to recruit the system I gave laudanum and sulphuric ether and applied

 

 

3 A. H. Barkley, Kentucky's Pioneer Lithotomists (Cincinnati, 1918).

4 J. L. Richmond, "History of the Successful Case of Caesarian Operation,"

Western Journal of the Medical and Physical Sciences (Cincinnati, 1827-1838), III

(1829/30).

• 24
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                   205

 

flannel with hot spirits to the feet . . . After doing all in my power for

her preservation, and feeling myself entirely in the dark as to her situation,

and finding that whatever was done must be done soon, and feeling a deep

and solemn sense of my responsibility, with only a case of common pocket

instruments, about one o'clock at night, I commenced Caesarian section.

Here I must digress from my subject and relate the condition of the house,

which was made of logs that were green, and put together not more than a

week before. The crevices were not chinked, there was no chimney nor

chamber floor. The night was stormy and windy, insomuch that the assis-

tants had to hold blankets to keep the candles from being blown out. Under

these circumstances it is hard to conceive the state of my feelings, when I

was convinced the patient must die or the operation be performed.

Without anesthetics, without antiseptics, but with sound

judgment and undoubted courage Richmond of the hamlet of

Newton, made Ohio medical history in saving this mother's life.

One of the few medical monuments in Ohio was erected in New-

ton to commemorate the event.

There exists a court record of a list of the instruments which

belonged to Dr. Gideon Case,⁵ who died in Hudson in 1822. This

inventory included a pocket case of instruments, a set of dental

instruments, male and female catheters, lancets and a syringe.

Though the type of syringe is not mentioned, it may have been

pewter, usual at that period.

It would seem that few doctors at that time carried with

them forceps or other obstetrical instruments, for indeed "meddle-

some midwifery" as it was called in pre-antiseptic days, was very

dangerous practice. Dr. John B. Harmon, who came to Warren

in 1808, had three hand-made obstetrical instruments, which,

though crude, showed good craftsmanship. The forceps and

crotchet have walnut handles to which the metal part is riveted,

while the Smellie perforator has ring handles which have been

hammered out over the conical end of an anvil. A walnut case

containing cupping glasses, a very sturdy saw and other amputa-

tion instruments are also attributed to Harmon, together with the

well-known turnkeys for extraction of teeth.

Other turnkeys were those of Dr. Peter Allen of Kinsman

and Dr. Leonard Hanna of Lisbon. Dr. Hanna also had other

 

5 Waite, "Historian's Note Book."

• 25
 

206   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

dental instruments, including an elevator and packer, both having

wood handles. Scarificators, numerous spring and trigger lancets,

some nested in ingenious carved wood cases lined with velvet and

covered with leather; gum lancets, thumb lancets, protected by

tortoise shell handles; larger lancets in a brass handle and used

for bleeding horses; many leather cases with emergency instru-

ments such as those belonging to Dr. Gideon Case of Hudson;

all of these types of the period are to be found in the Museum

of the Cleveland Medical Library, most of them having been the

property of early Ohio physicians.

As to drugs, these physicians used many of the drugs of

folk-lore and of course these were indigenous to Ohio. Among

these we find horseradish, skunk-cabbage, sage, thorn-apple,

butternut, elder, thoroughwort, slippery elm, etc. Other crude

drugs of proven worth came from the East, Pittsburgh, as we

have said, being a popular distributing center for Ohio doctors.

A favored method of treatment was hot applications, utilizing

such remedies as hops, wormwood, turpentine, bear's grease, etc.

In addition to bloodletting, and other drugless treatments, sweat-

ing was produced by Dover's powder, blistering by cantharides,

vomiting by ipecac, and purging by calomel and jalap. There were

practically no pharmacies, drugs being obtained in some centers

of population from shops whose signs read "Physician and Drug-

gist," "Chemist and Druggist," or "Druggist and Grocer."

In the first United States Pharmacopoeia published in 1820,

we learn that the Medical College of Ohio was invited to take

part in the compilation, and although the college approved of the

undertaking still on account "of the infancy of their institution

they did not think it proper to appoint delegates." There had been

a pharmacopoeia of the Massachusetts Medical Society published

in 1808 and one of the New York Hospital published in 1816.

The founders of the first U. S. P. saw that their small volume

would become larger with the progress of medical discovery for

they noted "the Materia Medica must soon grow to an unmanage-

able size if its enlargement be not followed by a corresponding

retrenchment of superfluities."

• 26
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              207

 

In the first United States Pharmacopoeia the following drugs

of unusual interest appear--garlic, gold, cinchona, hops, digitalis,

bitter-sweet, geranium, guiac, haematoxylin, isinglass, juniper,

tulip tree bark, musk, opium, prunes, sago, sassafras, amber,

tobacco, tapioca, and yeast. While in the secondary list we note

carrot, wild potato, mayweed, delphinium, parsley, gaultheria,

pomegranate, iris, wild lettuce, magnolia, violet, golden rod, and

spurred rye or ergot. Under official preparations the following

are described--infusion of Peruvian bark, infusion of foxglove,

infusion of tobacco, Dover's powder, paregoric and burnt sponge.

In the United States Pharmacopoeia of 1830, a few rather

ineffective remedies were dropped. Among those of recognized

value we find potassium iodide, quinine sulphate, and morphia

sulphate. In this issue we find in the list of new drugs colchicum,

iodine, oleum tiglii, and in the secondary list hepatica and sesame.

There was at this time considerable discussion regarding change

in names. Muriatic acid was not altered because it could not be

determined whether the change should be to hydrochloric or

chlorohydric acid. The terms chlorinated lime and ammoniated

mercury were retained because of their descriptive character. The

mild chloride of mercury and the corrosive chloride of mercury

were preferred to the protochloride and the bichloride of mercury.

Drugs listed in the Pharmacopoeias of 1820 and 1830 repre-

sent those to which Ohio physicians had possible access. Actually

these were not always available for treatment. Scarcity of drug

shops, meagerness of their stocks and difficulty in procuring fresh

supplies from the East, especially in the winter, must have left

the doctors with recourse frequently to folk-lore remedies of

local materials. An example was the Indian mixture of hickory

ashes and honey for a vermifuge, or white oak bark and

geranium for some of the dysenteries.

Study of the contents of a number of saddle-bags would be

a valuable contribution of pharmacy. We have listed from two

pairs of saddle-bags as many drugs as we have been able to

identify through the co-operation of the staff of the School of

Pharmacy.

• 27
 

208   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

The first pair belonged to Dr. Peter Allen⁶ who came to

Kinsman in 1808. Within the bags are many original labelled

packets of drugs and two leather cases of bottles, one for liquids,

the second for powders. The square folded packets of herbs are

carefully wrapped in two papers, inner and outer, each tied with

rough homespun linen thread. The contents are mainly crude

drugs in distinction to the processed drugs of a later era. Each

packet contains the amount necessary for one decoction, and the

dried herbs have preserved well their characteristic form and

taste. The liquid content of bottles has completely vanished with

time, but the bottles themselves are of interest, hand-blown, thin

and light, with slender necks and wide flanges. They are contained

in leather rolls tied with thongs.

We gain an insight, too, into the ailments he was prepared

to meet and for which he carried these precious drugs. Among

the packets there were senna, rhubarb, and calomel for laxative,

while for diarrhoea there was bismuth subnitrate and mercury

with chalk. Quinine was ready for malaria and other fevers.

Serpentaria, iron pyrophosphate, iron and ammonium citrate were

used as tonics and blood purifiers, and valerian as a nerve vital-

izer. A distinctive bottle, unmarked and with well-worn cork, con-

tained morphine, suggesting frequent use in the days of no

anesthetics. Digitalis leaves, well preserved, remind us that bad

hearts were present even then. In one package was a mixture of

senega, Irish moss and sarsaparilla to which he may have added

from the packet of squills or from the morphine bottle to provide

a cough remedy. For the child with worms there was pumpkin

seed, and as vehicles he carried Irish moss and the compound

tincture of cardamom. These drugs appear quite potent today,

and reflect care and precision in handling.

A richer find was made in the second pair of saddle-bags of

Dr. Erastus Goodwin (1784-1869). Goodwin came to Burton in

1811 and in caring for his patients rode a circuit as far north

as Painesville and south to Warren. He had a very liberal supply

of remedies including many powdered crude drugs and liquid

 

 

6 H. Dittrick, et al., Medical Pioneers of the Western Reserve (Cleveland, 1932).

• 28
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                209

 

preparations. In the two pockets of his saddle-bags there were

seventy-seven different packages and containers, some of the

latter being of unusual interest. Several of the crude drugs and

dried up specimens in bottles we were unable to identify, but the

following medicines were readily recognized: aloes, myrrh,

serpentaria, magnesia, senna, camomile flowers, cloves, liquorice,

uva-ursi, rhubarb, cubeb, castor, sarsaparilla, anise, juniper,

squills, gentian, gum arabic, gamboge, opium, benzoin, red precipi-

tate of mercury, Rochelle salts, soluble blue, chalk, mustard, cam-

phor, bismuth subnitrate and balsam Peru.

Dr. J. J. Tyler⁷ gives exact dates of drugs purchased and

prices paid for them. These drugs were bought in Pittsburgh,

Canfield and Youngstown between the years 1811 and 1816 by

Dr. Luther Spelman (1779-1863) who practiced in Youngstown,

Petersburgh and Wayne. His drug supply included opium, senna,

sulphur, castor oil, Glauber's salts, ipecac, lead acetate, orange

peel, magnesia, potassium bitartrate, rhubarb, ginger, calamine,

gingseng, citrine ointment, oil sweet almonds, ferrous sulphate,

guiac, Peruvian bark, calomel, saltpeter, wormwood, rosin,

cantharides, Burgundy pitch, balsam copaiba, mercurial ointment,

gum ammoniac, aloes, camphor, myrrh, sweet spirit of nitre,

serpentaria, zinc sulphate, alum, liquorice, steel filings, gum

arabic, calumba, tartar emetic, white arsenic, silver nitrate,

sponge, jalap, asafetida, anise, gentian, cloves, squills, kino, creta

preparata, juniper, red precipitate of mercury, turpentine, dyan-

thos, peppermint, spigelia, lavender, nitric acid, muriatic acid,

cassia, castile soap, and olive oil.

Referring again to the inventory of the effects of Dr. Gideon

Case8 of Hudson, over forty drugs are listed, including tartar

emetic, iron sulphate, ipecac, flowers of benzoin, balsam capivi,

oil peppermint, oil mint, nitric acid, muriatic acid, balsam Peru,

zinc ointment, calomel, red precipitate of mercury, Peruvian

bark, camomile flowers, orange peel, cloves, sugar of lead, borax,

squills, rosin, rhubarb, gum ammoniac, digitalis, guiac, canthar-

ides, emplastrum stomachicum olivea, magnesia, arsenic, liquorice,

 

7 Tyler, "Luther Spelman."

8 Waite, "Historian's Note Book."

• 29
 

210   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

castile soap, asafetida, aloes, white oil, camphor, turpentine, cream

tartar, ammonium hydroxide, laudanum and salts.

At the Ohio Medical Convention held in Cleveland in May,

1839, Dr. S. P. Hildreth⁹ of Marietta in his presidential address

mentioned a number of drugs used thirty years previously. These

included calomel and jalap as cathartics and Peruvian bark and

serpentaria as tonics. For the prevalent fevers, yeast, charcoal,

Fowler's solution, sulphate of quinine (after 1823), and powders

of nitrate of potash and antimony tartrate, were given internally.

We note in passing that already there was a division of opinion

regarding the use of alcohol as a therapeutic measure. However,

additional relief in fevers was obtained by some who wrapped

the patient in a sheet saturated with a mixture of red pepper,

spirits and water. Often in these fevers physicians administered

an alkali, on the theory advanced by Dr. Samuel Mitchell of New

York that "malignant fevers were caused or greatly aggravated

by the generation of septic or nitrous acid in the stomach and

bowels." To counteract this acidosis, they employed the subcar-

bonate of soda as an alkalizer.

We conclude, therefore, that very few doctors of pioneer

days in Ohio had sufficient equipment. Even of the known reme-

dies, their available supply was meager and its replacement un-

certain, probably at all times less than adequate. Because of their

modest training the earliest men were often not even familiar

with some of the instruments and procedures of the period. In

spite of these handicaps they frequently accomplished astonishing

results.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

9 S. P. Hildreth, ed., Journal of the Proceedings of the Medical Convention of

Ohio (Cleveland, 1839).

