After 11 years, From the Hands of Quacks is officially shutting down. Thank you for your support over the years.
Latest Posts
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At long last, my first book will be published! Hearing Happiness: Deafness Cures in History will be published by the University of Chicago Press and available in May 2020. Through lyrical history and personal memoir, this book raises pivotal questions about deafness in American society and the endless quest for a cure. Taking us from the 1860s up… Continue Reading
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Why is cancer taken more seriously than endometriosis?
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The first time must have been a year or two ago, but I dismissed it, thinking it was nothing more than a muscle cramp or leftover period pain. It made its appearance then left, so there was nothing left to think about. Yet, it persisted. Occasionally throbbing or stabbing me. I was fine though, for… Continue Reading
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I’m happy to announce that I signed a contract with University of Chicago Press to publish my first book, Hearing Happiness: Fakes, Frauds, and Fads in Deafness Cures. The book explores the history of therapeutic choices and negotiations respecting “deafness cures,” including Eustachian tube catheterization, artificial eardrums, electrical apparatuses, the fenestration operation, and an abundance… Continue Reading
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In May, I took up my position as the 2016 Klemperer Fellow in the History of Medicine at the New York Academy of Medicine. Thanks to the wonderful staff there, especially Arlene Shanter, I was able to dig through the library’s trove of materials on otologists in the 1920s and 1930s and their collaborations with social… Continue Reading
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“It is so refreshing these war-threatened days to find a scientist and an engineer using their great gifts to help humanity rather than to devise means to destroy life and property.” -Letter from Dr. C.J. McSweeny to Sir William Bragg, 27 June 1938. The S.O.S. call rang through the BBC airwaves the evening… Continue Reading
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Walking along Oak Street Beach, I braced myself against heavy winds flowing from Lake Michigan, taking in the beauty of ice nestled against the lakeshore. Beyond the rocky barrier I could see Chicago’s skyline, the Navy Pier at a distance, with the Ferris Wheel immobile, possibly frozen and awaiting the summer sun. With a few… Continue Reading
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In 1923, the New York Times and Time Magazine reported that King Alfonso of Spain summoned a famous New York osteopath to treat his fifteen-year-old son, Infante Don Jaime (1908-1975). Deaf and mute following a severe case of mastoiditis (middle-ear infection) and possibly tuberculosis at a young age, Don Jaime was adjudged “incurable” by Spanish… Continue Reading
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On my flight from Toronto to Phoenix last week, I passed the time by reading a series of letters from deaf persons sent to the American Medical Association during the 1930s. I collected the letters from a summer visit to the AMA archives but never had the time to properly examine them. Most of the… Continue Reading
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This fall, REMEDIA a collaborative blog on the history of medicine, launched a special series exploring the histories of surgery. I contributed a post for the series, on the development of the fenestration operation in the 1930s, as a “hope for the deaf.” The post aims to weave together the history of surgery and history of… Continue Reading
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In 1934, a surgeon examined the medical histories and nutrition diaries of his deaf patients. He soon noticed that most of his patients ate very little food containing vitamin B, which was essential for heathy nerves. He then pondered: could cases of nerve deafness be cured simply by adding more vitamin B to a diet?… Continue Reading
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