Uncle John’s Supremely Satisfying Bathroom Reader® (18 page)

Dispatcher:
“Help you what?”

Caller:
“Help me get these damn chains on my car!”

The average American worker receives 201 phone, paper, and e-mail messages per day.

Most of us take modern medical science for granted. MRIs, pain relievers, and the polio vaccine may not seem like a big deal today, but if you look back a couple hundred years, it may change your mind.

These days you can easily find dozens of effective remedies at the local pharmacy to treat anything from a sore toe to scalp itch. So it’s hard to imagine that less than 200 years ago, a person complaining to a trusted physician about a simple ailment was likely to undergo barbaric treatment that included draining of the blood, blistering of the skin, and induced vomiting.

In the 1800s, doctors were scarce and ill-trained. There were no regulations concerning the education of physicians. With just a little booklearning or information passed down by a family member, almost anyone could set up shop and call himself a doctor. There were no antibiotics, no X-rays, no vaccines, and none of the diagnostic tools we now take for granted.

Surgery was often performed by barbers. Not only did they give haircuts and shaves, but they also extracted teeth, lanced boils, and bled patients. In fact, the colors of the familiar barber’s pole are derived from the practice of bloodletting: red for blood, and white for bandages. The pole itself was sometimes grasped by the patient in order to make his veins stand out and make the bloodletting easier. In the end, the patient was as likely to die from the treatment as from the illness.

People of the 19th century accepted pain as an inevitable part of life. The aches and pains we associate with a long day of work or a touch of the flu couldn’t be quelled by popping an aspirin—that wonder drug wasn’t introduced until 1899. The common rationale was that pain was a punishment from God, and to endure it was good for the soul.

There were no anesthetics either. Until the 1840s all surgeries were performed without it. For this reason, not to mention the real possibility of death from blood loss, surgeons had to be quick. Records show that during the Battle of Bordello, Dominique Jean Larrey (1766–1842), a surgeon in Napoléon’s army, performed 200 amputations in the first 24 hours. Even at that speed, the mortality rate was almost 100% due to shock or infection. Septicemia, or blood poisoning, was an ever-present danger. Surgeons traveled from dissection room to operating room, never once changing their coats or washing their hands.

Heads up: Raindrops fall as fast as 22 mph.

Most physicians of the 1800s still subscribed to the ancient Greek belief that the body was made up of four “humors” corresponding to the four elements of the Earth: yellow bile (air), black bile (water), phlegm (Earth), and blood (fire). The Greeks believed that a lack or excess of these humors caused all illnesses, and had to be treated accordingly. If a doctor suspected a buildup of bad blood, the patient would be “cured” by the cutting and draining of the offensive liquid. There are even records of primitive transfusions using sheep’s or cow’s blood.

Dr. Benjamin Rush (1745–1813), a signer of the Declaration of Independence, humanitarian, and renowned physician, was a noted believer in “humor” therapy. To maintain balance among the humors, Rush prescribed a horrifying course of bloodletting, blistering, and swinging of the body, a treatment in which the patient would be strapped into a chair, suspended from the ceiling by a rope, and swung violently back and forth to induce vomiting. Once patients vomited, they were brought down and the treatment was considered a success.

In the 1820s and 1830s, people had little faith in “scientific” medicine, due no doubt to treatments that were painful and usually produced no results other than infection or death. A new movement of treating illnesses with old folk remedies grew out of the public’s fear and distrust of doctors. The medical profession called it quackery. The word is thought to originate either from the phrase “quicksilver doctor,” which refers to the use of highly poisonous mercury as a cure, or from kwaksalver, an early Dutch term meaning “someone who prattles about the efficacy of his remedies.”

Only 6% of coupons printed are ever redeemed.

Either way, quacks promised quick results and easy answers without evidence to support their claims. They sold cure-all elixirs—such as Lydia Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound, which was 80% vegetable extracts and 20% alcohol—and patent medicines laced with cocaine, opium, and caffeine. Morphine-based mixtures were even sold in the Sears catalog. Patients often felt better after taking a swig (or several swigs), but these patent medicines didn’t cure anything.

What changed? In 1865 Dr. Joseph Lister noted that almost half of patients with amputations were dying. The main cause: post-operative sepsis infections, or sepsis for short. He blamed it on unsanitary conditions, comparing the smell of an operating room to a city sewer. Inspired by Louis Pasteur’s theory that decay was caused by living organisms in the air, which on entering matter made it ferment, Lister made the connection with sepsis. He had also heard that carbolic acid was being used to treat sewage, so he began using it to clean wounds and sterilize instruments.

In 1846 Scottish surgeon Dr. Robert Liston (1794–1847) introduced the use of ether as an anesthetic, making it possible for doctors to operate on patients with less pain.