• 30
 

METHODS OF TREATMENT OF SOME OF THE MORE

COMMON DISEASES BY THE PIONEER

PHYSICIANS OF OHIO

 

By DAVID A. TUCKER, M.D.

 

As a preface to the description of the treatment of some

common diseases in the Ohio Valley a century or more ago, I

should like to sketch briefly the knowledge with which the phy-

sician of that period was equipped.

First, he was familiar with the gross appearance of body in

health and disease as anatomical studies were greatly stressed,

but knew little or nothing of microscopic structure of tissues. His

knowledge of physiology was meager and had scarcely any prac-

tical application. He was familiar with a multitude of symptoms

to which undue diagnostic significance was often attached. The

art of percussion had been developed and auscultation was intro-

duced in the early 'twenties, forming a basis for a more scientific

method of diagnosis. Laennec's works were translated into Eng-

lish and then appeared in American editions. Indeed, extensive

excerpts with critical commentary appeared in Daniel Drake's

Western Journal of the Medical and Physical Sciences.

As a rule the doctor served both as physician and apothecary;

he prepared many of his own crude drugs, made tinctures and

effusions, put up his own prescriptions and in addition taught

simple nursing procedures to friends or relative of his patients.

To give a general picture of the diseases of the country as

described 100 years ago, I quote freely from Nathaniel Potter

as follows:

With regard to our diseases, pleurisies, rheumatisms, and inflamma-

tions generally prevail during the winter in the northern states. Catarrh,

too, is common, and often terminates in the consumption; which may be

(211)

• 31
 

212    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

called the endemic of the country. In some districts and seasons, one

fourth in the number of deaths are from this cause. The various forms

of quinsy occur frequently; nor are local inflammations of the internal

parts of the body by any means uncommon. The eruptive diseases,--such

as the scarlet fever, the measles, &c., occur generally at the interval of

three, four, or more years:--but the smallpox, since the introduction of

the vaccine, has certainly been suppressed as far as the irregularities of

poverty, ignorance, and prejudice will permit. It is a lamentable truth,

however, that this loathsome disease is still seen in our cities. The plague,

exactly in the form which it wears in the old world, has seldom appeared in

our country. The disease of Pemphigus, and military fever, are not often

seen. Apthae and cholera, particularly among young children, appear in the

summer, when the heats are great. The nettle rash is common among the

adolescent,--but more rare in adults. Haemorrhages, both active and pas-

sive, are known in all climates of the country, and cannot perhaps be said

to belong to one district more than to another,--excepting that from the

lungs; which is not uncommon in the northern districts, and most generally

precedes the consumption. In the southernmost regions it is almost un-

known. Haemorrhoids are often an affection of the old; and perhaps,

indeed, it may be said that, with respect to this disease, as well as to others,

not immediately connected with our variable climate, we resemble the

inhabitants of Europe. With regard to the diseases peculiar to the sex

the same remark may be made.

Apoplexy and palsy are often the result of intemperate habits; in the

middle and southern states particularly. They are the diseases of which the

aged die, in the concluding months of the winter, as well as at the begin-

ning of spring or of autumn. The active habits of our countrymen render

hypochondria more rare than in Great Britain. In the northern states the

tetanus, or lockjaw, is uncommon, in summer, and never occurs in winter.

In the middle states, it is dangerous to receive a wound, particularly a

lacerated one, during the warm season, without using stimulating remedies

to prevent this dreadful disease. In the southern, it is not at all infrequent

in summer, and it sometimes occurs even in winter. In the former seasons

it often proceeds from a cause, viz., exposure to the night air, which in

the northern states is seldom or never known to produce it. Of epilepsy,

asthma, and St. Vitus's dance, there is nothing peculiar to be said with

regard to our country. Pyrosis and indigestion, are often the result of

intemperance: they are confined to no particular district, or tract; and may

be said to attack in the common forms and from the ordinary causes.

Hydrophobia appears not unfrequently; and is often symptomatic,--

though it most commonly arises from the bite of rabid animals. Madness,

indeed, may be supposed to arise in this country from the same occasional

causes, as in Europe. It appears in families and descends by hereditary

succession; often disappearing in one branch, or generation, and making

• 32
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                      213

 

its appearance again in another. Sometimes high-toned pride, intemperance,

excessive headaches or eccentricity, in a parent, becomes mania in the next

generation; while on the contrary, they leave a family in a reverse order.

Religion, love, and losses in business, may perhaps be the most frequent

causes of this disease, though from its connection with hereditary perdis-

position, it is often difficult to trace them with accuracy.

Dropsy is believed to be less common, than formerly, and is now a

very manageable disease, where the constitution is not absolutely broken.

It generally occurs among the poor, the irregular, and the intemperate.

Rickets rarely appears; though it sometimes affects the negroes, and par-

ticularly negro children. Scrofula occurs more frequently; and is gen-

erally manifested in diseased mesenteric glandular swellings, and ulcers

of the soft parts, with carious bone. With regard to the disease resulting

from impure connexion, it may be supposed, that, in a country, where

population is extended on a scale unknown in any other quarter of the

globe,--where all the delights of life highly stimulate the system, the dis-

eases of a function so intimately connected with the general health would

naturally be common. Accordingly, it may be said, that among the labour-

ing classes, particularly in the cities, there are few individuals who have

not had their constitutions seriously affected by frequent contaminations,

by injudicious exhibitions of mercury, or by suffering the malady to go

imperfectly cured or totally neglected. To give the reader a general view

of the state of the disease in our country we would say, that malignant

bilious fevers of remittent or an intermittent type, prevail most in the sum-

mer and beginning of autumn; catarrhs, pleurisies, inflammations, rheuma-

tisms, typhous fevers, in the approach and progress of winter, as well as

in the commencement of spring--and that other diseases which have been

enumerated, are regulated in their appearance by irregularity of living, by

the decay of nature, and by the other numerous and varying accidents of

life and of climate. Accordingly in the north, where winter has the sway,

the remittent fevers of the north are more mild, and the inflammations

more severe. But in the south, the contrary takes place,--the feveres being

malignant and deadly; whilst inflammations, pleurisies, catarrhs, and con-

sumptions, seldom occur or are entirely unknown. In the mild states, on

the other hand, where the climate is alternately tropical and artic, we

have, accordingly as one or the other season prevails, the malignant fevers

of the south,--or the consumption, and the inflammations of the north.

From this view of the climate and diseases of our country, it need not

be said, that various districts have various degrees of health; that the sea,

lakes, marshes, highlands, and mountainous regions diversify the tempera-

ture of the air, as well as the character of disease; that epidemics appear

in districts, for many years blessed with health; and that while there are

endemics, which never leave particular regions,--there are others at all

seasons and in all years are comparatively free from disease of any kind.

• 33
 

214   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

The Treatment of Pleurisy and Pneumonia

The diagnosis between these two conditions was not always

made clearly and the treatment was similar in each instance. John

Eberle states that "both in pleuritic and peripneumonic inflamma-

tion bleeding is the first and most important remedial means,

the extent to which it is to be carried must be entirely regulated

by the degree and obstinacy of the pains and the state of the

pulse." The same author recommends "gentle aperients" and

cautions against drastic purges; cooling diaphoretics such as

muriate of ammonia, nitrate of potash were indicated. Nauseating

doses of tartar emetic were prescribed by some in the belief that

the "undue action" of the heart and arteries were thus diminished,

expectoration increased, and absorption promoted. Calomel and

opium were given after the disease had continued for three or

four days, one grain of opium and two of calomel being ordered

every three hours until relief from the cough was obtained.

Expectorants while frequently used were not regarded as of

decisive benefit. Blisters and other methods of counter irritation

were considered to be effective methods of treatment. In pleural

effusion a combination of calomel, digitalis, and squills was widely

used. In empyema, paracentesis was recommended although the

procedure was considered by some writers to be extremely

dangerous.

Of consumption or "chronic inflammation of the substance

of the lung" George Gregory wrote in 1829 the following: "It is

melancholy to reflect how very little this disease is under the con-

trol of medicine." He advocated a less active treatment than some,

stating that "on the one hand we have to combat the actual pres-

ence of inflammation; and to bear in mind, on the other, the

danger of exhausting the constitution." On the cure of this dis-

ease he further writes:

The question has been frequently agitated whether tubercles can be

absorbed; and by what medicines that desirable object can be effected.

Emetics have been recommended by some; muriate of baryta by others;

but though there is every reason to believe that tubercles have in some

cases dispersed, yet the effect appears to be as completely out of our con-

trol as the manner of their formation is beyond our knowledge. All that

• 34
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO               215

 

can be reasonably expected from medicine is to keep them in a quiescent

state; and this is to be done by a strict attention to diet, air, exercise and

by avoiding all those causes which are likely to bring on haemorrhagy

of the lungs.

Not all authorities of the day were so rational as Gregory

however, and blisters, setons, and pustulation were advocated.

Bleeding was often done in the so-called incipient consumptive.

Likewise purgatives and emetics were used to rid the body of

"noxious material." Expectorants with opium were used to con-

trol the cough and lead acetate in doses of 4 or 5 grains each

night was given to control night sweats. A farinaceous and milk

diet was widely used, and the beneficial effects of a mild elimate

was universally noted.

 

The Treatment of Acute Bronchitis

In this condition bleeding was generally proposed only early

in the disease. Emetics, purgatives, and expectorants with external

counter irritation formed the basis of the treatment. Invariably

weak infusions of calumba, gentian, or the bark, were prescribed

during convalescence.

In chronic bronchitis in addition to the measures used in the

more acute process various inhalations such as tar fumes were in

vogue. Drugs used included prussic acid, digitalis, opium, quinine,

lead acetate, Dover powder, hyoscyamus, sulphur acid, and

mercurials.

Acute Nephritis

The diagnosis of this disease rested on the symptoms of local

pain, scanty urine, nausea and vomiting.

In this disease prompt and efficient bloodletting constituted

the primary remedy. Cupping or leeching over the lumbar region

was frequently done. Hot fomentations and vesiculation were

advocated. Purgation with calomel followed by the salines or by

castor oil was almost universally recommended. Enemas were

used. Drugs included opium, Dover's powder, uva-ursi, lime

water, and various antimonial preparations.

• 35
 

216   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

Acute Rheumatism

The usual treatment consisted in bleeding, the prescription of

purgatives, emetics and diaphoretics. Opium alone or with either

calomel, colchicine and stramonium were used. Local treatment

with heat and blisters was advised at times.

In chronic rheumatism bloodletting was not commonly done.

The medical treatment was much the same as in the acute form.

Local rubefacients were usually used.

 

Diabetes

Concerning this disease Gregory in 1829 wrote, "Where

pathology is obscure the principles of treatment are necessarily

deficient." In 1776 Dr. John Rollo of England proposed a diet

consisting wholly of animal food and it was noted that there was

a marked reduction in the quantity of urine voided and an im-

provement in many of the symptoms of the disease. However

bloodletting and cupping were considered by many to be neces-

sary. Opium and cinchona were widely used as also various

mineral waters.

Fevers

The diseases which we now know as malaria, typhoid and

typhus fevers (and probably septicema), were responsible for a

large number of deaths and a great deal of disability. They were

known variously as periodical fevers (intermittent, remittent),

and continued fevers.

In the periodical or malarial fevers bloodletting was advised

during the so-called hot stage; cupping also was commonly done.

Purgatives were given at the onset, but the recognized remedy

was cinchona and its preparations. Unfortunately in the first part

of the century the cost of quinine in the United States was almost

prohibitive and the preparations of cinchona varied in alkaloidal

strength so that the latter was not entirely reliable. Other reme-

dies were opium, the bark of dogwood, the bark of the horse-

chestnut, the bark of different oaks, calumba, quassia and gentian.

• 36
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              217

 

The black or cellar spider's web was recommended as a remedy

for intermittent fever. Arsenic and zinc were often used in con-

junction with cinchona. Tartar emetic was regarded as a cure in

some quarters. There was a great deal of difference in the method

of use of cinchona and quinine. Some advocated small doses,

such as two or three grains of the quinine, hourly, others gave

fifteen to twenty grains at a dose repeating in six to twelve hours.

One author, Dr. Perrine, in the Western Journal of the Medical

and Physical Sciences for 1833, wrote, "The medium dose of the

sulphate of quinine at any period of fever from its incipient to

its terminating symptoms is ten grains to be repeated every two

hours, whatever the state of the pulse and skin."

Eberle bases the treatment of the typhoid fevers on the re-

quirements:

1. To diminish the general momentum of the circulation.

2. To restore the natural actions of the various excretory

organs--above all those of the skin, liver, and kidney.

