Observations on the Superior Efficacy of the Red Peruvian Bark, in the Cure of Agues and other Fevers ...

Boston: Robert Hodge for William Green, [1783]. Third edition. 8vo. 91, [5, ads]. Original wrappers; spine perished; covers stained, foxing From the library of Hallowell, Maine, physician Benjamin Page (1770-1844), one of the earliest proponents of Jenner's smallpox vaccine in America, with a presentation to Page on the ffep: "For Dr. Benja. Page, From his most obt. humble servant, A. Stoddard. Hallowell, [ME], 17th Sept. 1793" and signed by Page on the front wrapper ("Benjamin Page's 1793"). "Memoir of Benjamin Page, M.D., 1770-1844" published in The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, 1845, describes Page's early use of the smallpox vaccine: "he was furnished with some vaccine matter by his most intimate and attached friend, Benjamin Vaughan, Esq., who had just received it directly from the hands of Dr. Jenner, of London. He immediately made use of it and was the first American physician, be it known, who applied the vaccine virus to the arm of a human subject in this country." The vaccine matter used by Page proved to be inert, thus the credit for this major advance in public health would go not to Page, but to Benjamin Waterhouse, whose experiments were being conducted simultaneously: "Great was [Page's] disappointment, however, upon finding the matter dry and inert, more especially as a portion of the same parcel which had been sent to Boston proved operative, and gave to a distinguished medical philosopher of the times the enviable reputation which he himself would otherwise have obtained" (ibid). Page persevered, procuring a new sample from Boston as well as cultivating his own vaccine matter from the arm of a women who had recently been vaccinated, and was ultimately able to administer successful vaccinations against smallpox.PROVENANCE: Benjamin Page (presentation and ownership inscriptions) REFERENCE: Austin 1703; ESTC W21356; Evans 18178