Nicholas Senn / [Carl Beck].

  • Beck, Carl.
Date:
[1923]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Nicholas Senn / [Carl Beck]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    ROY MOODIE COLLECTION. Reprint from * SURGERY, GYNECOLOGY AND OBSTETRICS September, 1923, pages 398-400 NICHOLAS SENN By CARL BECK, M.D., F.A.C.S., Chicago IN the earlier and middle part of the nineteenth century, America was still far behind Europe in medical and surgical sciences; but the progress of modern transportation and particularly the settlement of our country with pioneers in arts and sciences have caused rapid strides of advancement, and today we excel in many respects. Without being immodest we may say that the American surgeon ranks very high among his confreres. Progress, however, always rests upon a small number of men of genius. Thus we have in the science of surgery in every epoch and every country, a certain number of renowned men who are the carriers and pillars of this advancement. Nicholas Senn was one of those men who helped to build up the reputa¬ tion of American surgery. His name is well known to almost every physician of our times. What did he do for American surgery? How did he develop to be a pioneer and a leader? He was born in 1842 in Switzerland and came as a child to America, with his parents who settled in Wisconsin. He had all the characteristics of his ancestry, a sturdy, robust body, a clear eye, great courage, and most of all un¬ bounded energy and ambition for work. Work represented to him the stepping stone for success. He was a genuine toiler in the field of science. His education was to a great extent that of an autodidact; at first he prepared himself for a school teacher but soon he found his way into medicine. Dr. Munk, a German doctor of the vicinity where he lived, had a great influence upon the young man: from him he imbibed the desire for study. He began to read industriously and absorbed almost voraciously medical literature; very soon he knew of the classical works of his time, and this knowledge of literature was a great help to him through the rest of his life. Particularly the experiment on animals which celebrated its triumph in those days, was a great attraction for Senn. After graduation from Northwestern University in 1868 and an interneship in the Cook County Hospital, though he lived in primitive surroundings and had only very simple means at his disposal, he plunged into the field of scientific research and became known as the bold experimenter—on every important question of surgical technique: but feeling the necessity of more and better knowledge, like hundreds of others, he travelled abroad to study in foreign 1 Published by Surgical Pub. Co., Chicago, U.S.A.
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