3. To equalize circulation and obviate local determination.

4. To remove from and out of the system, as far as may

be practicable, everything which has a tendency to irritate or

unduly excite the system.

 

To meet these indications Eberle recommends bloodletting

the use of such purgatives as the saline (sulphates of magnesia

and soda) or jalap and cream of tartar. Diaphoretics such as nitre

and antimony were advised and small doses of calomel and ipecac

and mucilaginous drinks were frequently given. Digitalis--one-

fourth to one-half grain every two hours--was administered until

the pulse was appreciably slowed. The diet consisted in demulcent

drinks, weak broths, barley or toast water, and during con-

valescence tonics.

Scarlet Fever

As an example of the treatment of this disease I quote from

a letter by Dr. George E. Conant of Windham, Portage County,

to Dr. Daniel Drake, March 20, 1833, as follows:

• 37
 

218    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

In the commencement, I prescribed a cathartic of equal parts by

measure of jalap, sulphur, and cream of tartar. If the arterial action was

high and the skin hot, I made use of tepid affusions to the body and

extremities, with cold water and vinegar to the head. The external appli-

cation to the throat was flannel clothes wet in a strong decoction of red

pepper and vinegar. To those of the greatest severity, I made use of

mustard poultices, and plasters of cantharides with benefit. Internally the

mouth and fauces were gargled frequently with a decoction of blackberry

briar root, to which borax was added, and made sweet with honey. In the

most severe cases, myrrh, cayenne pepper and brandy were made use of

with the happiest effects. As expectorants, antimonial wine and vinegar of

squills were found to be of great service. But the remedy on which I placed

the greatest reliance, was a powder composed of carbonate of ammonia

and nitre. When the fever was the highest, and in the first stage of the

disease, I gave a greater portion of nitre with the addition of a little

ipecac; but as the fever began to subside the ipecac was entirely and the

nitre gradually withdrawn, while the ammonia was increased, and camphor

added, which were given freely during the remainder of the illness. Some

mild aperiento, such as magnesia and rhubarb or castor oil, was admin-

istered daily, if necessary, to keep the bowels loose and open. When the

fever began to abate, I found superior advantage from the application of

bass-wood leaves wilted in warm water to the surface generally. They

produced a gentle perspiration, and broke up the fever at once. As soon as

the favrile action was gone, a decoction of cinchona, orange peel and

chammovaile flowers was given with advantages. For drinks I made use

of milk and water, toast and water, apple water and hot tea, as best suited

the patient. Rubefacients were applied to the feet throughout the disease.

• 38
 

MEDICAL JOURNALS OF PIONEER DAYS

 

By JONATHAN FORMAN, M.D.

 

We are going back today to a time "when entrance into our

profession was largely through apprenticeship, when operations

were done without anesthesia and without antiseptics, when mis-

takes in diagnosis, errors in judgment or lack of dexterity in

operating were published with every accompaniment of insult

and derision which malice could suggest, when nursing in hos-

pitals was done by women of the charwomen class, when the

study of anatomy depended upon the activities of the resurrec-

tionists, when cholera, typhus, and hydrophobia were ever-present

realities, when phrenology was called a science and there still

lingered a belief in the possibility human beings undergoing spon-

taneous combustion."

At about the beginning of the epoch under discussion here

today, there occurred a great impetus within the profession to

spread its ideas by means of periodicals. About 1790, the first

medical journal in the United States appeared. It was called

A Journal of the Practice of Medicine and Surgery and Pharmacy

in the Military Hospitals of France and contained merely transla-

tions from the French journals of military medicine. The first

real American medical journal was The Medical Repository (New

York), begun in 1797 and discontinued in 1824. Its pages were

filled with descriptions of the prevalent diseases. Its twenty-first

volume presented a series of articles on the "summer epidemic

of Yellow-fever" and its eighteenth volume presented a systematic

study of the "Winter Epidemic" of 1812-13-14 and -15.

In 1812, the New England Medical and Surgical Journal

began its existence under the sponsorship of John Collins War-

ren and James Jackson.

(219)

• 39
 

220   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

Most of the new medical journals, as was to be expected,

sprung up along the Atlantic seaboard in the larger cities there.

New York produced more than a score, then came Philadelphia

to be followed by Boston and Baltimore. Later, as settlement took

place west of the Alleghenies, they began to appear in the ex-

pected centers, Lexington first and then Cincinnati. At first a

prominent physician and teacher would enter into an agreement

with a publisher to prepare for him a medical journal. In a few

instances, a group of physicians would form an association and

the effort of editing and publishing a medical journal would be

cooperative.

In 1820, The Philadelphia Journal of Medical and Physical

Sciences was founded as a quarterly under the editorship of Dr.

Nathaniel Chapman, professor of institutes and practice of physic

and of clinical medicine in the University of Pennsylvania. In

1824, Dr. William P. Dewes and Dr. John Goodman joined the

staff. In 1827, Dr. Isaac Hays also was added to the staff and

the name was changed to The American Journal of Medical

Science which name is still used today.

About 1819, the first secret Greek letter medical society of

Lambda Kappa was formed by that visionary professor of medi-

cine at Transylvania in Lexington, Kentucky, Dr. Samuel Brown,

with the purpose of promptly raising the professional standards

without consulting the doctors themselves. In 1826 the society

secretly founded the North American Medical and Surgical

Journal in Philadelphia. With its distinguished group of editors,

it maintained comparatively high standards of medical journalism

but went out of existence when its sponsoring society fell into

disrepute.

Around 1820, Transylvania University put literally hundreds

of its medical graduates into the communities of the Middle West.

Many of these alumni, later no doubt, subscribed to The Transyl-

vania Journal of Medicine and Surgery (Lexington, Ky.) which

began in 1828, because when the cholera threatened in 1832, we

find the newspapers of central and southern Ohio filled with

what these alumni had learned by a visit to Lexington and with

• 40
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO             221

 

reprints from the Lexington Journal, about the prevention and

treatment of cholera.

So, too, the physicians of the Western Reserve had come from

the schools of New England and more especially from the schools

of western New York and it was but natural that they should

subscribe to the journals from Boston and New York. Many of

the physicians in central Ohio came with settlers from Pennsyl-

vania and if they had attended a medical college, it was the Uni-

versity of Pennsylvania and so they were likely, if they subscribed

at all, to take a journal from Philadelphia..

Ohio's first medical journal was The Ohio Medical Reposi-

tory, a semi-monthly begun in 1826 by Dr. Guy W. Wright and

Dr. James M. Mason. Both being western graduates and intensely

patriotic with everything pertaining to the western country, their

ambition was to give the profession a western medical journal

edited by and for western doctors. Mason retired after one year.

Dr. Daniel Drake taking his place, the magazine became a monthly

under the title The Western Medical and Physical Journal, origi-

nal and eclectic. Drake soon became the sole owner and editor and

issued it under the new name of The Western Journal of the

Medical and Physical Sciences.

In 1839, Drake took the journal with him to Louisville where

it was subsequently combined with the Louisville Journal of Medi-

cine and Surgery. Drake's contributions included case reports,

papers on pathology, and the treatment of special diseases as well

as essays and comments on medical education.

It was not long until medical journalism in this country was

in its development closely related to the growth of medical

schools. As the various medical colleges sprang up, it became a

necessary part of the equipment to have a medical journal asso-

ciated directly or indirectly with the faculty. In almost every

instance, the outstanding figure on each faculty started a medical

journal to serve himself, his school, his faculty, and their alumni.

The medical faculty of the University of Pennsylvania had been

organized in 1765 and the college which is now the Medical

School of Columbia University in 1767. In 1785, Harvard opened

its medical college. These three institutions were all the medical

• 41
 

222   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

schools that there were when the Northwest Territory was estab-

lished. From that time on until the end of the period under dis-

cussion--1835--there were established some twenty-six more col-

leges and with them came many new medical journals.

As historical documents, these journals are of great impor-

tance because they depict the interests of the profession. The

usual make-up was first "Original Communications." Here were

set forth case reports or case studies, descriptions of prevalent

diseases, and local botanical surveys. Next came reprints from

other medical journals here and abroad. Very often this grew to

be the largest department of each issue. Of it, a critical commit-

tee of the American Medical Association, as late as 1849, said,

"The committee has been struck with the fact, that the same

articles have been presented over and over again to the notice, in

many different periodicals, each borrowing from its neighbors

the best papers of the last preceding number, so that the perusal

of many is not so much laborious than that of a single one, as

would be expected. The ring of editors sit in each other's laps,

with perfect propriety and great convenience." One must not take

this criticism too much to heart. Discoveries were rare. The read-

ers had few books and no other journals. They were interested in

practical things and wanted help in their daily tasks. The postal

rates and regulations of the day pretty much confined the circula-

tion to a very limited distance. As the third department in the

make-up of one of these journals, came book reviews. These, too,

often were not reviews but lengthy exhibitions of the opinions

of the reviewer. Finally, the last section dealt with news, items

from medical colleges, and societies, an occasional editorial and in

some instances literary excursions and comments on current

reforms.

When one considers that twenty-five cents was about the

professional fee for a journey from downtown Columbus through

almost impassable roads to Alum Creek for a house call, it will be

seen that a subscription rate of from $1.50 to $5.00 made these

journals rather expensive to the physician of that day. Conse-

quently many doctors did not take even one but relied upon a few

texts for their information. That such was the case, is borne out

• 42
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                223

by an editorial statement in the Boston Medical and Surgical

Journal, "There is not a profitable medical journal in this country

and what is more surprising there never was one." Dean John

Butterfield of the Starling Medical College writing editorially

of these times in his journal in 1848 described the preceptor-

trained physician of these days:

A very considerable proportion of the practitioners of medicine in our

state never received a regular medical education ... Some of them entered

a physician's office and after studying, from a few months to two or three

years, perhaps Bell's Anatomy and Thomas' or Eberle's Practice more or

less, started out with a certificate from their preceptor, hoisted their

"shingle" in some backward settlement and was, thenceforth, past all

redemption or recall dubbed "DOCTORS".

As American medical journalism grew older, it fell more and

more into the hands of medical educators who gave increasing

space to the trends in medical education. To these, they added

attacks upon quackery and advocacy of adequate organization

and legal protection. They conducted frequent surveys to show

the comparative state of the profession as to numbers in relation

to the total population, fees, and education. "It is," as Henry B.

Shafer says, "noteworthy that the magazines, even more than the

colleges, were instrumental in fostering the medical convention

which led to the formation of the American Medical Association."

Of all of the medical journals brought out in this period,

two were alive by 1850 and they have continued to the present

day. They were The American Journal of Medical Science and

The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal.

Thus as Ohio and the western country were settled, there

arose medical publications of a varying degree of worth but with

each decade they were more scientific than in the preceding one.

Beginning with the next epoch in Ohio's medical history, Ohio

medical journalism became something more extensive, more inter-

esting and more worth while.

• 43
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS AND THEIR PARTICIPATION

IN THE ESTABLISHMENT OF SOCIAL

INSTITUTIONS IN OHIO

 

 

By ROBERT G. PATERSON, Ph.D.

 

Participation of the pioneer physicians in the establishment

of social institutions in Ohio during the period 1788-1835 was

sporadic, without long term vision and was born of the immediate

necessities of the times. Almost without exception, such partici-

pation was confined to a few outstanding medical men. They were,

as a rule, men of strong individual personalities and born leaders.

In the period under discussion the names of four medical

men stand out from the rank and file of the profession--Daniel

Drake, M.D. (1785-1852) of Cincinnati, who has so many "firsts"

attached to his activities that he has been called with entire justice

the "Colossus of the Medical Profession of the West," and

William Maclay Awl, M.D. (1799-1876), Samuel Parsons, M.D.

(1786-1857), and Robert Thompson, M.D. (1797-1865), all of

Columbus.

Ohio Penitentiary

The first state institution in Ohio was the penitentiary. An act

of the General Assembly passed January 27, 1815, and effective

the following August 1, provided that the punishment for larceny

should be imprisonment in the penitentiary. It provided that the

offender, upon conviction of the larceny of the value of ten dol-

lars and upward, should be imprisoned in the penitentiary at hard

labor not more than seven years nor less than one year. This

institution was a part of the basic agreement between the state

of Ohio and a private company which agreed to erect the neces-

sary buildings as a part of other considerations for the establish-

ment of the seat of the state government at Columbus. So far as

(224)

• 44
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                      225

 

we have been able to ascertain no influence of any medical man

appears in connection with this institution.1

Cincinnati

About the same time in the year 1815 a hospital was estab-

lished in Cincinnati by the township trustees for the accommoda-

tion of sick and indigent persons. It was a rented house on Vine

Street above Sixth Street and was ill-adapted for its purpose and

passed out of existence in 1821.2

Commercial Hospital and Lunatic Asylum

On January 22, 1821, the General Assembly of Ohio passed

an act establishing a commercial hospital and lunatic asylum for

the state of Ohio. Drake created this institution almost single-

handed. It was a direct outgrowth of his activities in establishing

the Medical College of Ohio.3

At the very beginning of the first session of the Medical

College of Ohio in 1820 Drake prepared the bill

and laid it before the township trustees of Cincinnati. The trustees agreed

to the bill and cooperated with Drake in his appeal to the General Assembly.

