Blanchard's Balloon
On January 9, 1793, Jean Pierre Blanchard made the first balloon ascent in North America. That day, he ascended from the Washington Prison Yard in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and landed in Gloucester County, New Jersey. Carrying the first airmail letter, this flight was observed by President George Washington. After that flight, Blanchard returned to Europe and, with his wife, Marie, who had also learned to fly balloons, performed many other exhibitions. In addition to his balloon flights in France and the United States, Blanchard is also credited with the first balloon flights in Germany, Belgium, Poland, and the Netherlands.
About Blanchard
More about the event
About Blanchard
More about the event
Dr. Benjamin Rush
Rush's therapeutic theories were severely tested during the Philadelphia yellow fever epidemic of 1793, which struck harder than any of the six such epidemics before it. From early August until November of that year, it claimed the lives of between 4000 and 5000 residents of Philadelphia, or about one-tenth of the population. As the epidemic worsened, Rush grew desperate, for nothing he tried seemed to work. In late August, he happened to reread a 1744 manuscript written by John Mitchell, a Scottish physician who had experienced the 1741 yellow fever epidemic in Virginia and who recommended strong purges for even the weakest patients. Rush began "depletion" treatments accordingly, administrating heavy doses of purgatives complemented with bloodletting and applications of cold water. He found his system highly effective, especially when employed early. Rush himself fell ill with fever twice during the epidemic, but recovered quickly after applying his treatment.
When the epidemic lifted, stories of Rush's untiring devotion to his patients while other physicians were fleeing the city made him a popular hero. Nonetheless, a number of his professional colleagues and a few lay persons accused him of applying his therapy indiscriminately and excessively. His continued use of his therapy in later yellow fever epidemics excited such antagonism between him and the College of Physicians that he ultimately resigned from the body and nearly left Philadelphia for New York. Rush also made a number of professional enemies when he defended unpopular theories on the origins and transmission of disease. His insistence that yellow fever arose from putrid matter left in the open rather than from contagion angered many proud Philadelphians.
As Rush continued practicing, teaching, advocating social reforms, and writing after the yellow fever epidemic, his renown grew at an increasing rate. From 1797 to 1813, he served as Treasurer of the U.S. Mint. Rush's interest in the medical relationship between mind and body resulted in the 1812 publication of Medical Inquiries and Observations upon the Diseases of the Mind, which was reprinted four times by 1835. The work was the first American text on the subject and secured Rush's position as "father of American psychiatry". While studying psychiatry, Rush devised two curious instruments, the gyrator, based on the principle of centrifugal action to increase cerebral circulation, and the tranquilizer, "to obviate these evils of the 'strait waistcoat' and at the same time to obtain all the benefit of coercion". These instruments provided a form of shock therapy, which was interpreted as effecting cures according to his theory involving nervous states.
Dr. Rush's Medicine Chest
When the epidemic lifted, stories of Rush's untiring devotion to his patients while other physicians were fleeing the city made him a popular hero. Nonetheless, a number of his professional colleagues and a few lay persons accused him of applying his therapy indiscriminately and excessively. His continued use of his therapy in later yellow fever epidemics excited such antagonism between him and the College of Physicians that he ultimately resigned from the body and nearly left Philadelphia for New York. Rush also made a number of professional enemies when he defended unpopular theories on the origins and transmission of disease. His insistence that yellow fever arose from putrid matter left in the open rather than from contagion angered many proud Philadelphians.
As Rush continued practicing, teaching, advocating social reforms, and writing after the yellow fever epidemic, his renown grew at an increasing rate. From 1797 to 1813, he served as Treasurer of the U.S. Mint. Rush's interest in the medical relationship between mind and body resulted in the 1812 publication of Medical Inquiries and Observations upon the Diseases of the Mind, which was reprinted four times by 1835. The work was the first American text on the subject and secured Rush's position as "father of American psychiatry". While studying psychiatry, Rush devised two curious instruments, the gyrator, based on the principle of centrifugal action to increase cerebral circulation, and the tranquilizer, "to obviate these evils of the 'strait waistcoat' and at the same time to obtain all the benefit of coercion". These instruments provided a form of shock therapy, which was interpreted as effecting cures according to his theory involving nervous states.
Dr. Rush's Medicine Chest
Bloodletting
Bloodletting is a procedure that was performed to help alleviate the ills of mankind. For an operation with a 3,000-year history, bloodletting has attracted little attention in recent historic accounts of medicine. Bloodletting began with the Egyptians of the River Nile one thousand years B.C., and the tradition spread to the Greeks and Romans; its popularity continued throughout the Middle Ages. It reached its zenith during the beginning of the nineteenth century, but had virtually died as a therapeutic tool by the end of that century.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/redgold/basics/bloodlettinghistory.html
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/redgold/basics/bloodlettinghistory.html
Videos of the history
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBaHB_T16lk
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