LONG
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LONG
New Orleans School of Medicine the next
year. In 1867 he was dean of that
school and professor of anatomy and
clinical surgery in the University of
Louisiana in 1872. He was peculiarly
fitted for teaching and his clinical lectures
and operations were of the highest rank.
He was one of the editors of Geddings
Surgery, published in 1858.
Dr. Logan was president of the New Orleans Academy of Medicine in 1872 and of the New Orleans Medical and Surgical Association in 1876 and a member of the South Carolina Medical Society. He married Mary Virginia King, a daughter of a former judge of the Louisiana Supreme Court.
J. G. R.
N. Orl. M. and Surg. Jour., vol. xx, n. s.,
1892-3 (portrait).
Proc. Orleans Parish M. Soc, N. Orl., vol. i,
1893. 1894.
Daniel's Texas M. Jour., vol. viii, 1892-3.
Long, Crawford Williamson (1815-1878).
The credit of first using ether as an anesthetic, though not of demonstrat- ing it to the medical world, must be as- cribed to Crawford W., son of James Long, a lawyer of Danielsville, Georgia, where Crawford was born on the first day of November, 1815.
His paternal grandfather, Capt. Samuel Long, of Pennsylvania, distinguished himself during the Revolutionary War, and was one of Gen. Lafayette's officers at Yorktown.
He matriculated at Franklin College — now the University of Georgia — at a peculiarly early age. After studying for one year at the University of Penn- sylvania, he graduated there, then spent a year in New York, and there attained reputation as a skillful sur- geon, and though a young man, soon acquired an extensive practice, for his abilities were apparent. In 1841, because of family importunities, he re- turned to Georgia and began prac- tice in the village of Jefferson. His office became the place of sojourn of the young men of the village who desired a pleasant evening. About that
time the inhalation of laughing gas,
as an exhilarant, was much discussed.
Lecturers on chemistry would some-
times entertain by giving a "nitrous
oxide party," during which the partici-
pants would become drunk from its
inspiration. It was in the winter of
1841 that some young friends impor-
tuned Dr. Long to permit them to
have a party in his rooms in his office.
The physician had no means of pre-
paring nitrous oxide gas, but suggested
that sulphuric ether would produce
similar exhilaration. The ether was
produced; the young men inhaled and
became hilarious, some of them receiv-
ing bruises. Long noted these bruises
were not accompanied with pain, so
divined that ether must have the
power of producing insensibility, and
from this simple observation came the
great discovery of anesthesia.
He promptly determined to prove the value of his discovery, and during the month of March, 1842, ether was administered to Mr. James Venable until he was completely anesthetized, then a small cystic tumor was taken from the back of his neck. To the amazement of the patient he experienced no pain. From five to eight other cases, testing the anesthetic power of ether, were satisfactorily dealt with by Dr. Long during the years 1842 and 1843 — quite a goodly number when it is re- membered that surgical operations were not frequent in the country practice of a young physician more than half a century ago.
Dr. Crawford Long's surgical oper- ations, under ether, were exhibited to medical men and also to persons of the community, as established by affi- davits of persons operated upon, and of witnesses to the operations. Says Ange De Laperriere, M. D., of Jackson County: "I do certify that the fact of Dr. C. W. Long using sulphuric ether by inhalation to prevent pain in surgical operations was frequently spoken of and became notorious in the county of Jackson, Georgia, in