Serving in the General Assembly was William H. Harrison, future Presi-

dent of the United States and a loyal friend of Drake who gave yeoman

service to the proposal.⁴ Governor Ethan Allen Brown of Ohio, also lent

his aid. Drake came to Columbus and after a month of laborious explana-

tion and personal effort the bill became a law. The state, having in view

the relief of her sick boatmen, gave a small sum of money to assist in the

erection of a house, and pledged, forever, half the auction duties of the

city of Cincinnati toward the support of the patients. The township

was to supply the remainder, and the professors of the college were to be

its medical and surgical attendants, with the privilege of introducing their

pupils for clinical instruction; the fees of admission were to constitute

a fund for the purchase of chemical apparatus, anatomical preparations

and books for the college.

To him [Drake] the two institutions were really one. They were

 

1 Jacob Studer, Columbus, Ohio, Its History, Resources and Progress (Columbus,

0., 1878), 368.

2 Otto Juettner, Daniel Drake and His Followers (Cincinnati, O., 1909), 398.

3 Ibid., 399.

4 A. C. Bachmeyer, "The Hospitals of Cincinnati during the Past Century," Uni-

versity of Cincinnati, Medical Bulletin (Cincinnati, O., 1920-), I, no. 1 (Nov. 1920),

27.

• 45
 

226    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

mutually dependent upon each other, and contributed, in their united ca-

pacity to the promotion of medical science and the relief of human suffering.

Drake was far ahead of his time in his estimation of hospital instruc-

tion as a necessary part of medical education. In discussing this subject

before the class he spoke as follows:

"And here allow me to say, that all the tendencies of the age are to

the study of medicine and surgery in hospitals. In the arrangement for the

session now opened, the faculty have made ample provision for clinical

teaching, by assigning each alternate afternoon to the hospital. . . ."

The original Commercial Hospital and Lunatic Asylum of

Ohio was a combination of a hospital, an insane asylum, an

infirmary, a poorhouse and an orphanage. It was the parent

institution from which sprang the Orphan Asylum, the City

Infirmary, the Cincinnati Hospital and Longview Hospital for

the Insane.

Cincinnati Eye Infirmary

In 1827, Dr. Daniel Drake opened on Third Street between

Main and Walnut Streets, the Cincinnati Eye Infirmary in con-

junction with Dr. Jedediah Cobb. This institution became the

clinical department of the Medical Department of the Cincinnati

College in June 27, 1835, and continued as such until 1839 when

the Commercial Hospital was thrown open, by an act of the Gen-

eral Assembly, to students in both the Medical College of Ohio

and Cincinnati College.5

At the Medical State Convention held in Columbus, Decem-

ber 10, 18276 we find Dr. Drake seeking support from his peers.

He sent a memorial to the meeting "praying for countenance and

support to an institution recently established by him, called the

'Cincinnati Eye Infirmary.'"

The convention adopted unanimously the following resolu-

tion:--

Resolved, That this Convention highly approves the foundation and

objects of the Cincinnati Eye Infirmary, established by and now under the

direction of Daniel Drake, M.D., and believe this gentleman is qualified in

an imminent [sic] degree, to superintend an establishment of this kind,

 

5 Juettner, Daniel Drake, 58, 186.

6 Medical State Convention, Proceedings . . . begun and Held in the Town of

Columbus, December 10, 1827 (Zanesville, O., 1828), 2.

• 46
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                227

 

and do therefore recommend it to the favorable consideration of the public

and the patronage of the Legislature.

Ohio School for the Deaf

The next state institution to be established was the Deaf and

Dumb Asylum which was made possible by an act of the General

Assembly in 1827. The school was opened October 16, 1829, in a

small building rented for the purpose at the northwest corner of

High and Broad Streets. In 1834 it was removed to its present

location on East Town Street.

No mention of this subject is to be found in the proceedings

of the medical conventions of 1827 or 1829. But official records

reveal the interest of the medical profession in that several phy-

sicians served on the board of trustees of the institution: Dr.

Lincoln Goodale, Columbus, 1830-1835; Dr. Samuel Parsons,

Columbus, 1830-1838; and Dr. Robert Thompson, Columbus,

1832-1849.⁷

Ohio School for the Blind

While the Ohio School for the Blind was not founded by an

act of the General Assembly until 1837 yet the agitation for such

an institution had its beginnings in the sessions of the medical

convention in 1835.

At the first session of "a Convention of Physicians of Ohio"

held in Columbus, January 5-7, 1835, a resolution was adopted

"that Dr. Daniel Drake be requested to deliver an address on the

subject of the Instruction of the Blind, tomorrow (Wednesday)

evening, at half past 6 o'clock, and that both Houses of the Legis-

lature of Ohio be respectfully invited to attend."⁸

Contemporary newspaper accounts indicate that Drake cov-

ered the subject with his characteristic thoroughness and fervor.

He introduced a resolution in the convention which "Resolved,

That a committee of three members be appointed to prepare a

report and resolutions on the subject of a school for the Educa-

tion of the Blind, to be established by the Legislature of Ohio in

 

7 E. Howard Gilkey, The Ohio Hundred Year Book (Columbus, O., 1901), 710-11.

8 Medical Convention of Ohio, Journal of the Proceedings of a Convention of

Physicians of Ohio Held in the City of Columbus (Cincinnati, 0., 1835), 7.

• 47
 

228    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

the City of Columbus." Upon adoption of the resolution the presi-

dent, Dr. Peter Allen, appointed Doctors Drake, D. W. Rhodes

of Muskingum County, and Samuel Parsons to serve on the

committee.⁹

As chairman of the committee Drake submitted a report

which estimated the number of blind persons in the state at 500

as a minimum, or one for every 2000 inhabitants. The committee,

he said, was "decidedly of the opinion, that it is the duty of the

state to create an institution, where the permanently blind may

receive that instruction which will enable them to participate more

extensively in the enjoyments of society; provide for their own

support, and fit themselves for a state of happy future existence."

After pointing out the peculiar methods of instruction, their

practicability and their expensive nature, he then concludes that

the task can be accomplished and that the blind may learn with

equal facility as those not deprived of their sight; that they can

be taught useful mechanical and musical arts.

In the opinion of the committee, these views only, should induce the

General Assembly to extend its fostering arm over these children of mis-

fortune; but there is a different aspect in which the subject may be pre-

sented. From the difficulty under which the poorer classes of society do

now and must forever labor, in obtaining early and efficient medical aid,

a large proportion of the blind in every community, belong to that order in

society. Many of these bereaved and pitiable members of the community

are, therefore, perpetually sinking into pauperism, and becoming permanent

charges upon the townships, while if they were taught some profitable

mechanical occupation, they would be able to support themselves.

The report then reviews acts of Congress and the state of

Ohio to provide for the financial support of free popular educa-

tion and concludes that "the blind, at the present time, enjoy no

participation in these public provisions, although in equity they

are entitled to an equal, in charity to a larger, share, than other

children; and hence their claims rest on the broad foundations

of justice and humanity."¹⁰

Following the discussions before the convention in January

 

 

9 Ibid., 6.

10 Ibid., 14-16.

• 48
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              229

 

the General Assembly of Ohio on March 11, 1836, appointed a

board of trustees, consisting of Rev. James Hoge, a minister;

N. H. Swayne, a lawyer, and Dr. William Maclay Awl, a phy-

sician, to collect information relative to the education of the blind

in letters and mechanical arts. The information collected was

communicated to the legislature, in December, 1836, in a very

elaborate report. The act establishing the institution was passed

April 3, 1837. Fifteen thousand dollars were appropriated for the

erection of suitable buildings, and ten thousand dollars for the

purchase of books and apparatus.

In passing, it may be proper to observe that the entire pro-

ceedings from the time Drake initiated the idea to its final con-

clusion is a model of logical, effective and swift action. The Ohio

School for the Blind is directly traceable to the medical profes-

sion of Ohio.

Central Ohio Asylum for Lunatics

Much the same course of events applies to the central Ohio

Asylum for Lunatics (now the Columbus State Hospital) as has

been recounted in connection with the establishment of the School

for the Blind. In the same "Convention of Physicians of Ohio," in

1835, Dr. Robert Thompson introduced the following resolution

which was adopted unanimously: "Resolved, That a committee

of five be appointed to inquire into the expediency of memorial-

izing the Legislature of Ohio upon the subject of a Lunatic Asy-

lum, and make report thereon."

The committee appointed consisted of Dr. Robert Thompson,

Franklin County; Dr. Edwin W. Smith, Montgomery County;

Dr. William Maclay Awl, Franklin County; Dr. John Eberle and

Dr. Thomas D. Mitchell, Hamilton County.11

The report of the committee which was adopted unanimously

was in the nature of a memorial addressed to the General As-

sembly of Ohio. A preamble stated:

Humanity and the character of the state of Ohio, call imperiously for

the erection of an Asylum that will be creditable to the State, and in all

 

 

11 Ibid., 6.

• 49
 

230   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

respects adapted to the relief and care of mental derangement. On this

topic, it is believed that no diversity of opinion obtains in the medical

profession; and under these impressions, the Committee beg leave to submit

for your consideration the following memorial to the Legislature now in

session.¹²

It was estimated by the committee that there were between

600 and 1000 insane persons in the state without proper care and

means of recovery. After citing the inadequacy of the "Com-

mercial Hospital and Lunatic Asylum" at Cincinnati and its

inconvenient location so far as the remainder of the state was

concerned, the committee recommended that the institution be

located in Columbus as more centrally accessible to the entire

state.

Again we see the smooth consummation of an idea. The legis-

lature passed an act March 5, 1835, organizing the "Lunatic Asy-

lum of Ohio" and Drs. Samuel Parsons and William Maclay Awl

of Columbus together with General Samuel F. McCracken of

Lancaster were appointed directors. In July, 1835, thirty acres

of land were purchased for a site and a building was erected at

a cost of about $61,000.00. On May 21, 1838, Awl was elected

medical superintendent by the trustees and the first patient was

received on November 30, 1838.

Here then, is another social institution, directly traceable to

the activities of the medical profession of Ohio. In the intervening

years this institution has grown into a net-work of similar institu-

tions over the state. The interest of the pioneer physicians of the

state in the creation and establishment of social institutions never

flagged. Throughout the proceedings of the medical conventions

of Ohio whenever the meetings were held in Columbus there is

constant reference to acceptance of invitations to visit the Ohio

Penitentiary, the schools for the Deaf and the Blind and the State

Hospital.

And the outstanding leaders in this direction were Dr. Dan-

iel Drake, Dr. William Maclay Awl, Dr. Samuel Parsons and Dr.

Robert Thompson. And the greatest of these was Dr. Daniel

Drake.

 

12 Ibid., 25.

• 50
 

THE PART THAT THE PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF

OHIO PLAYED IN THE COMMUNITY AS

EXEMPLIFIED IN THE CHURCH AND LODGE

 

By JAMES J. TYLER, M.D.

 

The church has had an important place in the development

of the frontier. The first forty years of religious development in

Ohio is full of absorbing interest and vital realities. It produced

permanent results in the establishment of our Commonwealth.

The minister of the Gospel, the lawyer, the teacher and the doctor

comprised the educated element of the community and were gen-

erally admired and respected. At one time or another on his lonely

travels, the doctor visited every household however remote and so

came to know the people perhaps better than any others. The more

the lives of these men are held up to view, the more sterling quali-

ties we find to admire.

The period under discussion witnessed the dawning of a new

era and the twilight of a rapidly disappearing old order. The past

was represented by those staunch followers of Jonathan Edwards

who still dinned into the ears of man the religious ideas and

tenets of Calvinism. In contradistinction to this rather dismal

philosophy the new order proclaimed that man should seek a full

and wholesome life, make the most of his opportunities, and en-

deavor to enlarge the bounds of human knowledge and achieve-

ment.

