Charles Daggett: Is Now Nevada, but It Also Is a Textbook Example of How Frost- Nevada’S First Doctor Bite Is Treated in Similar Circum- Stances Today
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Volume XIV, Number 3 Fall 2003 known medical treatment in what Charles Daggett: is now Nevada, but it also is a textbook example of how frost- Nevada’s First Doctor bite is treated in similar circum- stances today. The treatment of On a bleak night in the man into the warmth of the frostbite is a process of gradual December 1855, Judge Orson cabin but took him to a frozen warming rather than sudden heat Hyde (1805-1878), the well- stream, chopped a hole into the application. In fact, over a hun- known Mormon traveler and ice, and urged the weary traveler dred years ago Russian fishermen missionary, was expecting to die to dangle his black board-like knew that sudden warming of in the mountains. His hope of swollen legs and feet into the icy frozen fish resulted in mushy crossing the Sierra Nevada into water. Once the legs began to feel flesh, while slowly warming the the Carson City area was quickly soft to the touch Daggett helped flesh resulted in firmer more fading before his eyes. With Hyde into his home where he normal meat. What is remarkable unparalleled will, he managed to rubbed the thawed limbs with is that a doctor who lived nearly trudge on, rolling down snowy turpentine and then packed them one hundred and fifty years ago inclines, finding his way to the in fluffy raw cotton. was able to apply the best medical cabin of Dr. Charles Daggett. As simple as the entire knowledge to treat frozen feet in Daggett had settled in a log cabin ordeal may seem today, Dr. that manner. situated at the base of the Daggett and Mr. Hyde were Born in Vermont in 1806 Georgetown cut-off on the unaware at the time that this act Charles Daggett graduated from emigrant trail. (Because of his was to become one of the first the Berkshire Medical College in prestige in the little community, it documented cases of medical Massachusetts, where he also took on his name and became treatment in the State of Nevada. received his law degree. In 1851 known as Daggett Pass.) It was one in a string of firsts he moved west with a man known Dogs outside of Daggett’s which Dr. Daggett would take only as Gay settling in the area house alerted him to the presence part in, throughout the remainder then known as Mormon Station, a of a visitor, and he found the of his life in Nevada. few miles south of Genoa. exhausted shell of Hyde. Seeing Not only is the case Daggett and his companion frozen feet, Daggett did not bring remarkable in that it is the first settled in the log cabin Hyde stumbled upon shortly after their Prison.” In 1910, and for many move to Mormon Station. More on years after, the only state prison Kinsbury Road, where the cabin facilities in Nevada were in was located, was a trail that had Mollie’s Folly Carson City. Dr. McClean been established shortly before We are always glad to hear [Maclean] mentions the operation Daggett moved to the commu- from our readers. Following is an in his report in 1910, which is nity. email we received from Guy L. part of the Prison Warden’s Dr. Daggett was selected Rocha, Asst. Administrator for biennial report in the Appendix to as Prosecuting Attorney, County Nevada Archives & Records. Journals of Senate and Assembly Assessor, and Tax Collector of “I read with great interest for 1911. Carson County on September 20, the article entitled “The Mollie “In Harrison’s prison record 1855. His value to Orson Hyde as Folly” by Ryan Davis. I wanted to when she was seeking release the tax collector was enhanced by know more about this woman so I from prison in 1911, she mentions Daggett’s not being a member of looked for her prison inmate case the medical procedure and that the LDS faith. People in Carson file. Mollie was a Black woman, she still has health problems Valley had never paid taxes before age 23 in 1908, sentenced to 10 despite the surgery. There is and were outraged. Dr. Daggett’s years in prison in Carson City for nothing more about the operation. life was openly threatened over 2nd degree murder in It appears she was released from this. Because of the reluctance of Winnemucca, Nevada. Her last prison in 1913 as there are no the locals to come under “Mor- name was Harrison not Marrison records in her file after that date.” mon Law” almost everyone on [a typo in the 1910 Reno Evening Further research by Grease- the first Mormon Ticket was a Gazette story] because the story wood staff reveals the following non-Mormon. Dr. Daggett be- in the Carson City News of Dec. information. The surgeon was Dr. came Nevada’s first “resident” 11, 1910 has Harrison