Emilie Spencer
History 101- Levesque
Paper 2-History Channel
The new fall season is just around the corner and I am so excited. My staff and I received your memo about getting back to you with an idea for kick off week in September. We have had our researchers working on a project for sometime now and think this is a perfect time to move into production. Ratings tell us that viewers enjoy shows about medicine and we’ve done a variety in this particular genre; but for fall we propose doing a show about American medicine at the turn of the nineteenth century. We feel that this should be presented as a three part series, starting with a show called Bad Joke: an end to Humorous Medicine, featuring the medical practices available to Americans in the late eighteenth century, Post-Revolutionary War. Then a show called Army Medicine and The War of 1812, featuring Mary Gillett’s book The Army Medical Department 1775-1818. Then we’d finish the series with Prophetic Healer, a show specifically highlighting the physician Nathan Smith M.D. the founder of Dartmouth Medical School. These three shows would cover the time frame we discussed, from approx. 1775-1840.
Our opening show Bad Joke: an end to Humorous Medicine will go over different prevailing theories on the diagnosis and treatment of disease at the end of the eighteenth century. At the start of the program we could show how medical diagnosis happens today, such as: you go into a doctors office have an examination, blood may possibly be drawn for tests and medicine maybe prescribed. We will then describe the typical diagnosis system for eighteenth century Americans. It will describe the theory of balancing the four “humors”. (blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile) Primitive methods of treatment will be demonstrated through reenactment, including bleeding. We may consider filming at Colonial Williamsburg, the living museum in Williamsburg, Virginia for reenactments. The show will reveal that although the theory of “humors”, or the practice of balancing “humors”, had been widely used by physicians for centuries it was now coming to an end. Other theories such as the Acid/Alkalinity theory by Hermann Boerhaave, a Dutch physician, and the balancing of the nervous system by Dr. William Cullen, a Scotsman became more prevalent. These theories should be highlighted. The show will then turn to the more practical practice of medicine in the home and discusses the use of herbs by the early American housewife. The Bernard Becker Medical Library at Washington University School of Medicine has an extensive collection of rare medical books and it would be great to show some of the pages of the book Medical Repository the first medical journal published in the United States. Interviews could pepper the program, including interviewing the Librarian at Bernard Becker Medical Library and the Curator of Colonial Williamsburg.
The second show Army Medicine and The War of 1812, will be an especially interesting show. We purpose that this be filmed on location in tour like fashion, with a commentator showing the historical sites such as: The Battle of Thames in Canada, the Battle of Plattsburg in New York, the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in Alabama, and the battle for New Orleans after the official end to the war. The commentator should describe the hospitals of both the northern battle ground and southern, whether they are a hospital tents or mansions turned into hospitals. Treatment of the patients should also be described and reenacted. Ms. Gilletts book has a copious amount of graphics, including supply manifests, health records including photos of actual death lists with personal effects, vital statistics, and photos of physicians’ bags and descriptions of procedures to treat the wounded. These graphics are extremely informative, they could be used in combination with an interview of Ms Gillett, an expert of medical treatment of the time, which would be great. Using computer animation to show maps and hospital set-ups would be impressive as well. I also would like to touch on contagious diseases such as smallpox. Showing how recently inoculated but contagious soldiers were used to infiltrate the American strongholds by Great Britain, an example of germ warfare. A flash into the future of germ warfare would grab viewer interest at this point as well.
To conclude our series we’ll present an expose on Dr. Nathan Smith. He was a man whose skills were ahead of his time. Dr Smith was a rare bird, highly trained in a society of ordinary and poorly trained physicians. This Harvard trained master of medicine,(the fifth to graduate) wasn’t afraid to look outside the box. This is evident by his infamous surgery in 1813, on Joseph Smith the boy who would become the Prophet of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, the Mormons, who was afflicted with a bone infection in his leg after a wake of typhoid fever in the area. Described by Le Roy Worthlin, a vascular surgeon and member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, in 1978 “Nathan Smith was one of early America’s greatest medical men and had, on his own, devised an operation for osteomyelitis as early as 1798 that he would later publish in 1827 but that would lapse into disuse for two generations.” (Wirthlin, 2011) The LDS church currently has a film describing the life of the Prophet Joseph, and we are currently seeking permission to show the portion where his leg surgery is dramatized, this would add an interesting dynamic to the show. I also think an interview with a church historian would be called for. Dr. Smith single handedly founded Dartmouth Medical College as well as three other New England medical colleges, he was professor at Yale, and taught many other influential American physicians. At Yale today they have a historical club called the Nathan Smith Club, which has been around since 1924. Interviews with members and clips of the club in session would be a wonderful addition to this episode.
We have discussed and agree that the shows you’re looking for need to have lots of personal interest, reenactments, interviews, computer graphics including animation, well-known and not so well known historical figures and relevance to today’s society. By providing the History Channel with this series, we feel we meet this need. We also feel that although we have made medical shows previously, these particular scenarios have not been spotlighted. We look forward to presenting these shows in fall. Thank you for your consideration.
Works Cited
Blough, B., & Grossman, D. C. (2011). Two Hundred Years of Medicine. Retrieved 04 07, 2011, from Dartmouth Medical School: http://dms.dartmouth.edu/about/history/history.shtml/
Brainerd, R. (2005). 18th Century Medicine. Retrieved 04 07, 2011, from history1700s.com: http://www.history1700s.com/articles/article1016.shtml
Gillett, M. C. (2009, 05 21). The Army Medical Department 1775-1818. Retrieved 04 07, 2011, from U.S. Army Medical Department:Office of Medical History: http://history.amedd.army.mil/booksdocs/rev/gillett1/default.html
Jackson M.D., B. (2007). Nathan Smith Club. Retrieved 04 07, 2011, from Yale School of Medicine: http://medicine.yale.edu/histmed/events/smithclub.aspx
Library, B. B. (2009). Monuments of Medicine Collection. Retrieved 04 07, 2011, from Washington University School of Medicine: http://beckerexhibits.wustl.edu/rare/rights.html
Pryor, S., Kipps, R., Cotner, S., & Dippre, K. (2011). Eighteenth Century Medical Myths. Retrieved 04 07, 2011, from Colonial Williamsburg: http://www.history.org/history/teaching/enewsletter/volume2/may04/medicalmyths.cfm
The History of Medicine:The Revolutionary War. (2003). Retrieved 04 07, 2011, from Wellness Directory of Minnesota: http://www.mnwelldir.org/docs/history/history02.htm
Wirthlin, L. R. (2011). Jospeh Smiths Surgeon. Retrieved 04 07, 2011, from LDS.org: http://lds.org/ensign/1978/03/discovery/joseph-smiths-surgeon?lang=eng&query=joseph+smith+leg+surgery
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