"Every frontier in America has been a frontier in emotional-

ism as well as in geography." In western New York, into which

the stream of immigration began to pour contemporaneously with

the movements toward the Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee coun-

try, religion filled this emotional vacuum in the life and mind

of the community. The frontier had barely begun to assume

(231)

• 51
 

232    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

definite outlines before revivalism came into this region and

within a short space of time there were concocted many weird

and strange institutions. Here developed Milleritism, the brain

child of William Miller, who went about preaching the end of the

world in 1833. Here the Fox sisters had been able to establish

contact with departed spirits. Here, too, Joseph Smith at Palmyra,

had been given revelations by the Angel Moroni, and, climbing

Commorrah Hill, had discovered the Book of Mormon.

The first generation of Ohio was drawn from all parts of the older

colonies. The New Englander settled at Marietta and upon the lands of

the Ohio Company; men from Virginia peopled the country between the

Little Miami and the Scioto; New Jersey men made their homes upon the

Symmes tract; the Pennsylvanians poured over into the "Seven Ranges";

and the Connecticut and New York farmers flocked into the Western

Reserve.1

The Ordinance of 1787 provided that both religion and liberty

should be cherished. Here were Congregationalists, Presbyterians,

Episcopalians, Baptists, Methodists, New   Lights, Campbellites,

Mormons, Shakers and Quakers. The Great Revival which began

among the Presbyterians in Kentucky in 1800 soon spread to the

southern and eastern portions of Ohio. In later years it found its

best expression in the camp-meetings of the Methodists. It was

marked with great emotionalism.

The shouts of the preacher were followed by sobs and cries from the

audience, and men and women fell to the ground in hysterics, or were

dashed from place to place in a series of frightful yet ludicrus contortions

known as "the jerks." When a person was seized by "the jerks" the head

was wrenched from side to side with such velocity that the features became

indiscernible. Brawny backwoodsmen who came to scoff at the "jerkers"

were by some unknown power hurled cursing from the spot, and only

gained control of themselves after an involuntary dance had carried them

sometimes a great distance.²

The unemotional character of religion in the Western Re-

serve was due to the missionary activities of conservative Con-

gregationalists and Presbyterians. Rev. Joseph Badger, pioneer

 

1 E. O. Randall and D. J. Ryan, History of Ohio (New York, 1912) III, 8.

2 Alexander Black, The Story of Ohio (Boston, 1888), 188.

• 52
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                     233

 

Congregational missionary to the Western Reserve in the course

of his missionary tours, sometimes traveled outside the Reserve

where he had much opportunity to study this religious emotion-

alism. In the course of a journey to Washington County, Penn-

sylvania, he records the following:

The first Sabbath in . . . June [1803], the sacrament was attended at

Pigeon Creek Church, at which there was a very large assembly. There

was present a medical gentleman who was an unbeliever in the Christian

religion; but wished to gratify his curiosity. He took his seat in a pretty

conspicuous place, and was well known to most of the people. Soon after

the preaching commenced Dr. H. began to feel himself in some danger

of falling with others; he immediately started to go away; got about half

way through an opening and fell on the ground, and cried out, "Carry me

away! carry me away!" Three or four men took him up and carried him

to a suitable distance, and sat down with him on the ground.

He was all in a tremor, unable to support himself, and shook sur-

prisingly; but appeared to possess his mind fully; says to the men, "what

does this mean? I have cut off limbs, and taken up arteries, with as steady

a hand as any man ever did; and now I can not hold these hands still if I

might have the world. 0, it must be the power of God   Carry me back

where I can hear." He became hopefully pious, was elected an Elder in

that church, and lived and died a hopeful Christian.3

Much crudity and lack of refined religious expression would be found

it is true [writes R. C. Downes⁴ in his Frontier Ohio], but although the

stammering of frontier tongues and the excessive emotion of frontier hearts

make up the darker and more pathetic side of a phase of American thought,

they have been too often held up to ridicule, and too little understood.

The following notes show that many of the early physicians

were active in the work of the various denominations.

Dr. Jabez True (1760-1823), Ohio's first resident physician,

was a member and a deacon of the Congregational Church of

Marietta.

Concerning    Dr. Samuel Prescott Hildreth         (1783-1863),

Marietta, Ohio, it was said that "he was exact in all his dealings,

an honest man, and a Christian."

Dr. Isaac Swift (1788-1861), of Ravenna, was for forty

years treasurer of the First Congregational Church.

 

3 Joseph Badger, A Memoir . . . Containing an Autobiography and Selections

from His Private Journal and Correspondence (Hudson, O., 1851), 51-2.

4 R. C. Downes, Frontier Ohio (Columbus, 1935), 88.

• 53
 

234   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

Dr. William Judkins (1788-1861) began the practice of medi-

cine in Jefferson County. He was by birth a member of the Society

of Friends, and remained during his life in that connection, con-

forming to its customs in dress and language.

Dr. Samuel McAdow, pioneer physician of Chillicothe was a

devout Methodist and one of the founders of the society there.

Dr. Peter Allen (1787-1864), Kinsman, Ohio, was past

president of the State Medical Association. An obituary notice

said of him that he was an active church member and that a short

time prior to his death had been a lay delegate to the Presbyterian

General Assembly held at Dayton, Ohio.

Dr. Lincoln Goodale (1782-1868), Columbus, Ohio, was one

of the incorporators of the First Presbyterian Society of Colum-

bus, June 20, 1821.

Dr. John Delamater (1787-1867) was one of the organizers

of the Cleveland Medical College. "Religion in him was the under-

lying and controlling element, and with all his native resource and

acquired skill, he recognized his implicit dependence upon divine

support in common duties."

Dr. E. W. Cowels (1794-1861) studied with Dr. O. K.

Hawley, of Austinburg, Ashtabula County; practiced in Portage

County, Cleveland, and in Detroit, Michigan, "staunch abolitionist

and a member of the Congregational Church."

Dr. Asa Coleman (1788-1870) was prominent in establishing

the Trinity Episcopal Church in Troy, was elected the first senior

warden in 1830.

Dr. Bass Rawson was born in 1799 and was one of five broth-

ers who removed from Massachusetts at an early day and settled

in Ohio, four of them being physicians. In 1829, Dr. Rawson

settled in Findlay, the first practicing physician that had arrived

in the town. He was a member of the Presbyterian Church.

Dr. Storm Rosa (1791-1864), Painesville, Ohio. Educated in

the old school of medicine, he practiced according to that school

until 1841. He was one of the earliest pioneers of homeopathy in

Ohio. His views on religious matters were tinged, during the

greater part of his life, with scepticism, but before his death he

sent for a minister of the Episcopal Church, who administered

• 54
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              235

 

the sacraments to him, and he died after a short illness, in com-

munion with that church.

Dr. Nathan McIntosh (1768-1823) practiced at Marietta and

the surrounding territory. When first married the doctor and his

wife were members of the Presbyterian Church. Afterwards he

joined the Methodist Society; finally he came to believe in uni-

versal salvation and held that belief until the end. He lectured and

wrote a great deal on religious subjects and published a book on

Scripture Correspondences.

Dr. John Cotton (1792-1847) arrived at Marietta in 1815

and began the practice of medicine. In the course of the ensuing

year he entered zealously into the enterprise of establishing Sab-

bath Schools and thenceforward filled constantly the role of

spiritual teacher and guide. In order to acquire the needed ability,

he took up the study of Hebrew at forty years of age and within

a short time was able to read in the original tongue.

Dr. Michael Z. Kreider (1803-1855), of Lancaster, Ohio,

"was a true type of the self-made man, a physician and surgeon

of acknowledged ability throughout the State, who still found time

to devote to the healing of souls as a local preacher."

Dr. Peter Smith (1755-1816), was author of the first west-

ern work on materia medica, The Indian Doctor's Dispensatory,

printed at Cincinnati by Browne and Looker in 1813. Dr. Smith

was the grandfather of General J. Warren Keifer, and the son

of Dr. Hezekiah Smith, and was educated at Princeton and later

studied medicine with his father. He was born in Wales and came

with his father to New Jersey. His death occurred at Donnelsville,

Clark County, Ohio. He was a devout Baptist and after emigrat-

ing to Ohio, settled on Duck Creek, near the Columbia Old Bap-

tist Church, now adjacent to Norwood Village. Shortly after his

arrival in Ohio in the year 1794, he and his family became mem-

bers of the congregation and he frequently preached there and at

other frontier places, still pursuing the double occupation of farm-

ing and the practice of medicine.5

Dr. Edward Tiffin (1766-1829), first Governor of Ohio, was

 

 

5 Lloyd Library, Bulletin (Cincinnati, 1900-) no. 2 (1901).

• 55
 

236    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

reared in the Church of England but in 1790 he and his wife

united with the Methodist Church. He was consecrated a lay

preacher and on occasions performed the functions of that office.

He retired from the practice of his profession as a physician in

1812.

Rev. Joseph Doddridge (1769-1826), first clergyman of the

Episcopal Church to preach regularly and continuously in Ohio,

was not only a minister but a physician as well.

An interesting comment on the combined professions of

minister and physician is found in an article, "Medical Ohio"⁶ by

Dr. David Tod Gilliam, which in part states:

The awakening of the medical profession of Ohio, at or about the

middle of the 19th century, is reflected in the president's address to the

Ohio Medical Society for the year 1860. He felicitates them on the large

and constantly increasing attendance, the quality and high character of

work accomplished; deprecates the avoricious tendency of the times, which

lures the doctor into other callings in association with medicine, and speak-

ing of those who essay to practice medicine and preach the Gospel, he

says: "I should be loth to trust either my body or soul in their keeping."

In that strange combination of doctor, carpenter and preacher, the carpenter

being also the coffin-maker, one can imagine the doctor "Curing" the patient

till he dies, the carpenter boxing and labeling the remains and the preacher

launching him into the Great Beyond with appropriate word and ceremony.

The pioneer physicians had respect for religious matters and

often were religious leaders in their respective communities.

 

*  *  *

It has been said that "Masonry follows the flag." The de-

velopment of the Northwest Territory and the state of Ohio

proved no exception. Here its early lodges helped to displace the

loneliness of pioneer life and in them Freemasons found brother-

hood and companionship as they played their part in the westward

march of the Nation. The first lodge of the order was organized

at Marietta, June 25, 1790. On that date, American Union Lodge,

one of ten military lodges which served through the Revolutionary

War, was reorganized there. Among the early medical members of

 

6 D. T. Gilliam, "Medical Ohio." in Randall and Ryan, History of Ohio, V.

171-2.

• 56
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                237

 

American Union Lodge were: Jabez True (1760-1823); John

Baptiste Regnier (1769-1821); William    Pitt Putnam    (1770-

1800); and Nathan McIntosh (1768-1863).

The following communication written by Dr. McIntosh is an

indication of the spirit of the times:

 

To THE WORSHIPFUL MASTER OF THE AMERICAN UNION LODGE, NO. 1,

AT MARIETTA, WITHIN THE FEDERAL TERRITORY:

WORSHIPFUL--While the first ray of real light which I have received

is a predominant inducement for me to endeavor to behold, if possible, the

full luster of that resplendent luminary which ever enlightened the east;

while the necessary avocations of life make it incompatible for me to con-

tinue longer in this place, I have only hereby to request that a special

lodge be called this evening, at my expense, for the purpose of receiving

that further instruction which is nearest the heart of every true Mason.

I am Worshipful Brother, with fraternal affection, yours sincerely,

NATHAN MCINTOSH.

On September 2, 1791, a warrant was granted for a lodge at

Cincinnati by the Grand Lodge of New Jersey, the lodge to be

known as Nova Caesarea Lodge No. 10. The lodge, however,

was not organized until December 27, 1794. The Worshipful

Master designated in the warrant was Dr. William Burnet, a

brother of Judge Jacob Burnet and the son of Dr. William

Burnet, Sr., of New Jersey, chief physician in the Continental

Army. The death of the father caused Dr. William Burnet, Jr.,

to return to Newark before the lodge was fully organized. Dr.

Calvin Morrell, also an officer of the lodge, came with Dr. Burnet

from  New Jersey. He did not remain long in Cincinnati, but

joined the Shakers, near Lebanon, Ohio, and eventually died

there. Another member and Worshipful Master of this lodge was

Dr. William Goforth (1766-1817). He was an eminent physician

of Cincinnati and had as a pupil the celebrated Dr. Daniel Drake.

Charters for Erie Lodge at Warren and New England Lodge

at Worthington were granted by the Grand Lodge of Connecticut,

October 19, 1803. Among the twenty-two petitioners for the lodge

at Warren was Dr. Charles Dutton (1777-1843) of Youngstown.

He was born in Wallingford, Connecticut, and studied medicine

with Dr. Jared Potter, grandfather of Dr. Jared Potter Kirtland.

