How chloroform anesthesia reached Lowell, Massachusetts: From Simpson's pamphlet to Gladwin's advertisement.

J.Y. Simpson of Edinburgh, Scotland discovered chloroform anesthesia in November 1847. During this time, W.T.G. Morton's agents had been collecting royalties for the use of ether across much of the United States. After reading about the advantages of chloroform as cited in C.T. Jackson's writings in the Boston Daily Atlas, S.F. Gladwin, a dentist in Lowell, Massachusetts, who had been reluctant to pay any ether royalties, demonstrated his independence and opportunism in swiftly adopting chloroform in his practice and publicizing its use through local advertisements.

"To nitrous oxide, chloroform gives way": Was Dr. W.J.A. DeLancey's poetic license in advertising inspired?

Born in New Hampshire but raised in Massachusetts, 14-year-old William J.A. DeLancey became "the man of the house" after the accidental death of his father. Amiable and good humored, young DeLancey supported his widowed mother and his three sisters until the girls all reached maturity. After he married, DeLancey moved to Illinois and took up dentistry, eventually settling in Centralia. Following anesthesia training back east at Manhattan's Colton Dental Association, DeLancey returned to Centralia. There he practiced the Coltonian method of testing freshly made nitrous oxide upon himself before using the gas upon patients. Before his training at Colton Dental, DeLancey had advertised in Centralia newspapers only in prose. After he began administering laughing gas to his patients and to himself, DeLancey waxed poetic and began advertising in heroic couplets in local newspapers.

From Colton's guess to Andrews' table to Bunnell's paper to Spencer's card: Misleading the public about nitrous oxide's safety.

Famous for pioneering the oxygenation of nitrous-oxide anesthetics, Chicago surgeon Edmund Andrews trusted the Manhattan-based Colton Dental Association's claim that they had conducted 75,000 nitrous-oxide anesthetics without a single mortality. Those statistics were cited in Andrews' 1870 journal article on anesthetic risks and then, remarkably, advertised on the business cards of dentist James M. Spencer, Jr., of Gouverneur, New York.

From ACE to ACENO: How America's Munson added Harley's British mixture to nitrous oxide.

An Ohio dentist, Corydon Munson, patented a gasometer with an attachment for vaporizing trace amounts of volatile general anesthetics or their mixtures into unoxygenated nitrous oxide. After vaporizing a variant of George Harley's ACE mixture into nitrous oxide, Munson branded his own novel anesthetic combination as ACENO.

James M. Clyde, D.D.S., M.S.A.: The Canadian-American who rescued the Chicago Post-Graduate School of Anaesthesia.

The Chicago Post-Graduate School of Anaesthesia (PGSA) commenced with the opening of the Columbian Exposition, eight miles north of that Chicago World's Fair in May of 1893. When PGSA founder Samuel J. Hayes, D.D.S., M.S.A., forsook Chicago to tend to his moribund son back in Pittsburgh, Hayes' fellow professor, James M. Clyde, D.D.S., M.S.A., kept the PGSA from closing.

Emerging from tabloid scandal: Dr. U.K. Mayo's Vegetable Vapor extends nitrous oxide's anesthetic duration.

Urial K. Mayo (1816-1900) was a successful Boston dentist who was plagued by personal scandal. In 1883 he patented extending the duration of nitrous-oxide anesthesia with an alcoholic tincture of hops and poppies.

W Harry Archer's collection of Horace Wells letters are still available. A commentary on a new publication.

The definitive account of the life and work of Horace Wells, the dentist from Hartford, Connecticut, who experimented with nitrous oxide anesthesia in 1844, is that published by W Harry Archer for the centenary of Wells's work. A major source of original material was a collection of letters, by Wells and others, that Archer found in the house in Hartford, Vermont, in which Wells was born. In later support for Wells being better recognized for his role in the introduction of general anaesthesia, Richard J Wolfe and Leonard F Menczer published a collection of essays in 1994. However, their preparation was hampered by their (mis)understanding that the 'Archer' letters (which were lodged in the Pittsburgh University Library) were "missing", a belief which continued, but has been disproved by a new author. Before his death, John Bunker encouraged his anthropologist daughter, Emily, to continue a project he had been planning on the history of anesthesia, and the result is a new book, "Horace and Elizabeth: Love and Death and Painless Dentistry". First and foremost Ms Bunker has discovered that the Archer Letters are very much available, and has been greatly helped by the University of Pittsburgh Library in producing her book. She has used reproductions and transcriptions of the letters (some previously unpublished) and other contemporary documents to illustrate Wells's role in the great discovery. Some of the material, especially from before the 'Colton' demonstration of 1844 is remarkable; it is almost like hearing the story from Wells himself.

Phineas T. Barnum, Gardner Q. Colton, and Painless Parker Were Kindred Princes of Humbug.

