Maine physicians of 1820 : a record of the members of the Massachusetts Medical Society practicing in the district of Maine at the date of the separation / by James A. Spalding.

  • Spalding, James Alfred, 1846-1938.
Date:
1928
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Maine physicians of 1820 : a record of the members of the Massachusetts Medical Society practicing in the district of Maine at the date of the separation / by James A. Spalding. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Origin of The Maine Medical Society of 1820 “The Eastern Argus” of Portland for December 19, 1819, contained this Notice: “A Meeting of the Physicians of Maine will soon be called for, from the Member of the Massa¬ chusetts Medical Society residing in Kennebunk, with the idea of forming a new medical society to begin with the Declaration of the Sovereignty of the State of Maine in 1820.’’ This notice was inserted by Dr. Samuel Emerson of Kennebunk, whom I entitle the Founder of the Society. When the Maine Medical Society after its first meeting in 1820 was legally incorporated in 1821, Dr. Nathaniel Coffin of Portland was elected President, Dr. Jonathan Page of Brunswick, Vice-President, and Dr. Samuel Ayer of Port¬ land, Secretary and Treasurer. Trouble arose at the start, and these officers resigned, but new officers were soon elected, meetings were held at Brunswick with seventeen members present at the first and in connection with Com¬ mencement at Bowdoin or at Augusta, and carried along with two addresses, five papers, and occasional reports of cases until the dissolution about 1845. One of the chief diffi¬ culties may have been too much joviality on the part of some of the members. As for the habits of physicians of that era, I note that on one occasion in another Society, one hundred members present disposed of 42 bottles of claret, 23 of Madeira, 41 of cider, and 11 gallons of lemonade flavored with more or less rum. Bad roads, also, must have pre¬ vented members from regular attendance. Physicians who were obliged to spend two entire days on the road from Ber¬ wick or Augusta or Thomaston to Brunswick and back, were not likely to make a great effort to attend. At all events, from various causes the Society died. If the members had held out a bit longer, the Railroads and the Prohibitory Law would have solved many difficulties about that time, and there would have been no interregnum between the death