• 57
 

238   OHIO ARCHEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

Dr. John Brown Harmon (1780-1858), first resident physician at

Warren, was a member and officer of Erie Lodge. Dr. John W.

Seeley (1777-1840), pioneer physician of Howland township,

Trumbull County and for many years president of his District

Medical Society, together with his son, Sylvanus Seeley (1795-

1849), were also members of Erie Lodge. It is interesting to

note that John Starke Edwards, grandson of the Rev. Jonathan

Edwards, was also a member of this lodge.

Dr. John Harvey Hills of Worthington and Delaware was

a charter member and Worshipful Master of New England Lodge

at Worthington. Dr. Lincoln Goodale (1782-1868), a member

of New England Lodge, was one of the founders of Columbus

Lodge at Columbus, Ohio.

Amity Lodge at Zanesville was organized under the authority

of the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania, June 24, 1805. Dr. Thomas

Flanner (1795-1833) was initiated in Belmont Lodge at St.

Clairsville and was later a member of Amity Lodge.

Scioto Lodge at Chillicothe was organized November 22,

1805, under authority of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts.

Dr. Joseph Scott, Dr. William Waddle and Dr. Thomas Waller

(1774-1823) were members of Scioto Lodge at Chillicothe. Dr.

John Harris (1798-1849), preceptor of Chapin A. Harris and

James Taylor, pioneers in dental surgery, was also a member of

this lodge.

A Grand Convention composed of delegates from American

Union, Nova Caesarea, Erie, New England, Amity and Scioto

lodges met at Chillicothe in 1808 and formed the Grand Lodge of

Ohio. Dr. John W. Seele(1771-1840) of Warren seconded the

motion of General Lewis Cass, "that a grand lodge be formed in

the State of Ohio." Dr.Lincoln Goodale (1782-1868) served as

Grand Treasurer from 1818-1836. Dr. Michael Z. Kreider

(1803-1855) served as Grand Master during the years 1847-8-9.

Rev. Joseph Doddridge (1769-1826), author, minister and

physician, was a member of Mingo Lodge of Charlestown, Vir-

ginia (present Wellsville, West Virginia).

Dr. David Long (1787-1851), Cleveland's first physician,

was a member of Concord Lodge of Cleveland.

• 58
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              239

Dr. James Wilson served as Worshipful Master when Lan-

caster Lodge, Lancaster, Ohio, was organized in 1820. Dr.

Michael Z. Kreider was also Worshipful Master of this lodge.

Dr. Asa Coleman (1788-1870) was one of the first officers of

Franklin Lodge at Troy.     Coleman  Commandery, Knights

Templar of Troy perpetuates his name.

Dr. George Anderson, one of the incorporators of Sandusky

in 1824 and second mayor, was a member of Science Lodge of

that city.

Dr. Erastus Goodwin of Burton, was a member of Western

Phoenix Lodge of Parkman, Ohio.

Dr. John Venen (1783-1875) and Dr. Greenleaf Fifield

(1801-1851) of Conneaut, Ashtabula County, were members of

Evergreen Lodge of Conneaut.

Dr. Luther Hancett who began practice at Middlebury (East

Akron) in 1815 was one of the charter members of Middlebury

Lodge. Dr. Eliakim Crosby (1779-1854), one of the great

pioneers of Akron and who built the mill race from Middlebury to

Akron, was also a member of Middlebury Lodge.

Dr. Isaac Swift (1790-1874) was a member of Unity Lodge

at Ravenna and Dr. Nathan B. Johnson, first physician of Har-

persfield, was a member of Temple Lodge of Harpersfield.

Among the members of Western Star Lodge of Canfield

(later of Youngstown) are found the names of Dr. Jared Potter

Kirtland (1793-1877); Dr. Henry Manning (1787-1869), a

member in 1819 and still active in 1854; Theodatus Garlick (1805-

1884), a member of the Board of Censors of the Cleveland

Medical College and of whom it was said that "he made the first

daguerreotype picture taken in the United States and himself con-

structed the instrument and apparatus to take it, December, 1839."

He was a son-in-law of Dr. Elijah Flower of Brookfield, Ohio,

also a member of the order.

Dr. Storm Rosa (1791-1864) and Dr. John H. Mathews

(1785-1862) were members of Meridian Orb Lodge of Paines-

ville. Mathews' residence, built by the celebrated Jonathan Gold-

smith, is still standing at Painesville.

Freemasonry had existed in America since colonial days.

• 59
 

240    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

Side by side with the growth of Masonry there had developed a

distinct attitude of mind that was hostile to the order. No aggres-

sive stand, however, was taken against it until the Morgan incident

occurred at Batavia, New York. In the religious emotionalism of

western New York perfect material was again ready at hand for a

new crusade, the motive for which was suddenly and dramatically

supplied by the expose of the ritual of Freemasonry by William

Morgan and Morgan's subsequent disappearance.        The Morgan

incident occurred in 1826 and was made the basis of a bitter cam-

paign against the fraternity by religious, social-religious and

political elements.

At this time there were twenty-seven Masonic lodges--about

one-fourth of the lodges in the state of Ohio--located in the

Western Reserve and so seriously were they affected that only one,

Mt. Vernon Lodge of Norwalk, can boast of a continuous

existence. In the Grand Communication of 1830, Hon. Joshua R.

Giddings moved that a "new Charter be issued to Jefferson Lodge

(Jefferson, O.) the former having been mutilated by the violence

of some evil-disposed and weak-minded person unknown." John

Udell,⁷ an anti-Mason, gives the following account of the same

community.

About this time there began to arise a very great excitement on the

subject of Free Masonry, both in church and State, and from the exposi-

tions of Free Masons themselves, some of whom I was personally ac-

quainted with, and knew to have always sustained a good character for

truth and veracity, it was obvious to my mind, that it was a wicked and

dangerous institution, calculated to paralize civil justice, and to have the

same effect on the christian church. Perhaps I was too credulous in the

matter, but I was possessed of a very sanguine and decided temperment,

and am especially warm when from my convictions, I am opposing evil or

error. I therefore took an active part as an anti-Mason, religiously and

politically. In our part of the country, the anti-Masons were largely in the

majority. The churches were broken up and completely divided on the

subject--so great was the excitement; and our county offices were all filled

by anti-Masons. As it had been the custom for years (and the practice

had never ceased to gain ground), for the party in power to reap the

 

 

7 John Udell, Incidents of Travel to California across the Great Plains; together

with the Return Trips through Central America and Jamaica (Jefferson, O., 1856),

143.

• 60
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                   241

 

spoils, through the influence of the Sheriff, I received an appointment from

the county court to act as a kind of deputy--a post which was worth a

small sum to me. I continued in this office nearly four years, and until

I left the place. I was then a member of the Baptist church, in Jefferson,

as were, also, my parents; and I still lived under the immediate influence

of their good counsel. We had little trouble in our church, on account of

Free Masonry, for we had but one of the order, among us, and he came

out and renounced it, and publically exposed their secrets, wicked oaths and

usages. Some of our sister churches, however, were rent asunder by the

excitement.

In the latter part of the year 1827 there was formed in the

state of New York, an Anti-Masonic Party which grew rapidly

and soon spread to other states. It became thoroughly political in

character but after flourishing for a number of years went the

way of most third parties. E. H. Roseboom and F. P. Weisen-

burger in their History of Ohio⁸ give an interesting account of its

activities in Ohio. As the period under discussion comes to an end

there were but few active Masonic lodges. It was not until 1843

that a reaction set in and many of the former lodges were rehabili-

tated and new ones organized.

In conclusion it seems proper to speak briefly of one other

secret society, the Tammany Society of Ohio,⁹ of which a phy-

sician, Dr. Edward Tiffin was the Grand Sachem. "The Tam-

many Society, or Columbian Order was organized in the City of

New York in the year 1789, and was designed to counteract the

combined influence of the Federalists and the Society of the Cin-

cinnati. The latter was looked upon as a species of aristocracy and

hostile to democratic institutions. . . . As the Society of Cincinnati

sprang from the officers of the Revolutionary Army, so the Tam-

many Society sprang from the people." The latter became a

strictly secret organization "for the purpose (or so its enemies

declared) of promoting the political aspirations of its members

who held the favor of its inner circle." Beginning in the year

1810, wigwams were established at Chillicothe, Zanesville, Cin-

 

 

8 E. H. Roseboom and F. P. Weisenburger, History of Ohio (New York, 1934),

152.

9 Samuel Williams, "The Tammany Society of Ohio," Ohio Archaeological and

Historical Quarterly (Columbus, 1887-), XXII (1913), 349-70; C. B. Galbreath, His-

tory of Ohio (New York, 1928), II, 403-7.

• 61
 

242   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

cinnati, Xenia, Lancaster, Warren, Hamilton and New Boston

(Champaign County).    Associated with the Grand Sachem,

Dr. Edward Tiffin, were many men of great prominence. There

was much opposition to the order and at a meeting held at Chilli-

cothe in 1811, of which General Nathaniel Massie was president

and William Creighton, Jr., secretary, it was agreed that "they

believe the secret aim and concealed design to be in fact to con-

solidate and concentrate all power which is the legitimate birth-

right of the people and of the republican form of government in

the hands of this secret, cabalistic convention." Tiffin was severely

attacked and felt it keenly. The anti- and pro-Tammany dis-

pute waxed furiously until "the coming of the War of 1812, when

all parties and factions were merged in the common peril." It

is interesting to note that Massie and Creighton, leaders of the

opposition, were both Masons. Within the order were a number

of Freemasons including Thomas Worthington, David Kinkead,

Daniel and John Cleves Symmes.

The names of so many of the pioneer doctors are found on

the rolls of the early lodges that we cannot but conclude that

Freemasonry played a real part in their lives. "As a class," states

Hildreth, "no order of men have done more to promote the good

of mankind and develop the resources and natural history of our

country than the physicians, and wherever the well-educated in

that profession are found, they are uniformly on the side of order,

morality, science and religion."

• 62
 

THE BEGINNING OF FORMAL DENTAL EDUCATION

AT BAINBRIDGE, OHIO

 

BY EDWARD C. MILLS, D.D.S., F.A.C.D.

 

The history of any human endeavor deals with the process of

its growth; and though its development may be irregular, it is a

continuous process proceeding from antecedent conditions. In this

process of evolution, it may take on new form and become unlike

its former self, but continuity retains enough of the old to serve

as the basis for tracing subsequent progress. Dentistry in its initial

state, has been traced to medicine and surgery because it is con-

clusive that any care given to dental ailments, would be con-

sidered as some phase of medical practice.

Many names are deserving of mention as contributing to the

development of dentistry, other than those dentists from the

Atlantic States who were to follow in the wake of the tide of

emigration to the West. The increasing number of dentists was

greatly accelerated as a result of the panic of 1837 brought on

by President Andrew Jackson's policy relative to the United States

Bank. Many persons unable to earn a livelihood from their former

vocations and lured by the apparent success of those practicing

dentistry, were tempted to follow that calling. There being no

legal restraint, numerous incompetent, unqualified persons entered

the practice, ambitious for great financial returns.

Population is migratory and is attracted by natural advantages

and productiveness of the territory. Ohio ranks as one of the

most remarkable instances in the increase in population. Prior to

1850, no state had made such progress in this respect as Ohio, and

during the two decades previous to this date, its population had

increased 110%.

With this influx came the physician--whose services were of

the greatest necessity in those strenuous years of pioneer life.

(243)

• 63
 

244   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

Every ailment that flesh is heir to came within his province, and

dental troubles were administered to with the turnkey or crude

forceps.

Among the physicians came John Harris, a native of Pompey,

New York. He was educated in medicine and commenced prac-

tice in 1819. A year later he removed to Mississippi where he

practiced as a physician and surgeon, but owing to impaired

health, he came to Ohio, and located at Madison, a few miles

from Cincinnati. While here his two brothers, James and Chapin

A. Harris studied medicine under his preceptorship.

As the population became more centralized into communities,

Ohio became an inviting field for the increasing number of den-

tists from the East. The settlements being small, it was neces-

sary to adopt an itinerant practice in order to procure a livelihood.

An examination of the Cincinnati papers during the period 1817-

1824 enables one to form an estimate of the qualifications of

some of those itinerant pioneers, among whom were Dr. E. Parmly,

who was later to become the first president of the first dental

society in the world--the Society of Dental Surgeons of the City

and State of New York, December 3, 1834; Dr. Plantou, from

Paris, France, who is credited as being the first to introduce

porcelain teeth into this country--supplanting the teeth carved

from ivory; Drs. Green, Ratrie, and Monroe, whose announce-

ments bespeak a preliminary training of a high order for that

period.

