Medicine in the Wild West

The Fort MacLeod historical site also had a quaint medical display from life on the Frontier.  The first thing that caught my eye was the packet of Clinitest.  Xylocaine we still have...carbocaine?  Thinking not so much.  But in 1874...we didn't have these little metal jars either.  So I decide a bit of research was needed to date these items in the Fort's Pharmacy.

The patent for Clinitest was in 1942.  So I suspect most of these items in this cabinet are from the late 1940's or early 1950's.  Even the Mucara, though I don't know what it is but I can wager a pretty good guess.

The company that produced the wormwood and other pressed botanicals did start up around 1870.  These guys were some hardcore chemists.  Parke Davis and Co actually invented some wonderfully effective and toxic things -- Chloramphenicol, PCP (street name "angel dust"), amylase, pure adrenalin, and they marketed numerous cocaine/heroine products before they became illegal (like most chemists).  More famously, they were one of the first few companies to manufacture Joseph Salk's polio vaccine.  And they remained a powerhouse until they were eventually bought out by another rather famous pharmaceutical company of today -- Pfizer.

Sadly most medicine in the 1870's was relatively ineffective.  Decorative china with medical uses was probably the best that could be done for a sick patient...decorate the things they used in the course of their illness.  The past is the future of the anti-vaccination movement.  Just saying.

Here we have an early X-Ray Machine Transformer.  I suspect this was unhealthy to everyone in the room.

And here we have an incubator.  I'd like to believe it was for petri plates...but the angle of that shelf makes me think this is a baby incubator.  Definitely gives me the creeps.

Nothing says sterile like a rusty bucket!

I can't even imagine how this helped make X-rays.

And here we have the Church...it probably got an equal amount of use as the infirmary...and probably immediately thereafter.  Beautiful stained glass window in this far off prairie outpost though!

This little place, right next to the Fort, was the Road Coat Cafe.  The Road Coat Trail is the historic route that the Royal Northwest Mounted Police took as they moved across the west setting up their outposts.  So obviously Fort MacLeod is on that trail.  So is my hometown in Saskatchewan.  Our sole restaurant is named the Road Coat Inn.  However the specialty at this little Cafe, is ice cream.  Alberta made by the Foothills Creamery. And it was delicious!

Unfortunately as I headed north to Calgary, I ran out of time.  There are some great museums I have long wanted to see, at Nanton and Claresholm.  I snapped this on the way by, but since I am 11 months behind in blogging the adventures...I can no longer remember which place it was!  I will make my way back there one day though.  This area has rich history in the WWII era.

After that it was a few flights and back home.  I was certain my little cats, despite the very patient kitty sitter, would be distraught at my absence.  But, since they are cats, they merely looked up from what was once my spot on the couch with mild disinterest to mark my return home.  And thus ended my August of last summer.  Let the blog catch up begin.