'MECCA' FOR THE CURE OR FOR THE DOCTOS

Post by Doris McCraw

writing as Angela Raines

The remedies listed below were taken from a book written in 1847 on the treatment of injuries and illnesses.

If you were suffering from asthma you might be treated with skunk cabbage root, taken as a syrup or dried, and smoked through a pipe. Earaches might be treated with the heart of a roasted onion placed in the ear. Toothaches, how about a pill composed of camphor and opium placed in the tooth, or if really bad, pulled by whoever was available.

If you were bitten by a rattlesnake you might drink a half a glass of olive oil, and apply some to the site of the bite.

Childbirth had either a female neighbor or if lucky a mid-wife present. Of course, if neither of those was available it became an individual or at most a family affair. The common practice of laying in, that is remaining in the birth bed, no clean sheets, etc. was not always practical for the woman in the West. Usually, there was too much to do to just lay around, so these hearty women were up an about more quickly than their Eastern counterparts.

One of the Mineral Springs located in the town of Manitou Springs

In the 1800s there were three types of doctors. Most practiced homeopathic medicine which started in the 1790s, a few practiced allopathic medicines which started or were given the name in the early 1800's and a few were osteopaths, which came into being around 1874. In the Pikes Peak Region, most early doctors practiced homeopathy. This included three of the four women who were practicing in the area prior to 1880. They were Julie E Loomis, Esther B Holmes, and Clara (Clararbel) Rowe. The fourth, Harriett Leonard was an allopath.

By the 1870's Colorado was known not only for the gold and silver they were pulling out of the mountains, but also an area for invalids to come to recover. Before then the area was a place of businesses, ranching, and some farming, some in remote areas. The early days didn't have the medical doctors that began arriving in the 1870s. Instead, most folks did their own doctoring or called a mid-wife, using some of the above remedies.

It the mid-1800's hygiene and sanitation made their way into the medical field. Prior to and even during the War Between the States, many doctors still did not clean their instruments or hands between surgeries or seeing patients. Once it became standard practice the mortality rate fell, but it wasn't until the 1920's that antibiotics came into use.

Dr. Samuel E. Solly
from Find a Grave website

Dr.Samuel Edwin Solly moved from England to Manitou Springs shortly after the town was founded in the hope that the air would help cures the tuberculous he and his wife had contracted. His wife did not survive her illness, but Solly did.  After regaining his health he sang the praises of the area far and wide. The region quickly became a mecca for health seekers. Into the mix of these migratory people came a number of doctors. The area around the base of Pikes Peak, the easternmost 14,000-foot peak in the Colorado Rocky Mountain Range, grew from a population of 3,000 in 1873 to around 10,000 by 1879. Of the twenty-plus doctors who were in the area in 1879 three were the women listed above, Julia E Loomis, Esther B Holmes, and Harriett Leonard. Clara Rowe appears to have arrived in late 1879 just prior to the 1880 census.

By 1881 Colorado began licensing physicians, just a year after the death of Julia E Loomis.

Julia E Loomis was born in New Woodstock, New York. After her marriage to John C Loomis she and JC as he was known moved around a great deal. While in Iowa, her daughter died at twenty-one, about a year after her marriage. It was after her daughter's death that Julia went to medical school. Julia was around fifty-four years old when she attended the Cleveland Homeopathic College for Women in Cleveland, Ohio and obtained her M.D on February 24, 1870. By 1878 she was in Colorado Springs and working to set up a clinic for the treatment of consumption (TB). She passed away in 1880 from pneumonia. Her 'death certificate' was signed by doctor E.B. Holmes. 

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Esther B. Holmes was born in Rhode Island and married in her mid-teens. Records indicate she also attended the Cleveland Homeopathic Medical College for Women. Dr. Holmes was one of the early doctors to receive her Colorado license, #387 in 1882. She continued to practice in Colorado Springs until her death in 1910 at the age of sixty-five and according to the family she was known as the 'baby' doctor. 

