A Brief History of Medicine in Massachusetts

A BRIEF HISTORY OF MEDICINE IN MASSACHUSETTS. By Henry R. Viets, M.D., (Fellow of Massachusetts Medical Society). Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin Company, I930, Xiv + I94 pp. One of the salutary signs of the growing interest in the history of medicine is the recent appearance of a large number of histories of medicine devoted to a given locality-a country, a state, a town, or even a hospital. A few weeks ago, for example, Hoeber published a History of Haitian Medicine (Parsons). The state histories, however, are even more significant. C. B. Burr's Medical History of Michigan*, the first volume of which has just appeared, is an admirable work giving, among other things, many details about William Beaumont. W. P. Blanton's Medicine in Virginia**, also a delightful book, nicely printed and bound, illustrates the same tendency in the South. We are also informed that a history of medicine in Minnesota will soon appear under the editorship of Dr. James Armstrong. No one, since Gurdon W. Russell of Hartford wrote his brief (158 pp.) Early medicine and early medical men in Connecticut in I892, has attempted to describe the story of medicine in this state, and it is hoped that under the stimulus of our contemporary state historians a local history will soon be written. No American state has had such rich or varied material for medical history as has Massachusetts. One immediately calls to mind the discovery of surgical anesthesia (Dr. Viets' book has as a frontispiece the well-known picture of Morton's first public demonstration of ether), and the celebrated medical families of Massachusetts-Warrens, Jacksons, Bigelows, Shattucks, Cheevers, and Homans; one thinks also of the great personal contributions of Boylston, Bowditch and Fitz, and of the new era in surgery inaugurated by Harvey Cushing; finally one is reminded of one of the great discoveries of modern clinical medicine, the cure of pernicious anTmia. These riches would have embarrassed many medical historians and intimidated others, but Dr. Viets has sailed a clear course and given a book of absorbing interest which has the great virtues of brevity, accuracy, and a singularly happy perspective.