Phineas T. Barnum (1810-1891) and Gardner Q. Colton (1814-1898) both entered the laughing gas show business in Manhattan in 1844. With Horace Wells (1815-1848), Colton introduced inhaled nitrous oxide for dental anesthesia in December 1844. The Barnumesque nature of laughing gas exhibitions may have contributed to the initially negative reception of nitrous anesthesia as humbug. Colton continued laughing gas shows after 1844, and he performed in a Barnum forum in Boston in 1862. In 1863, Barnum encouraged Colton to establish a flourishing painless dentistry practice in Manhattan. Barnum designated himself to be the Prince of Humbug. He embraced humbug for entertainment purposes but decried medical humbug. Notwithstanding, Barnum explicitly evinced awareness of the power of the placebo response. Accordingly, the proneness of individuals to deem impersonal all-purpose assessments to be personally applicable is dubbed the Barnum effect. Barnum was indirectly connected to Painless Parker (1872-1952), a dentist who exploited sensational advertising and humbug and ran a circus.

Cocaine and Achieving Rapid Pulpal Anesthesia Prior to Extirpation.

Prior to the effective use of local anesthetics to achieve profound pulpal anesthesia before extirpation, whether in the form of a nerve block or infiltration, or in some cases the use of intrapulpal injections,1, 2 the clinician was faced with a challenge to ensure that the patient would be pain free during the procedure. In these cases the use of nitrous oxide and oxygen was common. Not so common was the use of cocaine or a solution of cocaine hydrochloride that was advocated to penetrate the dentinal tubules and create pulpal insensibility in the late 1800s.3, 4.

From Dental to Mental Institutions: A Quadruple Threat of Nitrous-Oxide Administration Before and During Mental Asylum Admission.

During the 19th century, patients undergoing anesthesia for surgical and dental procedures were at risk of being given hypoxic or dilute nitrous oxide on four separate occasions. Primary and secondary saturation during surgery could account for two administrations of 100% nitrous-oxide anesthesia, while both diagnostic and therapeutic doses of dilute nitrous oxide were frequently administered in mental asylums.

From Dental to Mental Institutions: Elmer McKesson's Secondary Saturation with Nitrous Oxide.

As popularized by Elmer McKesson, MD, "secondary saturation" with nitrous oxide could expose patients to a second burst of 100% laughing gas to relax their muscles to assist surgeons. On rare occasions, this technique could provide a second opportunity for hypoxic brain damage and possible admission postoperatively to insane asylums.

A Nitrous-Oxide Pioneer Peddles His Own Dentifrice: "Dr Colton's Vegetable Dentonic".

During the latter half of the six-year long "Panic of 1873," nitrous-oxide pioneer G.Q. Colton developed, advertised, and sold his dentifrice, "Dr Colton's Vegetable Dentonic" to supplement his dental anesthetic enterprise.

Popular Literature as an Educational Aid for History of Anesthesia.

INTRODUCTION: History of anesthesia can be learned through formal didactic lectures, discussions, tours, audiovisual media, general anesthesia textbooks, anesthesia history texts, and by popular literature. METHODS: We studied thirteen books that describe events and advances related to the discovery and development of modern anesthesia. Deliberately omitted were books that might be considered by some to be textbooks, because our aim was to explore the genre of popular literature. RESULTS: The books span the spectrum from introductory historical narratives to comprehensive summaries, biographies, and scholarly works. CONCLUSIONS: These books provide a varied perspective on various aspects of the discovery of anesthesia, ranging from a quick read to scholarly work. If only one book were to be recommended for the novice, we suggest Julie Fenster's historical narrative, Ether Day.

The Perfect and Famous Anesthetic Known as Methyl in Boston in 1895.

Extravagant claims were made for proprietary dental anesthetics in Boston, MA, in the late 1800s. For instance, in 1883, Urial K. Mayo introduced an inhaled Vegetable Anaesthetic comprised of nitrous oxide that had been uselessly pretreated with botanical material. This misguided concept may have been inspired by homeopathy, but it was also in line with the earlier false belief of Elton R. Smilie, Charles T. Jackson, and William T.G. Morton that sulfuric ether could volatilize opium at room temperature. In 1895, the Dental Methyl Company advertised an agent they called Methyl, a supposedly perfect topical anesthetic for painless dental extraction. The active ingredient was probably chloroform. Anesthetic humbug did not cease in Boston on Ether Day of October 16, 1846.

From Dental to Mental Institutions: An American Dentist and a British Psychiatrist Highlight Insanity Following Nitrous-Oxide Administration.

In 1887, American dentist Samuel J. Hayes published reports associating unoxygenated anesthetics with asphyxia and insanity, and then British psychiatrist George H. Savage published a report of cases of insanity following nitrous-oxide anesthesia in British journals.

Providing Anesthesia in the Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery Office: A Look Back, Where We Are Now and a Look Ahead.

Throughout its development the practice of oral and maxillofacial surgery has been richly associated with the provision of anesthetic services. Dentists and particularly oral and maxillofacial surgeons have advanced the science associated with anesthesia especially in the outpatient setting. This article will look back on the development of anesthesia as it relates to oral and maxillofacial surgery, discuss the current mode of anesthesia in the oral surgeon's practice and look ahead to what innovations are advancing this field.

Precarious Distraction and Carious Extraction: Nitrous Oxide during the "Second World Billiards Tournament".

During the 1879 Brunswick & Balke World Billiards Tournament, Manager FC Newhall had a tooth extracted under nitrous oxide administered by GQ Colton. The dental extraction occurred at the tournament site, New York City's Cooper Institute.