Other advances included the invention of the clinical thermometer, stethoscope, and hypodermic needle, the development of anthrax, rabies, and smallpox vaccines in the 19th century; and the discovery of penicillin in the early 20th century.

When technology started catching up with advances in medicine, X-rays, the incandescent light, and even the invention of the telephone changed things dramatically for both patient and surgeon. But was it the end of quackery? Not by a long shot.

To read about Modern Quackery, go to
page 300
.

Sweet Dreams.
According to Betty Bethards in
The Dream Book: Symbols for Self-Understanding,
“toilet dreams” have to do with how well the dreamer is “flushing out negativity and wastes,” including letting go of unneeded thoughts and experiences and releasing the past so as to live fully in the present.

Number one health complaint Americans report to their doctors: insomnia.

Politicians aren’t getting much respect these days—but then, it sounds like they don’t deserve much, either.

“The more we remove penalties for being a bum, the more bumism is going to blossom.”

Sen. Jesse Helms (R-NC), on welfare

“We didn’t send you to Washington to make intelligent decisions. We sent you to represent us.”

—
Kent York, a Texas pastor, to Rep. Bill Sarpalius (D-TX)

“President Clinton had a bill, e-i-e-i-o. And in that bill was lots of pork, e-i-e-i-o.”

—
Sen. Alfonse D’Amato (R-NY)

“I have orders to be awakened at any time in the case of a national emergency, even if I’m in a cabinet meeting.”

—
Ronald Reagan

“The present system may be flawed, but that’s not to say that we in Congress can’t make it worse.”

—
Rep. E. Clay Shaw, Jr. (R-FL)

“Is the country still here?”

—
Calvin Coolidge, waking from a nap

“We’ve killed health care; now we’ve got to make sure our fingerprints aren’t on it.”

—
Sen. Bob Packwood (R-OR), in 1994, on the GOP blocking Clinton’s health-care reforms

“Ambiguously definitive—or is it definitively ambiguous?”

—
Sen. Bill Bradley, on being unclear about his presidential ambitions

“It’s no exaggeration to say that the undecideds could go one way or another.”

—
George H. W. Bush

“We didn’t get the pay raise—why work?”

—Bob Dole, in 1989, on the slow pace of Senate activity

“Welcome to President Bush, Mrs. Bush, and my fellow astronauts.”

—
Dan Quayle

When George Washington was president, there were about 350 federal employees.

Remember those long summer days when you were a kid… jumping rope and making up rhymes? Here are some great old jump rope rhymes found in
Zickary Zan, Childhood Folklore,
by Jack and Olivia Solomon.

Bubble Gum

Bubble gum, bubble gum,

Chew and blow.

Bubble gum, bubble gum,

Scrape your toe.

Bubble gum, bubble gum,

Tastes so sweet,

Get that bubble gum off your feet.

Alligator Purse

Mother, Mother, I am ill,

Send for the doctor to give me a pill.

In came the doctor,

In came the nurse,

In came the lady with the alligator purse.

Hot Dog

My mother is a butcher;

My father cuts the meat.

I’m a little hot dog

Running down the street.

How many hot dogs did I sell?

Mary Mack

Mary Mack, dressed in black

Silver gold buttons down her back.

Ask her ma for fifteen cents

To see the elephant jump the fence.

He jumped so high he touched the sky

And won’t come back

Until the Fourth of July.

K-i-s-s-i-n-g

(John) and (Karen) sitting in a tree

K-i-s-s-i-n-g.

First comes love, then comes marriage,

Then comes (Karen) with a baby carriage.

How many babies did she have?

Rooms for Rent

Rooms for rent,

Inquire within,

When I move out,

Let (Ann) move in.

Margie

Margie drank some marmalade,

Margie drank some pop,

Margie drank some other things

That made her stomach flop;

Whoops went the marmalade,

Whoops went the pop,

Whoops went the other things

That made her stomach flop.

How Many Years?

Apple, peach, pumpkin pie.

How many years before I die?

One, two, three, etc.

Dressed in Green

Cinderella, dressed in green,

Went upstairs to eat ice cream.

How many spoonfuls did she eat?

Americans use 4.8 billion gallons of water flushing toilets each day.

In part one of our story (
page 45
), we told you about the camera obscura, the drawing tool that eventually evolved into the modern camera. In this installment, we introduce you to some of the people who played a role in inventing film.

In 1674 an alchemist named Christoph Adolph Balduin performed a chemistry experiment that he hoped would help him isolate the mysterious natural force he called the
Welt-geist,
or “universal spirit.” He dissolved some chalk (calcium carbonate) in nitric acid to create a sludgy substance that would easily absorb moisture from the atmosphere. Balduin believed that if he could distill the moisture from the sludge, he would capture the universal spirit in pure form.