Hello and welcome.
My name is Patrick and today I’m showing you 9 books that you might like if you’re
interested in medical history.
I’ll be giving a short summary and recommendations for each one, but if you just want the list
and links, they’re in the description
I’ll start with my favorite story I read last year: Black Death at the Golden Gate
by David K Randall.
Randall tells the story of how the third wave of bubonic plague made its way through San
Francisco from 1899 to the early 1900s, and how public health officials managed it.
For context, everyone’s familiar with the Black Death, the massive bubonic plague pandemic
that killed an enormous percentage of Europeans in the 14th century, but that was the second
major plague outbreak.
The first was the plague of Justinian that spread around the Mediterranean from the 6th
to the 8th century.
But the third lasted from the mid 19th century through early, mid 20th century and made its
way all around the world, including San Francisco where this book is set.
I don’t want to give away too much of the story, but it tracks the real events in San
Francisco’s management of the outbreak at the time, including how they learned about
the biology of Yersinia Pestis, the pathogen that causes plague, and the rat flea connection.
But the story is even more relevant because of the parallels to that plague and early
COVID-19 days.
For instance, at first, the plague was isolated to Chinatown, which caused intense anti-Asian
sentiment and prompted officials to make decisions that actually endangered the rest of the city.
There are so many other parallels to COVID management too.
From how the governor prioritized the public image of California, to how quarantines were
implemented.
Plenty of pieces have been written in the last year comparing the 1918 influenza pandemic
to today, but this story was almost eerily similar
I was going to make a video about this story, but Caitlin Doughty already did such a great
job, that video will be linked up here and in the description.
Speaking of Caitlin, I finally got my hands on a paperback version of Will My Cat Eat
My Eyeballs, which has been out since 2019.
Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs? is written for a non-medical audience, and blends discussions
of culture and history with highly accessible science communication throughout the book.
For example, in her chapter titled “Can someone donate blood after they die?” she
describes some of the early experiments involving dog corpses:
And that’s as complicated as it gets.
If she does bring in science, it’s in order to demystify a concept.
Which makes sense — for years, Doughty’s goal has been to destigmatize death, to make
people more death-positive.
So by answering folks’ questions, she’s removing the shroud around a taboo topic.
Highly recommend this one!
Next up is On Immunity, an Inoculation by Eula Biss which I first heard of in a Vlogbrothers
video back in the fall.
This book is a quick read at 163 pages, and combines the history of vaccination with a
woman’s personal journey with vaccine hesitancy during the H1N1 outbreak in 2009.
The author falls into the category of affluent American woman who was skeptical about vaccines
because sensationalist news and Facebook posts scared her out of vaccinating her infant son.
But where she breaks from the archetype is when she took university level immunology
courses to understand vaccines better.
This book doesn’t go very deep into the global history of variolation or vaccination,
which I thought was appropriate.
The story of Jenner’s smallpox vaccine is one of the most cliche Great Man stories in
medical history.
Instead, Biss weaves the history in with her personal story as she learns how to contextualize
vaccines in terms of both personal immunity to disease, and tools of public health.
In doing so, she becomes more comfortable with them on a personal level, but also reconsidered
them to make the collective whole safer.
The closing line sums up her point: Immunity is a shared space — a garden we
tend together.
This line struck me because my colleagues in science communication spend a lot of energy
trying to convince individuals that vaccines won’t hurt them personally, but this woman
resonated more with the idea that vaccination was good for the collective.
Now, I’m not under delusions that this book will convince anyone to change their minds
about vaccination, but the fact that one person did made me hopeful.
With vaccine hesitancy and public health in mind, I read Black and Blue by John Hoberman.
It’s an extremely well researched, in depth collection of essays about the history of
medical racism in the US.
While most of you are probably familiar with the Tuskegee Airmen experiment, the history
of racism in America’s medical system goes way, way farther back.
Hoberman covers everything from the health management of enslaved people in colonial
days, the bad science that classified Black bodies as inferior, to the racist behavior
from doctors in modern day, and why the system is failing so hard at fixing it.
The writing style is straight-forward and professional, and the author packs a ton of
information into each chapter.
This is a very dense book.
If you’ve been following COVID vaccine rollout and have been wondering why Black Americans
are more skeptical of the medical system, I’d recommend this book for context.
Shifting gears to something more light-hearted, I enjoyed the Mystery of the Exploding Teeth
by Thomas Morris.
This book is a compilation of short stories exploring medical oddities and case studies
from the last few hundred years.
There isn’t really an overarching narrative, but that’s the charm of this book.
The stories are disconnected and digestible enough that you can sit down and read one
or two during morning coffee without having to commit to reading the whole book.