as Mollie’s Donald Maclean (1872-1938), the attorney on November 2, 1855, surname. father of longtime Reno surgeon, hours before he tried his first case. (The first lawyer was Col. L. A. Norton, a “temporary” resident from Placerville.) One of his last known distinctions occurred when he was appointed a member of the Committee of Arrangements for the formation of the Second Convention to form a separate territory out of the Utah Territory. With Dr. Daggett’s persistence, this territory became the State of Nevada. After his political career he settled down in the Genoa area and there is no official surviving document attesting to the year or age at which he died. (Ryan Davis was the author Side and front view of Mollie Harrison from prison record. of this article, but Guy Rocha “Dr. Donald McClean Kenneth Maclean (1914-1985). supplied the source of the article, [Maclean] was the resident doctor The prison record indicates that and further information was later at the State Prison in Carson City Mollie “Killed a negro in her tent supplied by Robert Ellison of the and not the “Humboldt State in Winnemucca with a knife.” It Nevada Library and Archives.) JACK C. GILBERT, M.D. Twenty-six Years of Devoted Service in Surprise Valley Submitted and edited by Pat Barry, Fort Bidwell Information from the Modoc County Record, 1/8/81 Born October 27, 1919, in He received fellowships in radiol- Manhattan, Kansas, Jack Clinton ogy and nuclear medicine at Santa Gilbert was the oldest child of Ana Community Hospital. A two- Roy and Ella Gilbert. When Jack year assistantship was accom- was a child, the family moved to plished in general practice serving Whittier, California. His mother as radiologist for a group practice. died of cancer when he was ten In 1952 Dr. Gilbert’s first years old, and his father raised the private practice was with a group three children, instilling in them in Sierra Madre which lasted three years. Hearing of a vacancy in Dr. George McKenzie the value of an education. Jack graduated from Northern California, Dr. Gilbert Whittier High School where he applied for and was accepted as was valedictorian of his class. He Modoc County’s health officer. continued his education at UCLA, Dr. Gilbert arrived in but his schooling was interrupted Cedarville on August 6, 1955, by World War II when, in 1943, and by this time, his family he joined the U.S. Army. During consisted of a wife and three Jack’s time in the service, he children. Dr. Gilbert had hoped completed a course for Medical that by coming to a small town, Corps candidates. While on duty he would be less busy and could in England, he met a nurse named pursue his love of research, but Rosalind Robertson, and after his this was not to be. honorable discharge from the to be continued Dr. Reine Hartzell army, Jack returned to England where he and Rosalind were further states under “marks, scars, married. moles, deformities, etc. Breasts Upon return to the abnormally large.” She was states, Jack continued his paroled in July 1911 from her medical education and gradu- second-degree murder convic- ated from the University of tion. Southern California with B.A. Photos above are Drs. and M.A. degrees. He received McKenzie and Hartzell, who his M.D. degree in 1951, from performed the surgery. Hahnemann Medical College in Pennsylvania. In 1952, Dr. Gilbert completed internships at Seaside Memorial Hospital in Two New Book Releases Long Beach and Los Angeles The Cutting Edge and County General Hospital. He Better Medicine also completed residencies in surgery and anesthesiology at See page 4 for details Seaside Memorial Hospital and contagious diseases at Los Angeles County General Hospital. Jack C. Gilbert, M.D. European Explorers’ description Great Basin History of Medicine of curare; (3) Collection of curare in the 20th century; (4) The initial September Meeting clinical uses; (5) Pharmacological investigations of the effect of curare; (6) Preparation and The September 2003 dinner- subject of the talk by Professor biological assay of curare; and (7) lecture meeting at the Eldorado Ove A. Nedergaard from Den- Introduction of curare in shock was a success as over ninety mark was “Curare – The Flying therapy of psychiatric disorders students, faculty, and guests Death.” The lecture highlighted: and in surgery. attended making this our largest (1) The preparation and use of audience in fifteen years. The curare as an arrow poison; (2) Book Signing Cutting Edge: Reflections and Memories by Doctors on Medical Advances in Reno; Where: WMC’s Resource Center; When: December 5, 4-6 PM. Better Medicine: The History of the University of Nevada School of Medicine; Where: Pennington Library Foyer at the UNSOM; When: December 9, 4-6 PM.