No doubt contact with the foregoing itinerant dentists awak-

ened in the mind of Harris an interest in dentistry, from which

was to follow a new era in dental education, as evidenced by the

subsequent events which took place at Bainbridge, Ohio, where he

located about 1825 and established a School of Medical Instruc-

tion, according to the following announcement which appeared in

the Chillicothe Supporter & Gazette, November 1, 1827:

 

MEDICAL INSTRUCTION

Dr. J. Harris, of the village of Bainbridge, Ross County, is making

a variety of preparations and arrangements for the instruction of a private

class of medical students preparatory to their entering a Medical College

• 64
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                     245

 

for the consummation of their profession. Among which are Anatomical

preparations and Chemical Apparatus, sufficiently extensive for the exhibi-

tion of many important experiments. He will deliver Lectures, during the

winter season, at least once a week on each of the following branches, viz.:

Demonstrative Anatomy, Operative Surgery and Chemistry; and during the

summer season he will devote as much of his time in lecturing on Osteology,

Physiology, Materia Medica, Theory and Practice of Medicine and Ob-

stetrics, as his professional avocations may permit; and every possible

facility will be afforded to those who may see cause to patronize his efforts.

No student will be received who has not at least a first rate English educa-

tion. Terms of tuition will be reasonable, depending on circumstances.

October 25, 1827.

This no doubt was prompted by the Act in 1824 of the Dis-

trict Medical Societies, which required that all applicants for exam-

ination should have received instruction under a preceptor.

The same newspaper carried the following announcement

from February 21, 1828, until the issue of December 3, 1828.

 

 

DENTAL SURGERY

DR. JOHN HARRIS

Respectfully informs the citizens of Bainbridge and contiguous towns

that he has just received a large supply of SURGICAL INSTRUMENTS.

Among which are a full set, for the practice of Dental Surgery. From his

knowledge of the Medical Profession Surgery and Dental Surgery in par-

ticular, he flatters himself that he shall be able to render general satisfac-

tion to all, who may have occasion to employ him. He will set Artificial

Teeth with much permanency and so natural in appearance, as to escape

detection; and without that pain so consequent upon the operation as per-

formed by most Dentists--cure all cases of Scurvy of the Teeth--preserve

those that are decaying by plugging--extract all kinds of Teeth and Stumps

with ease; and perform every other operation of a Dental character.

BAINBRIDGE, Feb. 7, 1828.

This announcement indicates that students under his precep-

torship, intent on the study of medicine had become interested in

the practice of dentistry, and a "large supply of Surgical Instru-

ments, among which are a full set for the practice of Dental Sur-

gery" leads us to believe this was an additional outfit for his stu-

dents. The subsequent portion of the announcement was possibly

intended to attract patients for a dental clinic in which to give

• 65
 

246    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

technical instruction to his pupils. He was equipped for his own

personal practice because according to an announcement pub-

lished in the Columbus Ohio State Journal and Columbus Gazette,

issue of October 14, 1830, he stated that he "has been a practi-

tioner for more than ten years and has devoted more than half his

time to the theory and practice of Dentistry."¹

Years later, one of his students, James Taylor, commenting

on Harris' ability, said:

From a long and intimate acquaintance of the medical profession we

must say--we know of none better calculated to advance a student in his

studies. It appeared to be with him not only a duty, but a pleasure--at

the close of every day to review the studies thereof; to explain and enforce

each lesson which his natural endowment and previous hard study has so

well enabled him to do. We have always thought, had he devoted himself

exclusively to the practice of medicine and surgery, he would have en-

joyed an enviable reputation. His attention was however turned more

particularly to the specialty of dentistry and our profession might date

much of its present advancement to his unwearied zeal.

We are indebted to Dr. Jonathan Taft, editor of Dental

Register (Cincinnati, 1847-1923), in volume XX (1868), page

91, for the statement:

Dr. Edward Taylor was born near Bainbridge, which place might

very properly be called the starting point of the following pioneers of the

profession in the Mississippi Valley; Drs. John, James and Chapin A. Harris,

Dr. [John] Jones, formerly of Dayton, Ohio, and Dr. [Wesley] Wampler

of Illinois, and Dr. [Samuel T.] Church of Baltimore, and Joseph, James

and Irwin Taylor.

Subsequent research has also added to this list the names of

Dr. John Allen, Dr. Edward P. Church and William Jones, a phy-

sician late of Kenton, Ohio. Undoubtedly inspiration and instruc-

tion were received in this primitive school by others whose names

have been lost to dental history, but such as are preserved have

redounded to the unsung praise of Dr. John Harris--that unselfish

promoter of dental science.

James H. Harris, brother of John, with whom he had studied

 

1 The building in which Dr. Harris practiced, and gave instructions in medicine

and dentistry, was purchased by the Ohio State Dental Society, December 10, 1938.

(Ross County Records, Deed Book 230, p. 602.)

• 66
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO             247

 

medicine in Madison, Ohio, located in Columbus, Ohio, in the

practice of medicine in March, 1822, with his "office and residence

on the east side of High Street, first door south of the State

House." His stay was of short duration as, among a list of un-

claimed letters, published October 17, 1822, was one addressed to

"James H. or Chapin Harris."  June 5, 1827, he was located in

Lancaster and was elected treasurer of the Thirteenth District

Medical Society. In the Lancaster Gazette, December 20, 1828,

is his announcement that he has resumed practice of "Physic,

Surgery and Midwifery." This indicates an absence from Lan-

caster the greater portion of 1828--one of the years during which

John Harris was conducting his school in Bainbridge. He must

have given up the practice of medicine entirely, because his name

does not appear in the list of members of the Thirteenth District

Medical Society, published June 2, 1829. He announced himself

as a dentist to the residents in Columbus in November, 1830, after

which he practiced dentistry in Lancaster for a number of years,

later locating in Baltimore, Maryland, where he died on October

24, 1836.

Edward P. Church, a native of Middlesex, New York, was a

student under John Harris at Bainbridge, after which he practiced

in several southern cities; later he returned to near his former

home in New York state, where he died of cholera, July 22, 1832.

He invented forceps for extracting the upper third molar, which

in 1849 were in use by the majority of dentists in this country.

Samuel T. Church of Baltimore, is listed in the Baltimore city

directories from 1858 until 1864. During the years 1858-1861, he

was professor of operative dentistry in the Baltimore College of

Dental Surgery, for which information the writer is indebted to

Dr. J. Ben Robinson, the present dean of that school.

Dr. Wesley Wampler, was a Virginian, and after leaving

Bainbridge followed an itinerant practice in Ohio, Illinois and

Wisconsin, finally settling at Milton Station, now Humboldt, Illi-

nois. While practicing there, in 1856, Abraham Lincoln on his way

to Chicago had him remove a tooth, the first he had had extracted

by a dentist.

Dr. John Jones of Dayton, after a few years' practice at

• 67
 

248   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

Miamisburg, Ohio, located in Dayton about 1840. He later

attended the Ohio College of Dental Surgery and was a member

of the first graduating class in 1846. "He was a man highly

esteemed both in professional and private life; his loss is no doubt

felt by more of the citizens than would be the loss of any other

citizen, public or private." He died there September 11, 1850.

Drs. John Jones and B. A. Satterthwait, another Dayton

dentist, at the meeting of the Mississippi Valley Dental Associa-

tion, September 1, 1846, introduced the following resolution which

was adopted:

Resolved: That any member of this Society, who shall extol his own

peculiar merits, over those of a fellow practitioner, or offer his services at

lower rates than is common among the members of the profession among

whom he operates, through public prints, or uses any secret nostrum (unless

pledged prior to the present time to maintain secrecy) shall be liable to ex-

pulsion from this Society.

Here we witness the beginning of our code of ethics.

John Allen, born November 4, 1810, was a native of New

York state and his father was for many years a practicing phy-

sician in Cincinnati. Allen was a pioneer in porcelain dental art

and the inventor of "Continuous Gum" work. He made many con-

tributions to dental prosthesis, the appreciation of which was mani-

fested by award of medals from many societies and institutes.

He was active in dental education and dental college work; took

an active interest in organized dentistry and in 1861 was elected

president of the American Dental Convention. He practiced in

Cincinnati until 1854, when he removed to New York City. He

died March 8, 1902.

It is an interesting coincidence that these events occurred just

one hundred years after the Frenchman, Fauchard, had published

his monumental work Le Chirurgieu-dentiste, thus establishing

another epoch in dentistry. The fact that John Harris had been

practicing since 1820, as evidenced by his announcement in the

Ohio State Journal for October 14, 1830, having his own equip-

ment for this purpose, the announcement of "an additional supply

of instruments" among which "are a full set for the practice of

dental surgery" furnishes unmistakable evidence that this set was

• 68
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO               249

for the use of his students and a subsequent portion of his

announcement was possibly intended to attract patients for a clinic

in which to instruct his pupils in dental technic.

Harris remained in Bainbridge until May, 1830, when he

removed to Chillicothe. He made occasional trips as an itinerant,

at least one to Columbus in October, 1830, and others to the South,

and in 1834 he was located at Georgetown, Kentucky. The Com-

monwealth of Frankfort, on April 1, 1835, published his announce-

ment as of the firm of Harris and Hobbs of Louisville, and as

practicing his profession "in Frankfort during the present session

of the legislature." During the winter of 1835 and 1836 he at-

tended a course in medicine and also delivered a course of dental

lectures before the students of the Medical Department of the

Transylvania University at Louisville and also contributed a series

of articles on dentistry in the Commonwealth of Frankfort. In

1836 he made an unsuccessful attempt to obtain a charter for a

dental college in Kentucky. This was the first effort, not only

in this country but throughout the world to establish an institution

of this kind through legislative enactment. A letter from Dr. R. L.

Sprau of Louisville, Kentucky, under date of August 24, 1934,

states, "It may be of interest to know that an attempt was made

to have an act passed to regulate the practice of dentistry at that

time [1836]. The record does not say who was responsible, but

Harris was in Frankfort at that time."

Under date of August 28, Sprau wrote: "There is a reference

in another record of an attempt to have legislation passed to charter

a dental college."

In July, 1842, John Harris was again in Chillicothe, and in

1845 was practicing in Annapolis, Maryland. At the sixth annual

meeting of the American Society of Dental Surgeons in 1845, of

which he was made a member in absentia at its organization in

1840, he read a paper, published in the American Journal of

Dental Science (New York, 1839-1909), volume VI, page 100, in

which he sounded the death knell to the retention of pulpless teeth.

If the experience of the most scientific and skillful practitioners that

have ever lived could be ascertained, I think it would be found that in the

adoption of other treatment than this [extraction], they have often been

• 69
 

250    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

disappointed in their expectations and that while they and their patients have

been lulled into imaginary security by the temporary relief from pain, the

malady itself has continued and become the cause of other and sometimes

more formidable diseases. . . . The records of medicine furnished numerous

examples . . . wherever a remedy has been tried that could be suggested

by the skill and ingenuity of man, without success--cures have been speedily

and permanently effected by the removal of diseased teeth even where they

have not been productive of pain or suspected as the cause of the mischief.

These facts were forcibly emphasized by Dr. William Hunter

of England seventy years later. A report and description of an

artificial nose and palate made by him for a lady patient in Scott

County, Kentucky, in 1841, is used by Chapin A. Harris in his

edition of Fox's Natural History of the Human Teeth (1846).

In 1845 Dr. John Harris donated to the Museum of the

Baltimore College of Dental Surgery some twelve thousand morbid

dental specimens. At the commencement of this college, February

17, 1846, Dean Chapin A. Harris gave the graduating address,

and his brother John Harris, his instructor in dentistry at Bain-

bridge, presented the diplomas. Great must have been the grati-

fication of John Harris on this occasion when he witnessed the

full fruition of the seed of his ideas and ideals as sown and

nurtured in his "School of Instruction" the first of its kind in the

annals of dentistry, and perhaps of medicine.

The length of John Harris' residence in Annapolis is uncer-

tain. He was a resident of Frederick, Maryland, in 1849, with his

wife, Mrs. Martha Wampler (nee Edmiston) whom he had mar-

ried at Bainbridge, November 12, 1827, and their children. Harris,

while on one of his itinerant trips, died at Hertford, North Caro-

lina, July 26, 1849, and was buried there by the Masonic fraternity.