Soda Springs in Manitou Springs prior to development 

The third doctor in the area was Harriet Leonard. In 1879 she was the proprietor of the Mineral Bath House in Manitou Springs. There she advertised Hot and Cold, Russian Vapor and The Electric Baths. She was a graduate of Keokuk College for Physicians and Surgeons in Keokuk, Iowa. The school came to Keokuk in late 1850 as a state-sponsored school and was a medical center until 1908 when it merged with Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. The school was also one of the early co-ed medical schools in the nation. 

Clara Rowe, the wife of F.G. Rowe, a man involved in insurance and loans, was also a graduate of the same Cleveland school as Holmes and Loomis. Clara Rowe also was licensed in the state of Colorado, receiving her license in 1881. After her husband's death around 1890, she moved to California and died there.

Both female and male doctors continued to arrive in Colorado Springs, Manitou Springs, and Colorado City, as the area was one of opportunity for those who wanted to take the cure themselves while also caring and curing the sick.

For those who might like to know more, I have an article on Women Doctors in the Summer issue of 'Saddlebag Dispatches' Summer

Doris Gardner-McCraw -

Author, Speaker, Historian-specializing in
Colorado and Women's History

Angela Raines - author: Telling Stories Where Love & History Meet

Books: Angela Raines Books

Website: Angela Raines - author

Angela Raines FaceBook: Click Here

COLORADO'S EARLY WOMEN DOCTORS - Pikes Peak Region 1870s

Post (c) Doris McCraw

Cheyenne Mounain,just west of Pikes Pike Colorado at sunrise

Last months post was about Dr. Alida Avery, one of Colorado's early female physicians, who had her practice in Denver, Colorado. But what of the women in the Pikes Peak region, which included Colorado Springs, Manitou Springs and Colorado City. Here is the story of four of the very early women who came to the Pikes Peak region to practice their profession.

As previously noted there were women physicians who moved to and made Colorado their home during the 1870s. In Colorado Springs, a new town which began in 1871, was home to Dr. Julia E. Loomis. Family stories have her living there as early as 1876. Documents, such as ads in the local Gazette newspaper, show she definitely was living there by 1878. Dr. Loomis was an 1870 graduate of the Cleveland Women’s Homeopathic College. This institution was one of the women medical colleges that started up to offer education to women who wanted to pursue medicine. This and other women medical colleges is a result of Dr. Elizabeth Blackwood, her sister, Dr. Emily Blackwell, and Dr. Maria E. Zackrzewka who began a hospital in 1856-1857 in New York, and offered hands-on education and experience to women in a practical setting Although Dr. Loomis may have been practicing medicine prior to her two years at Cleveland’s college, that she went to school after the death of her only daughter at the age of 52, shows a desire to be more, to also be one of the women who could and would practice medicine as the men did.

Headstone for Dr. Julia E. Loomis- Evergreen Cemetery, Colorado Springs, CO

Manitou Springs, a near neighbor and also new town, had Dr. Harriet Leonard. Like Dr. Loomis, family histories place her in the region in 1876. Dr. Leonard graduated from the Keokuk School of Physicians and Surgeons in Keokuk, Iowa. This school was the first co-ed schools in the nation. Originally located in LaPorte, Indiana, in 1849, the school moved to Keokuk and began classes in November 1850. The school was the Medical Department of the State University of Iowa, located in Iowa City, Iowa. As a result of this association, when the University became the first publicly supported university to be co-educational in 1870, the school in Keokuk, by mandate had to accept female students into the medical program.

Headstone for Dr. Harriet Leonard, Evergreen Cemetery, Colorado Springs, CO

These two women were shortly joined by Dr. Esther B, Holmes, 1878 and Dr. Clarabel Rowe, 1879. Dr. Holmes was born in 1844 in Rhode Island. Dr. Rowe around 1833 in Massachusetts. Dr. Rowe received her license in 1881 and Dr. Holmes 1882, shortly after Colorado started its licensing process. Dr. Rowe was also active in the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, giving talks and traveling on behalf of the organization. Dr. Holmes, who remained in Colorado Springs, was fondly known as 'the baby doctor'. Were these women and Dr. Loomis friends? Quite possibly. The death card for Dr. Loomis was signed by E. B. Holmes. In 1888 Dr. Rowe and Dr. Holmes traveled together on a trip through Southern California.

