Health & Medicine

Health & Medicine / Dairy Industry / Agriculture / Education / Dane County / Madison / Industry / Science & Technology / Related Stories / Curators' Favorites / 1877-1900 / Manufacturing & Trade / Babcock Butterfat Tester / Science & Medicine / Region 7 - South Center

How Does a Babcock Tester Work?

Simplicity, Simplicity, SimplicityIn 1890, few farmers had ever taken a science class, and even if they understood the potential benefit, most lacked the cash to pay an expert for laboratory testing. Babcock’s great accomplishment was to develop a powerful, reliable test that was simple…

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December 1, 2013

Dairy Industry / Agriculture / Health & Medicine / Science & Technology / Industry / Madison / Dane County / Education / Related Stories / 1877-1900 / Manufacturing & Trade / Babcock Butterfat Tester / Science & Medicine / Region 7 - South Center

The Men Behind the Butterfat Test

The “Real” InventorAlthough Stephen M. Babcock has been immortalized for his work on the butterfat test that received his name, it was not really his idea. The Babcock test was originally conceived by the forgotten man of the dairy industry, Frederick Garland Short. Short,…

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December 1, 2013

Health & Medicine / Appleton / Object Histories / 1848-1877 / Outagamie County / Science & Medicine / Region 5 - Center East / Cupping Kit

OBJECT HISTORY: Cupping Kit

Cupping therapy is a medical treatment in which local suction is created on the skin in an effort to increase blood flow to promote healing or restore humoral health balance. It was practiced as early as the Hippocratics and persisted in high medical popularity until the late nineteenth century. This particular kit belonged to Dr. James T. Reeve a physician…

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November 15, 2013

Broad History / Health & Medicine / Pre-1787 / 1787-1848 / Related Stories / 1848-1877 / Science & Medicine / Cupping Kit

What is Cupping?

Until the late nineteenth century, cupping was widely used for the treatment of inflammation and deep-seated pain believed to be due to an imbalance of the humors. A physician or barber surgeon would begin cupping by selecting the appropriate cup based on the amount…

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November 15, 2013

Health & Medicine / Related Stories / 1877-1900 / Science & Medicine / Cupping Kit

The Decline of Humoral Theory

Cupping (as well as general bloodletting) declined in the late nineteenth century. Louis Pasteur and Robert Koch’s experiments in pathology demonstrated the existence of foreign bodies and their role disease, called in to question humoral theory. 1 Dr. Ira Marks, in an address to the Wisconsin…

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November 15, 2013

Health & Medicine / Military History / Appleton / Education / Related Stories / 1848-1877 / Outagamie County / Politics & Government / Science & Medicine / Region 5 - Center East / Cupping Kit

Dr. James T. Reeve

The owner of this particular cupping kit was Dr. James T. Reeve. Dr. Reeve was born near Goshen, New York, on April 26, 1834. Despite losing his father at age five and his mother five days before graduating medical school, J.T Reeve received his…

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November 15, 2013