THE CINCINNATI LANCET-CLINIC
by DAVID A. TUCKER, JR., M.D.
Professor of the History of Medicine,
University of Cincinnati
The Cincinnati Lancet-Clinic was
formed in 1878 by the merger
of the Lancet and Observer (1842)
with the Clinic (1871). It was
known as the Lancet and Clinic until
1888 when the hyphenated
title was assumed.
The Lancet and Observer was
founded by L. M. Lawson in
1842 as the Western Lancet, a
monthly journal. It was issued in
Cincinnati under his direction for
thirteen years, although during
part of that time he resided in
Lexington, Kentucky.
We quote the opening editorial of the Lancet:
We present to the profession the first
number of The Lancet, and accom-
pany the offering with a brief
exposition of its principles and objects. Un-
influenced by sectional or party
interests, and free from the debasing effects
of clique government, we will in all
sincerity endeavor to promote harmony
and unity of action, and never permit
our journal to become a medium for
conveying off the debris of personal
collisions. We claim to be an honest and
devoted member of that great branch of
the human family, whose days are
spent in mental and physical exertions
to ameliorate the anguish of their
fellow beings, and whose sleepless
nights form but a counterpart to the same
scenes of toil; and so long as the light
of reason shall illumine our path, and
the tide of destiny roll harmless by, so
long will we candidly and fearlessly
endeavor to defend our common interests,
and expose common evils.
The Lancet is designed to be essentially
practical. Abstract speculations
and obscure theories will be sedulously
avoided, while true principles, leading
to practical conclusions, which will
exclude empiricism and establish rational
deductions, will be carefully
cultivated. For these purposes, we solicit from
the profession contributions, and hope
they will select from the vast amount
of materials within their reach, such
facts as will essentially aid our enterprise.
Through the kindness of the
distinguished gentlemen who have, ex
officio, control of the Commercial
Hospital, we expect to present an interesting
clinique of medical and surgical cases.
Our readers will also be regularly
informed of all important improvements,
foreign and American.
We have entered upon the enterprise with
a full understanding of the
labor, perplexity and responsibility,
inseparably connected with a medical
periodical; but at the same time, with a
fixed resolution that the Journal
387
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OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
shall be made worthy the patronage of an
intelligent profession, and that our
efforts shall not be relaxed, until it
rests upon a permanent and sure
foundation.
Such arrangements have been consummated
for publishing as will insure
the uninterrupted appearance of the work
throughout the year.
In 1858 the Western Lancet combined
with the Medical Ob-
server (1856) under the title of the Lancet and Observer. It
was
purchased by Dr. J. C. Culbertson in
1873. In 1878 Culbertson
acquired the control of the Clinic which
had been issued weekly for
seven years by members of the faculty of
the Medical College of
Ohio. Its first editor was the scholarly
James T. Whittaker, his
collaborators being W. W. Dawson, P. S.
Connor, W. W. Seely,
Charles Kearns, Thaddeus A. Reamy, C. D.
Palmer, Samuel Nichles,
John L. Cleveland, and Roberts
Bartholow.
The original announcement of the Clinic
read as follows:
The Publisher of the Cincinnati Medical
Clinic begs leave to state to
the Medical Profession that the Journal,
of which the first number is issued
today, is thoroughly organized on sound,
working principles:
1st Because its corps of editors is
composed of gentlemen well known to
the profession as working men.
2nd Because it has a fixed pecuniary
basis.
The Clinic's policy-none.
Its object-to give the profession the
best original matter possible-to
make its selections from domestic and
foreign journals, as judicious and
practical as space will allow-thus to
keep its readers au courant with the
progress of modern medicine.
Besides the contributions of its own
immediate collaborators, the Clinic
will contain communications at least one
every month, from leading medical
writers at home and abroad.
The department of selections will be
especially cultivated. The tables
of the City Library contain the
principal medical journals of the World, and
the editorial lists are choice and full.
Medical publications will be noticed and
reviewed to an extent sufficient
to acquaint the reader with the most
select literature in every department of
medicine, and the corner for News will
contain all items of interest that can
be gleaned from every source of
professional intelligence.
Each advertisement in this Journal is
exclusive, and the space allotted
to every kind of business suitable for
publication in a Journal of this
character, is open to the highest
bidder.
The contents of each number were usually
arranged under the
following headings: Original Articles, A
Lecture, Scientific Notes,
ThE CINCINNATI LANCET-CLINIC 389
Medical News, Correspondence, and
Clinical Memoranda. The early
republication of items of interest from
the current French, German,
and Italian literature was a special
feature of the Clinic.
The first issue of the new weekly
journal-the Lancet and
Clinic-was published on July 6, 1878, under the joint editorship
of Dr. J. C. Culbertson and James G.
Hyndman. The first editorial
read in part:
During the past year efforts have been
repeatedly made to secure the
consolidation of the two principal
medical journals of our city, The Lancet
and The Clinic. It was always admitted
that the interests of all the parties
concerned in their publication, the
interests of the subscribers, the interests
of our medical institutions, in short,
the interests of the medical profession
at and in the vicinity of this great
medical metropolis could be best subserved
by one Journal, which should secure the
virtues and escape the faults peculiar
to each alone.
These peculiarities have always been so
obvious as to scarcely require
mention. The Clinic, while it presented
to its readers, in its weekly issues,
the quickest accounts of discoveries and
reports of news, was so limited in
space as to virtually exclude detailed
communications and society reports for
fear of imparting too much monotony to
its pages; The Lancet, while it
afforded the necessary space for such
contributions, was published at such
long intervals of time as to deprive its
news and selections of freshness and
first appearance among its
contemporaries. The unification of the two journals
completes the requirements of modern
medical journalism and renders it as
effective, if we may use the comparison,
as an army equipped with both light
and heavy artillery.
