This is the first full-scale biography of Nathan Smith - medical pioneer, founder of Dartmouth Medical School and cofounder of three other medical schools (Yale, Vermont, and Bowdoin), and progenitor of a long line of physicians. Smith was a central figure in early American medical education from 1787, when he began practicing in New Hampshire, to his death in New Haven in 1829. Readers become immersed in Smith's life and the spirit of the times as they examine early Victorian notions of disease, how medical students were taught (the chapter on body snatching is especially lively), the politics and economics of founding professional medical schools in early America, and other topics. The book provides a vivid description of what it was like to study and practice medicine, and be the recipient of the ministrations of physicians, during this critical period.

Introduction by: Philip Cash
Foreword by: C. Everett Koop