The subtitle of this book is: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President. The President referred to is James Garfield. The book chronicles the miracluous rise of a bright and talented man to the presidency, the shooting of him by a probably delusional man, and then the medical mismanagement of his wound that ended in his slow and painful death two months after the shooting.
James Garfield grew up on what was then a rural farm outside what is now Cleveland, Ohio. He was the youngest of four children and when his father died when he was two years old, his mother had to sell most of their land to pay his debts and she farmed what was left to provide for her children. It was a poor household, and Garfield didn't have his first pair of shoes until he was four. They valued education, though, and Garfield was a smart and motivated student. It was possible to rise quickly in the ranks in rural America at that time, so while one year he performed janitorial duties to pay for his school tuition, the next year he was a professor.
The same metioric rise characterizes his political career. He was a reluctant member of Congress, but took a hiatus to fight in the Civil War--he was a successful battlefield strategist, but the loss of life was something he hated and did not get used to--after the war, he returned to Congress, and it was in his role as an Ohio politician that he gave the nominating speech for a fellow Ohioan for the presidency. Grant was the favored candidate, but Garfield was so elequent that above his protests that he did not want to be president, he was nominated.
He had some terrific reforming ideas that were never able to be realized because of his untimely death. A death that the author builds a case for not having had to have happened, if only his physician had been aware of the infection control measures that an English surgeon, Joseph Lister, had been employing with remarkable results for over a decade prior to Garfiled's bullet wound. Additionally, Alexander Graham Bell worked furiously on a device to try to localize the bullet lodged in the President's abdomen, but he wasn't allowed free reign to test it on the President. The author's premise is that a madman shot the president and conservative medical management killed him. Fascinating book, and it made me want to go back the Garfield's historic home and learn more about him.
Monday, July 2, 2012
Destiny of the Republic by Candice Millard
The subtitle of this book is: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President. The President referred to is James Garfield. The book chronicles the miracluous rise of a bright and talented man to the presidency, the shooting of him by a probably delusional man, and then the medical mismanagement of his wound that ended in his slow and painful death two months after the shooting.
James Garfield grew up on what was then a rural farm outside what is now Cleveland, Ohio. He was the youngest of four children and when his father died when he was two years old, his mother had to sell most of their land to pay his debts and she farmed what was left to provide for her children. It was a poor household, and Garfield didn't have his first pair of shoes until he was four. They valued education, though, and Garfield was a smart and motivated student. It was possible to rise quickly in the ranks in rural America at that time, so while one year he performed janitorial duties to pay for his school tuition, the next year he was a professor.
The same metioric rise characterizes his political career. He was a reluctant member of Congress, but took a hiatus to fight in the Civil War--he was a successful battlefield strategist, but the loss of life was something he hated and did not get used to--after the war, he returned to Congress, and it was in his role as an Ohio politician that he gave the nominating speech for a fellow Ohioan for the presidency. Grant was the favored candidate, but Garfield was so elequent that above his protests that he did not want to be president, he was nominated.
He had some terrific reforming ideas that were never able to be realized because of his untimely death. A death that the author builds a case for not having had to have happened, if only his physician had been aware of the infection control measures that an English surgeon, Joseph Lister, had been employing with remarkable results for over a decade prior to Garfiled's bullet wound. Additionally, Alexander Graham Bell worked furiously on a device to try to localize the bullet lodged in the President's abdomen, but he wasn't allowed free reign to test it on the President. The author's premise is that a madman shot the president and conservative medical management killed him. Fascinating book, and it made me want to go back the Garfield's historic home and learn more about him.
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