"The Lancet and Clinic" has
peculiar claims upon the medical profession
in the West, for the reason that it
represents the union of the first medical
monthly (now the oldest in the United
States), and the first medical weekly
published in the West. It will hope to
unite to the dignity, wisdom and
experience of age, the enthusiasm,
activity and enterprise of youth. It will
have space for entire essays and full
society reports, and show promptitude
in presentation of discoveries and news.
It brings to its pages as immediate
collaborators the working corps of
editors and translators previously engaged
upon The Clinic and the solid ability
and accumulated influence belonging to
The Lancet. It will exhibit also as
entirely new features, regular correspond-
ence, (at least one letter a week), from
all the principal medical centres in
the East as well as in the West, with
full accounts of all the transactions of
importance in the various hospital and
medical societies in this city, in this
State and in neighboring States,
whenever competent secretaries will furnish
histories and reports.
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OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL
QUARTERLY
The contents of the Lancet and Clinic
were arranged in a man-
ner similar to those of the Clinic and
under the following headings:
Original Communications, Reports of
Societies, Correspondence,
Continental Medicine, Book Reviews, and
Selections from the
Literature.
The first volume of the Lancet and
Clinic contained a number
of original contributions by Dr. A. J.
Keyt, who was the American
pioneer in cardiographic and
sphymographic research.
It was the custom for Cincinnati
physicians traveling either in
this country or abroad to write accounts
of such visits to the medical
press, describing particularly the
things which were of professional
interest. The Lancet and Clinic published
a large number of such
letters, many of which are of
considerable historical interest. Of
these we may mention a series entitled
"A Doctor's Summer Vaca-
tion Letters" written from Europe
by Roberts Bartholow (professor
of the theory and practice of medicine
in the Medical College of
Ohio). One letter from Philadelphia, in
the November 9, 1878,
issue describes a paper read by Dr.
William Pepper at a meeting
of the Philadelphia County Medical
Society in which the intra-
venous injection of milk was advocated
as a form of therapy. The
milk, obtained directly from the cow or
goat, was to be strained
through a fine wire sieve, then placed
in a sealed can which was im-
mersed in boiling water, the object
being to keep the milk heated
to 100°. The intravenous
injection was made through a fine needle
connected to the milk reservoir by
rubber tubing. The corre-
spondent says that "Dr. Pepper
stated that at first there was pro-
duced marked depression, followed by an
exhilarating stage of
excitement and stimulation."
Unfortunately the disease or diseases
for which the milk was to be used in
this fashion were not noted.
A summary of the sanitary reports issued
each week by the
surgeon general of the United States
Marine Hospital Service under
the authority of the national quarantine
act were published. These
consisted, in the main, of statistics
concerning reportable diseases
in the various localities in the United
States. The report for the
week of September 14, 1878, is very
interesting as it records the
spread of yellow fever in the last great
epidemic. In the week
ending September 12, there were 530
deaths in New Orleans, 607
deaths in Memphis, 7 in Louisville, and
4 in Cincinnati.
THE CINCINNATI LANCET-CLINIC 391
In the volume for 1878 (p. 194) there is
an abstract of the
article written by Dr. Adolph Hammer of
St. Louis in which he
reported the diagnosis of a thrombus of
the coronary artery before
death. The original article appeared in
the Wien med Wocken-
shrift, XXXVIII (1878), 102, and thus was promptly announced
to the medical profession in Cincinnati,
but apparently no one
recognized the significance of the
report.
Another interesting paper was one
written by Dr. R. B. Davy
of Cincinnati, in which he advocated
what we would now call "air
conditioning" for the treatment of
yellow fever. He described an
apparatus which used ice for the purpose
of cooling, but he also
stated that with an engine at hand
artificial cold could be produced
by using a mixture of solid carbonic
acid and ether, or by using
the carbonic acid alone.
The earlier volumes were filled with
discussions both pro and
con of the germ theory of disease; with
descriptions of antiseptic
and then aseptic surgical technique; and
with announcements of
the discovery of various bacteria as the
specific causes of diseases.
Operative procedures made possible by
aseptic technique were
described. The importance of preventive
medicine in the control
of contagious and infectious diseases
was the subject of a number
of papers.
Throughout the entire period of
publication frequent refer-
ence was made to medical education in
formal papers and in medi-
cal society discussions. The development
of our present-day medi-
cal curriculum is readily followed
through papers urging better
premedical training, the lengthened and
graded course, the intro-
duction of laboratory work, the
improvement of bedside clinical
teaching, and the introduction of
medical licensure.
Dr. J. C. Culbertson retained financial
control of the Lancet-
Clinic for many years-at least until 1893. He also acted as
co-
editor up to that time, being assisted
by various members of the
Cincinnati profession, among whom were
James G. Hyndman,
Frederick Kebler, C. W. Thrasher, J. C.
Oliver, A. B. Richardson,
and L. S. Colter.
During the early 1900's Dr. Mark Brown
was editor. In 1907
Dr. A. G. Kreidler became editor, being
succeeded in 1912 by
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OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
Dr. Charles Castle. In 1916 Dr. Martin
Fischer and Dr. A. G.
Kreidler were the editors.
The Lancet-Clinic ceased
publication with the issue dated No-
vember 18, 1916. The editor had stated
on November 4 "that finan-
cial embarassment had sealed its fate.
The sources of the embar-
rassment reside in the high cost of
production, the poverty incident
to being clean, and the unwillingness on
the part of enough of the
medical profession to make good the
difference."
Thus after 74 years of usefulness to the
medical profession of
the Ohio Valley, the Lancet-Clinic ceased
to exist.