Get your Goat

This history of medicine would be quite drab without the enormous rollcall of quacks and charlatans.  Sometimes the stories are so bizarre it's hard to believe they are true.  Today's self styled "doctor" is no exception.

Dr. John Romulus Brinkley (later to become John Richard Brinkley) lived from 1885-1942.  The son of a man who practiced as a medic in North Carolina during the Civil war, his father was married four times legally and had one other marriage that was anulled because John Brinkley Snr was underaged at the time.  John Jnr himself was born out of wedlock, to the niece of his father's current wife.

Alice Bunker Stockham and Tokology

One of the nurses at work, knowing my love for all things medical and historical decided to loan me a book.

Tokology: A book for every woman was authored by Alice Bunker Stockham  (1833-1912)  in 1886 (although I believe this copy is almost certainly a later edition.  It is essentially a guide for the layman about pregnancy and women's health.  Stockham is an utterly intriguing character.  An obstetrician and gynaecologist from Chicago, she was only the fifth woman to be made a doctor in the United States.

Study

I must apologise for her long sabbatical.  I have been off studying for, sitting and ultimately passing my examinations. (I then had a very long rest!).

To celebrate my return to the realm of blogging I bring you the following image:

 

(The above image was sourced from the national library of medicine.  It was taken by WHO photographer D. Henrioud).

The above image is undated but believed to be several centuries old and found on the wall of a museum in Shanghai.  It depicts students in the field of acupuncture being trained on a model.  Correct insertion of the needle would find the student hitting wax.  Incorrect and a stream of water would be emitted. 

I am not a student of acupuncture but I appreciate the stress of a clinical examination, no matter the century!

Before the Birth of One of Her Children

I recently found a link to a poem written by the first poet and first female writer to be printed in the British North American Colonies.  Anne Bradstreet was born in England in 1612.  She immigrated to America in 1630 with her husband Simon as part of a fleet of Puritan immigrants.

Bradstreet suffered from smallpox as a child, an illness that went on to cause her paralysis in later life.  She was also stricken with tuberculosis in later life.  Despite this she gave birth to eight children and lived to the age of sixty.

Bradstreet's works reflected on the hardships of her life in the Colonies, and were about her husband and her children.  They give insight into the Puritan faith, in particular its strict moral code.

One of the most interesting of her poems is entitled, ' Before the Birth of One of her Children'.

The simple verse betrays not only Bradstreet's deep love for her children, but also the inherent fear and respect with which she held childbirth.  It gives great insight into the mental prepartion mothers of her time underwent before giving birth. 

George V: Mercy or Convenience?

George V grandfather of the current British monarch, Elizabeth II was born in 1865 and died on the 20th January 1936.  He reigned from the 6th May 1910 until his death.  He is notable for being the reigning monarch during the first world war. 

(George V)