Marketplace of the Marvelous

October 7, 2013
Janik (Apple: A Global History), series producer for Wisconsin Public Radio’s Wisconsin Life, offers a particular perspective on 19th-century medicine with this survey of “irregular” treatments that Americans embraced as they turned away from standard medicine. Little changed for two centuries, standard medicine’s “heroic” and often deadly offerings were eschewed for practices like heat and herb therapy, hydrotherapy, phrenology, and homeopathy. Janik reveals the significant role women played in the development of these treatments and spread of do-it-yourself medical books, almanacs, and family recipes for healing salves, prophylactics, and popular herbal remedies. Americans loved anything that “gave them the power to treat themselves,” Janik notes—and 19th-century alternative systems did just that. Bottles of ready-to-use homeopathic remedies came in home kits, and Lydia Pinkham’s medicinal brews not only brought neighbors flocking to her door in the 1870s, but her secret vegetable compound is still on the market in at least two variations. Janik argues that “complementary” and “alternative” therapies are just a 20th-century update of irregular medicine—and recognition by Congress, the Mayo Clinic, and major universities proves “the willingness of regular medicine to consider or at least tolerate the merits of their competitors, an almost unimaginable idea less than a century ago.” She’s delivered a must-read for medical history buffs, whether mainstream or maverick.

January 1, 2014
A sharp compendium of the stranger developments in 19th-century medicine that have influenced how we care for ourselves today. In parallel to the discovery of germs, X-ray technology and the novel idea of sterilized surgery, there developed a branch of pseudoscience called alternative, or irregular, medicine. The irregular practices were aligned by their democratic belief in a common understanding of medicine for the benefit of the people--i.e., wellness that did not rely on institutionalized, elitist doctors. After all, the accepted practices of the establishment included painful, "heroic" treatments like bloodletting, induced vomiting and blistering, which were believed to draw the disease out of a person. Other accepted ministrations were chemical purgatives that contained mercury, arsenic and antimony. Among the alternative methods that historian Janik (Apple: A Global History, 2011, etc.) highlights are holistic practices like hydropathy and botanic medicine, which stressed the curative and hygienic qualities of water, as well as natural, plant-based solutions. While the methods of hydropathy and botanic medicine were ambitious and well-meaning, these methods were also mostly incorrect. Among the irregular practices that proved most reliable and scientific was the chiropractic technique, which is still practiced today. On the other hand, phrenology, homeopathy and mesmerism all fit the description of "quack" science for their bizarre practices--e.g., measuring skull variations to determine intellectual and emotional attributes, ingesting diluted doses of harmful tinctures and controlling the flow of nervous fluids with magnets. These practices proved highly lucrative for many of their founders and inspired throngs of followers and fellow practitioners, much to the dismay of the distinguished physician Oliver Wendell Holmes, who persistently railed against the pseudoscience community for challenging the academy. Perhaps most importantly, Janik asserts the role of women in administering remedies--mothers were the chief doctors of local communities--and developing the successful irregular methods into what we now consider conventional medicine. A thorough, informative history of the many eccentric narratives that make these quack sciences so interesting and important to modern medicine.

COPYRIGHT(2014) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

December 1, 2013
Conventional medical treatment in nineteenth-century America was a high-risk, low-reward venturea dangerous and not very effective path to recovery. Dubbed heroic therapy, the usual remedy for most ailments involved some scary combination of bloodletting, blistering, and purging (with liberal administration of laxatives and emetics). The side effects of this therapy, along with dismal results, opened the door for a variety of alternative healing methods. Historian Janik chronicles the rise and fall and renewed popularity of alternative medicine. Alternative healers tended to reach out to women (recognizing their role as caregivers in the family) and tapped into the prevailing mind-set of Americans, who thought of themselves as self-reliant. Some of these remedies have persisted and prospered: manual manipulation and adjustments (by chiropractors and osteopaths), hypnosis, and the use of botanic medicines. Others have had less success and staying power: phrenology (reading the topography of the skull), magnetic healing, and hydropathy (treatment with cold water). Oscillating between arousing feelings of hope and doubt, alternative medicine in America endures.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)