Mr. Cline's lectures on anatomy & surgery, 1799-1800 (inclusive)

Volume containing notes on the lectures of Henry Cline (1750-1827), a surgeon at St. Thomas's Hospital, London, England, that were kept by American medical student John Collins Warren in 1799 and 1800. The lectures were on topics including blood, blood vessels, absorbents, cellular membranes, and the nerves. There are annotations in pencil in an unknown hand throughout the volume.

Student lectures notes on chemistry and materia medica, and medical recipes, of Lyman Spalding, 1795-1799 (inclusive)

Contains notes taken by Harvard student Lyman Spalding during eleven chemistry lectures delivered by Harvard Professor Aaron Dexter (1750-1829) in the fall of 1795 and recipes prepared and used by Spalding in his medical practice in 1797. The recipes include elixir vitriol, containing liquor, Jamaica pepper, cinnamon, and ginger, and an electuary for a cough, containing oxymel squills (sea onion in honey), licorice, antimonium tartaricum potash (a compound of the chemical element antimony and a potassium-containing salt), and opium. The volume also contains writings about chemistry by Spalding, some of which appear transcribed from published sources, in undated entries, and a diary entry from 1799 regarding an experiment with water.

Student lecture notes on anatomy and surgery, and medical notes, of Lyman Spalding, 1795

Contains notes taken by Harvard student Lyman Spalding (1775-1821) from lectures on anatomy and surgery delivered by Harvard Professor John Warren (1753-1815) in 1795, as well a section entitled “Medical Observations,” which includes entries on “Vernal Debility,” or diseases occurring in the spring, and lung function. It is unclear if these are Spalding’s own writings or transcriptions from a published work. There is also text transcribed from “Elementa Medicinae,” published in 1780 by Scottish physician John Brown.

Student notes from medical lectures by Benjamin Rush, undated

The volumes contain student notes on a course of medical lectures given by Dr. Benjamin Rush (1746-1813) while he was Professor of the Institutes of Medicine and Clinical Practice at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School, likely in circa 1800-1813. The notes indicate Rush often referenced the works or teachings of contemporaries such as Scottish physicians William Cullen, John Brown, John Gregory, and Robert Whytt, and Dutch physician Herman Boerhaave. He frequently included anecdotes and case histories of his own patients, as well as those of other doctors, to illustrate his lecture topics. He also advised students to take notes on the lectures after they ended to allow them to focus on what they were hearing. Volume 1 includes notes on: physician conduct during visits to patients; human and animal physiology; voice and speech; the nervous system; the five senses; and faculties of the mind. Volume 2 includes notes on: food, the sources of appetite and thirst, and digestion; the lymphatic system; secretions; excretions; theories of nutrition; differences in the minds and bodies of women and men; reproduction; pathology; a table outlining the stages of disease production; “disease and the origin of moral and natural evil”; contagions; the role of food, drink, and clothing in producing disease; worms; hereditary diseases; predisposition to diseases; proximate causes of diseases; and pulmonary conditions. Volume 3 includes notes on: the pulse; therapeutics, such as emetics, sedatives, and digitalis, and treatment of various illnesses like pulmonary consumption, kidney disease, palsy, and rheumatism; diagnosis and prognosis of fever; treatment of intermitting fever; and epidemics including plague, smallpox, and yellow fever, with an emphasis on the yellow fever outbreaks in Philadelphia in 1793 and 1797.

Receipt for medical services, 1799 September

Two copies of a handwritten receipt signed by Dr. William Gamage (Harvard AB 1767) for "medicine and attendance" for Loammi Baldwin's son in September 1799.

College Book 8, 1778-1803

This volume contains a fair copy of minutes from Corporation meetings held from May 5, 1778 through October 14, 1803. It begins with an alphabetical index and contains entries related to a wide range of topics, including changes in the College laws; lists of Harvard graduates; historical information about the College and its governance; memorials to the Massachusetts General Court about currency concerns, the West Boston Bridge, and other matters; the establishment of medical professorships and selection of professors to fill them; land and property belonging to Harvard; the settlement of accounts with former College Treasurer John Hancock; support of missionaries to several Indian tribes; the establishment of a student dress code; the Charlestown Ferry, and its revenue troubles following the construction of the West Boston Bridge; the purchase of a wooden sloop for transporting students' "fuel" (presumably firewood); the creation and distribution of library catalogs; the commission of a lucernal microscope for the College Apparatus; Oneida Indian Isaac Solegwaston and Harvard's financial support of his studies at the Hamilton Oneida Academy; transcriptions of a letter (October 23, 1789) from the Corporation to President George Washington and of Washington's response; a petition to the General Court for the establishment of a public infirmary to serve the indigent; individuals who were granted permission to instruct Harvard students in the French language outside the established curriculum; and Thomas Welsh's excused absence from his Harvard graduation, granted June 14, 1798, because of his imminent departure for Berlin to serve as Secretary to John Quincy Adams, then Minister Plenipotentiary to Berlin.

Student lecture notes on the Theory & Practice of Physic, and patient case histories, of Lyman Spalding, 1795-1799 (inclusive)

Contains notes taken by Harvard student Lyman Spalding from lectures delivered by Hersey Professor of the Theory and Practice of Physic Benjamin Waterhouse (1754-1846) in 1795. The notes cover the history of medicine, theories of contemporary physicians like Herman Boerhaave, William Cullen, and John Brown, and topics like fetal growth, digestion, and circulation. The volume also contains six pages of patient case notes from Spalding’s medical practice in Walpole, New Hampshire, in 1799, which detail the patients’ symptoms and course of treatment he pursued. In the case of a young man who complained of pain in his breast following a wrestling match, Spalding bled him and prescribed a cathartic of soap and aloes. Spalding also operated on a man who cut off part of his ankle with an ax.

Student notebook of Benjamin Waterhouse: 1776

Volume containing notes taken in 1776 by Benjamin Waterhouse (1754-1846) on medical lectures given in Scotland by University of Edinburgh Professor Andrew Duncan (1744-1828). The lectures focused on pathology, with attention given to secretion, absorption, nutrition, excretion, circulation, and respiration. There are also notes on common medicines and their indications and contraindications, such as emetics, cathartics, diaphoretics, and diuretics.