As previously stated the students of John Harris at Bain-

bridge became dentists with one known exception--Dr. William

Jones of Kenton, Ohio; Jones was a native of southern Ohio

who began practice in West Liberty, Ohio, then removed to Round-

head, and about 1848-49 he came to Kenton. Jones was a man of

eccentric habits and a religious turn of mind. He abandoned his

profession to preach the gospel, but not finding that sufficiently

remunerative he returned to the practice of medicine in Kenton,

where he died, about 1874. He was a charter member of the

• 70
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                   251

Hardin County Medical Society, organized at Kenton, July 8, 1850,

and served five times as president.2 He reported a case in which a

lower maxilla had been lost by necrosis, and new bone had been

produced (a case of reproduction of the inferior maxillary bone,

following necrosis), published in the American Journal of Dental

Science, second series, volume III (1853-54), page 592-6, and

abstracted in the Dental Register of the West (Cincinnati, 1847-

1923), volume VII (1853-54), page 64-5.

Dr. George Watt, Xenia, Ohio, former editor of the Ohio

Journal of Dental Science (Toledo, 0., 1881-) referred therein

to Jones, as follows:

In the Spring of 1850 I made the acquaintance of William Jones,

M.D., of Kenton, Hardin County, Ohio, who had been a student with Dr.

James Taylor, under a private preceptor and he told me much about their

student lives. The location was at or in the vicinity of Bainbridge, Ohio,

where Dr. Taylor was born. . . . They remained fast friends till death.

Dr. Jones told me, and I think Dr. Taylor did likewise, that John Harris,

a brother of the after famous and revered Chapin A. Harris was their

preceptor, and this quiet country locality might well be called the birth

place of American dentistry.

Chapin A. Harris was practicing medicine at Greenfield but 10 or

12 miles distant. Both the Harris brothers and Dr. Taylor concluded

to practice dentistry in connection with medicine. A free exchange of

opinion showed that Drs. Chapin Harris and James Taylor held identical

opinions as to the necessity of a thorough professional education for the

dentist, and neither rested until he had, with such assistance as he could

rally around him, established a college to afford the desired instruction,

of which both so strongly felt the need. . . .3

The Taylors were natives of the vicinity of Bainbridge.

Of the seven sons of Joseph and Jane (Irwin) Taylor, four were

dentists, all probably influenced by James Taylor, one of the sons,

who was one of the early students of John Harris.

Joseph Taylor (1806-1873) followed an itinerant practice

until 1831 when he located in Vicksburg, Mississippi, later in Mays-

ville, Kentucky, and in 1850 he became associated with his brother

Jame, in Cincinnati. He had a high appreciation of dental science

and was successful in the construction of obturators and artificial

 

2 Warner, Beers & Co., pub., History of Hardin County, Ohio (Chicago, 1883),

238.

3 VII (1887), 3.

• 71
 

252   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

palates, and took great interest in organization of dental societies.

Owing to ill health he was obliged to retire from practice in 1859,

when he engaged in horticulture.

Edward Taylor (1811-1868) began practice in some of the

small towns along the Mississippi River. In 1833, he settled in

Springfield, Ohio, later at Maysville, Kentucky, and finally at

Natchez, Mississippi, where he remained for several years. About

1844, he opened an office in Louisville, Kentucky, but was soon

induced to join his brother James in Cincinnati. An attack of

cholera in 1847 so enfeebled his constitution that he was unable

to continue the arduous duties of an office practice.

Irwin Taylor (1813-1843) studied with his brother Joseph in

Maysville, Kentucky, and shortly afterward went to Natchez,

Mississippi, where his brother Edward was then practicing. He

died there April 4, 1843, and was buried in Spring Grove Cemetery,

Cincinnati.

James Taylor (March 25, 1809-June 12, 1881) exercised

greater influence in the development of dentistry in the West than

any of his contemporaries. While a student with John Harris,

they visited Chapin A. Harris, then practicing medicine in Green-

field, fifteen miles north of Bainbridge, and induced him to devote

himself to dental science.

Dr. James Taylor began practice at Hillsboro, later received

his M.D. degree at Lexington, Kentucky, and opened his office in

Bainbridge in the practice of dentistry and medicine. For several

years he spent his winters in the South and his summers in the

North. In 1834 he gave up medical practice, devoting himself

wholly to dentistry. In 1842 he permanently located in Cincinnati,

where he was joined by his brother Edward, who had been prac-

ticing in Louisville, and they soon established a lucrative practice.

Edward's health failing, he was succeeded by his brother Joseph

from Maysville. These three brothers laid a secure foundation

for dentistry, and through their labors contributed to the profes-

sional character which it attained in the Mississippi Valley. They

were largely responsible for the organization of the Mississippi

Valley Association of Dental Surgeons established in Cincinnati

in August, 1844.

• 72
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO              253

In 1844, James Taylor advocated the necessity of a dental

school in Cincinnati, and in 1845 the Ohio College of Dental

Surgery was organized, the second of its kind in the world. In

1847, the Dental Register of the West was begun, and he became

the first editor. Taylor's contributions to dental literature were

voluminous, touching upon every phase of dental practice. He was

a charter member of the American Society of Dental Surgeons in

1839 and was elected president of the American Dental Convention

in Boston, August 6, 1856. He was a deserving and modest re-

cipient of all the honors in the power of the dental profession to

bestow.

Chapin A. Harris (May 6, 1806-September 29, 1860) was

born in Pompey, New York, and in early manhood came to Madi-

son, Ohio, and studied medicine in the office of his brother Dr.

John Harris. He was licensed by the Board of Medical Censors

and commenced the practice of medicine in Greenfield, Ohio. He

became interested in dentistry and received instruction from his

brother John in Bainbridge. He remained in Greenfield about a

year, then moved to Bloomfield, Ohio. He later traveled as an

itinerant through the South, finally locating in Fredericksburg,

Virginia, and in 1835 permanently in Baltimore, and at once be-

came a contributor to medical and periodical literature. He was

one of the most vigorous and productive of our dental writers and

has long been regarded the founder of dental literature in America.

In 1839, he published his first work, The Dental Art, a Practical

Treatise on Dental Surgery which work, under title of Principles

and Practice of Dental Surgery, passed through the thirteenth and

last edition in 1896.

In 1839 he was the instigator of, and became editor of, the

American Journal of Dental Science, the first dental periodical

publication in the world, and continued as editor until his death.

Harris experienced some opposition in his efforts to establish the

journal. Solyman Brown wrote:

Dr. Chapin A. Harris of Baltimore, an eminent practitioner of

dentistry and educated physician and surgeon visited the city of New York

to consult with some of his professional brethren on the subject, which

• 73
 

254    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

later occupied much of his attention and engrossed a large share of his

professional attention. He invited Dr. Horace H. Hayden of Baltimore to

accompany him to the commercial capital of the nation and assist him in

the enterprise; but Dr. Hayden declined to comply, alleging that he had

labored too hard and too long in the acquisition of professional knowledge

to sow it broadcast through the land by means of a magazine. Whereupon

Dr. Harris visited New York alone and invited Dr. E. Parmly, Dr. E.

Baker and a few others, including the writer, to meet at some suitable place

to discuss the business of his errand to the north. . . . Late in the afternoon

Dr. Hayden arrived and joined in the discussion, still expressing himself

as opposed to the movement of publishing professional knowledge to the

world. Nevertheless, in spite of this individual objection, the meeting re-

solved on the publication of a Dental Journal forthwith.⁴

In 1849, Harris published a Dictionary of Dental Surgery,

Biography, Bibliography and Medical Terminology, a volume of

779 pages, the first dental dictionary in the English language, the

sixth edition of which appeared in 1898. He was the first to re-

spond to the call of Dr. H. H. Hayden to organize the American

Society of Dental Surgeons in 1840, and it was on his motion that

the convention to organize a society "resolved that a National

Society be formed."

There is a tradition that Harris with Hayden's advice and

assistance endeavored to establish a dental training school as an

adjunct to the Medical Department of the University of Maryland.

If this request was made, it may have been rejected, due to the

hostility of Dr. H. W., Baxley, one of the dental faculty, to the

regents of the university.

Burton L. Thorpe's biography of C. A. Harris, states that

not disheartened, Dr. Harris went to New York City and consulted the

leading men of the profession and with their aid endeavored to establish

a chair of dentistry in one of the New York medical colleges. Meeting with

discouragement, but stimulated with renewed energy, he returned to Balti-

more and during the winter of 1839-40, almost entirely unaided, he secured

the signatures of representative citizens to a petition to the legislature of

Maryland for the incorporation of a College of Dental Surgery at Balti-

more. After numerous difficulties and considerable opposition by jealous

medical rivals, which he finally overcame, the charter was granted and with

 

 

4 Dental Science and Art Journal (New York, 1875), February, 1875; cited also

in Dental Cosmos (Philadelphia, 1859-1936), LXII (1920), 944-5.

• 74
 

PIONEER PHYSICIANS OF OHIO                   255

 

the aid of H. H. Hayden, Thomas E. Bond, and H. Willis Baxley, he or-

ganized the Baltimore College of Dental Surgery, of which he was the first

dean.

This was the first dental college in the world.

Harris received the honorary M. D. degree from Washington

Medical College at Baltimore, in which he was a professor in

1838. His D.D.S. was obtained from the American Society of

Dental Surgery, and an honorary D.D.S. degree was conferred

upon him by the Philadelphia Dental College in 1854. He was

elected president of the American Dental Convention in 1856.

His death occurred on September 29, 1860, due mainly to

overwork. At a meeting of the dentists in New York City, October

8, 1860, of which Eleazar Parmly was chairman and Solyman

Brown, secretary, under the "Harris Testimonial Fund," the pre-

amble and resolutions pay him the following tribute:

Every distinct profession in human society has its leading members,

men of energy, talent and eminence. This is true of the dental profession

as of any other, and not less true in America than in other quarters of the

globe.

The names of Greenwood, Woodendale, Gardette, Hayden, Flagg, Hud-

son, Koecker and Randall among others that have left their sublunary labors,

are evidence of this fact.

It has become our melancholy duty in pursuance of the object of this

meeting to add another name to this catalog, more highly distinguished

than any of his predecessors for numerous and valuable contributions to

the science and literature of his profession, as well as by his writings, as

by personal inculcations as head of the oldest, and for many years, the only

dental college in the world.⁵

Harris, through his founding of the first dental journal, gave

a death blow to the selfish, secretive attitude of many dentists as

to their methods of practice; in his activities which contributed

to the formation of the American Society of Dental Surgeons, he

furnished a substitution of a cooperative type of society for the

old one of naked individualism, and in the Baltimore College of

Dental Surgery, he brought to a full fruition the ideals for den-

tistry that had been fostered in the mind of his brother, Dr. John

 

 

5 Ibid., II (1860-61), 221.

• 75
 

256    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

Harris, his preceptor, when conducting his school of Medical In-

struction, in Bainbridge.⁶

We have previously referred to the first dental journal, the

American Journal of Dental Science (1839), founded by Chapin

A. Harris, who became its first editor.

The second periodical publication, worthy of the distinction of

the name "Journal," was the Dental Register of the West, founded

under the auspices of the Mississippi Valley Association of Dental

Surgeons in 1847, and first edited by James Taylor. It suspended

publication with the November issue, 1922, at the close of the

seventy-fifth volume, and was the oldest dental journal in the

world.

The organization of the Ohio State Dental Society on June

27, 1866, was the dawn of a new and brighter era for dentistry in

Ohio. Such an organization marked the end of various sporadic

attempts to unite the profession of the state as a whole, and happily

such ending was as the morning ends--when it merges into the

fuller light of the day.

Of these United States, it is with pardonable pride that we

point to our own great commonwealth. Ohio has contributed its

full share of patriots to our Nation in times of peace and war. In

peace her sons are found in the highest positions of trust and honor

in national affairs: while in war, they have led the perilous advance

and accomplished deeds of heroic valor.

In the realm of literature, science, law, medicine, and dentistry,

fame has crowned the efforts of many of the sons of this great

state. And here in Ohio was laid the very foundation of dental

education, since which time there has been no cessation of building

thereon. Ohio has given many names whose heritage to dentistry

will cause them to live, wherever and as long as the profession is

practiced, and their zealous endeavors and notable achievements

will ever continue to reflect leadership in this important branch of

health service.

 

 

6 There has been much controversy as to who was the first to conceive the idea

of a dental college, and for information pertaining to this subject, the reader is

referred to the following publications: Dental Register of the West, XV (1861),

79-80; James Taylor, Life and Character of Chapin A. Harris (Cincinnati); Dental

Cosmos, LXII (1920), 936-58; L. Parmly Brown, New Light on Dental History

(Peekskill, N. Y.).

• 76