Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Joseph Lister

  • How black turned white

    Kateryna TsoiKharkiv, Ukraine In 1876, the World’s Fair was held outside Europe for the first time, taking place in Philadelphia and coinciding with the centenary of the US Declaration of Independence. Thomas Eakins, not yet a well-known artist, decided to present a large-scale canvas at the exhibition of a subject he knew well. An ardent…

  • The Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh and the legacy of Long John Silver

    George Venters Scotland   The “Old Surgical Hospital” as it is today. Courtesy of Dr. Iain MacIntyre. Faced with the danger of having his right foot amputated in 1873, the real “Long John Silver,” the English poet William E. Henley, turned for help to Joseph Lister and became a patient in the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary.…

  • Joseph Lister and the story of antiseptic surgery

    In some respects the year 1860 represents a watershed in the history of surgery. It was the year when a young surgeon from the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary by the name of Joseph Lister came to the University of Glasgow to take up the position of Regius Professor of Surgery. It was also a time when…