That’s because Morris lets the primary sources speak for themselves.
Each section follows this format: the author sets the scene, then adds context around certain
quotations, which makes it seem like you’re pouring over the sources alongside a historian.
He covers everything from dubious treatments, lots of weird enemas, gruesome surgeries,
and stories that seem overly sensational, but actually have a justifiable explanation.
If you want an example of the stories you’ll get in this book, I’ll link to Medlife Crisis’s
video about a sword swallowing sailor in this card here.
Overall, Morris struck a great balance as a historian and entertainer in this book,
and I recommend it.
Next on my list is Under the Knife by Arnold Van De Laar.
This book is a collection of short stories about famous surgeries throughout time.
Some of them are well known stories, like the man who removed his own bladder stone
or the origins of joint repositions.
But some I had never heard before, like the history of the first laparoscope, which, get
this, goes back to 1806!
Van de Laar does well as a storyteller, introducing the characters and context around the surgery
in question, then explaining the science for a lay audience.
At some points, the anatomy explainers felt unnecessary — you know, from my perspective
as someone who knows anatomy — but that makes it more accessible for a lay audience.
It feels like you’re learning surgical science alongside the surgeons in the story.
Like Exploding Teeth, this book is full of shorter stories that you can pick and choose
and make it part of your morning coffee routine.
That ended up being a good thing for me — I put the book down for a month while reading
another book, then came back to this one.
The focus on surgery is really the selling point for this one.
While other books might focus on the history of quack treatments or patent medicine, this
one’s all about surgery.
Next up, the only biography I read recently — Dr. Mutter’s Marvels by Cristin O’Keefe
Aptowics.
It’s the story of Thomas Dent Mutter, a 19th century American physician.
Technically he was born Thomas MUTTER, but after spending some time abroad, he added
the umlaut to sound European.
He’s the insufferable undergrad who spent a semester in Barcelona and makes sure that
you know it’s Bar-THE-lona.
I’ll dedicate a video entirely to his story, but he was this charismatic teacher and skilled
surgeon who lived in Philadelphia and pioneered a surgical technique called the Mutter flap
surgery.
Back then, people with severe facial deformities essentially wouldn’t be allowed to participate
in society, so this surgery gave them a second shot at life.
The author spends more time talking about politics at his university, Jefferson Medical
College, and his rivalry with Charles Meigs, who history of medicine fans might recognize
as not a great guy.
This guy had a reputation for opposing anesthetic use in obstetric surgery and staunchly refused
to clean his hands and instruments.
So you know, it’s hard to look at this guy favorably.
I usually don’t care about these political squabble background stories, but for some
reason, this one between Mutter and Meigs grabbed my attention.
Towards the end of his life, Mutter had amassed a collection of medical oddities and wanted
to put them to good use.
So he donated them to the American College of Physicians who built the Mutter Museum
in Philadelphia.
Speaking of, they have a very good YouTube channel that you should start paying attention
to…hint hint.
My final three books are all by the same author, MARY ROACH.
I mentioned Bonk in my first book review video, and since then, I’ve read so many more of
Roach’s books including Stiff, Grunt, and Gulp.
All of which are all great.
If you haven’t read a Mary Roach book, she’s an incredibly clever writer who doesn’t
write exposes necessarily, just interesting books themed around one idea.
Stiff is all about the science of cadavers, Grunt is about bodies and the military, and
Gulp is all digestive systems from mouth to anus.
In her own words, she’s “the goober with a flashlight stumbling into corners and crannies,
not looking for anything specific but knowing when I’ve found it”.
Mary Roach is the nerd that you wish you were friends with.
She lets her own curiosity take the narrative throughout her books, often starting with
stories from the history of medicine, then interviewing experts in the field and asking
question after curious question.
I especially love her footnotes where she’ll sometimes include a paragraph of information
that doesn’t quite fit into the main story, but was just too interesting not to publish.
Of the three, Stiff was my favorite from both a content perspective and writing style.
I don’t know how anyone can write about cadavers for 300 pages and still make it funny.
If you’ve never read one of her books before, I’d recommend starting with Stiff or Gulp
so you can get a sample of her writing style while still learning a ton about how cadavers
or digestion.
If you want to buy any of these books, I have affiliate links down in the description, although
I’d always recommend supporting your local book store if you have the option to do so.
Otherwise you can find my previous book review video here.
It’s one of my earlier videos, so go easy on me.
Otherwise you can find more medical history in this playlist here.
Make sure to subscribe and hit the bell so you get notified when I post a new video.
Have fun, be good.
Thanks for watching.