While Dr. Loomis was building her practice and taking care of her extended family, Dr. Leonard was working as the proprietor at the Manitou Spa. As far as records of any other female physician preceeding Dr. Loomis or Dr. Leonard in the Pikes Peak region, none have been found. Of the four women who were pioneers in the Pikes Peak region, only Dr. Rowe moved away. After the death of her husband, Dr. Rowe, moved to California. 

Doris McCraw, pen name Angela Raines is an Author, Speaker, Historian-specializing in
Colorado and Women's History

For a list of Angela Raines Books: Here 

Photo and Poem: Click Here 

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Five Women Doctors, Who Knew?

Post (c) by Doris McCraw/writing as Angela Raines

So what does the future hold?

I pondered for quite some time about what I would write about for this first post of 2017. Would I rehash the 'resolution' thing? No, I decided. I'd done that post on another blog already. How about things you don't know about me? Not that either, I tend to be pretty silent on that subject. How about famous quotes? Maybe.

I finally decided that I would share some of my research about a subject I'm passionate about. Other than writing fiction stories that is. So here for my first post of the new year, stories about early doctors in America and Colorado. Here then are five women who's stories captured me.

1. Dr. Harriet Kezia Hunt was a self-taught doctor who practiced in the state of Massachusetts in the 1830s. She is noted as the first woman to apply to Harvard Medical School and was denied admittance to that institution. Dr. Hunt began her studies when her sister Sarah became ill. Out of desperation for her sister’s health, Harriot had the English couple, Elizabeth and Richard Mott, take on her sister’s treatment. As she says in her autobiography ‘the doubt, uncertainty, and inefficacy of medical practice had been our portion; and the best physicians had given up an only sister!’ She continued studying with and working beside the Mott’s until Richard’s death and Elizabeth’s removal to New York. From that point on Harriot continued to build her practice, focusing on women and children. Hunt also was involved in social reform, specifically abolition of slavery and women’s rights, attending the 1850 women’s rights convention in Massachusetts. Dr. Hunt also corresponded with Dr.Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman to graduate from a medical college in 1849, on at least one occasion. Again from her biography Dr. Hunt states ‘after my experiences with Harvard College, first the professors, then the students who played the same game with different men, it was truly encouraging to hear that Elizabeth Blackwell had graduated at another college, had been to Europe to perfect herself in her profession, and returned to the New York to commence her practice. My soul rejoiced – I poured out my feelings in a letter, and gave her the right hand of fellowship; it was acknowledged in an answer worthy of the writer.’ Later Hunt was awarded an honorary degree from the Female Medical College of Philadelphia in 1853.

Would some of the early women doctors lived in log cabins?

2. Dr. Harriett Leonard practiced medicine in the town of Manitou Springs,Colorado in 1876 according to family history. Dr. Leonard graduated from the Keokuk School of Physicians and Surgeons in Keokuk, Iowa. This school was the first co-ed schools in the nation. Originally located in LaPorte, Indiana, in 1849, the school moved to Keokuk and began classes in November 1850. The school was associated with the Medical Department of the State University of Iowa, located in Iowa City, Iowa. As a result of this association, when the University became the first publicly supported university to be co-educational in 1870, the school in Keokuk, by mandate had to accept female students into the medical program.

3. In the 1879 Leadville City Directory, Dr.Mary Helen Barker Bates is the only woman listed among 34 physicians. She had gone to Leadville with her husband George C. Bates, an attorney, and remained there until his health forced the couple to move to Denver around 1881. In Denver Dr. Bates made history as the first woman in Colorado to be appointed to the staff of the Women's and Children's Hospital in 1885. Dr. Bates went on to serve as a member of the Denver Board of Education, as Vice-President of the Colorado Medical Society, and as Colorado's Delegate to the 1904 Pan-American Medical Congress.

4. In 1878, Dr. Julia A. Adams moved from New York to take up residence in Chaffee County at the Cottonwood Hot Springs. Dr. Adams and her husband the Reverend J.A. Adams purchased the Cottonwood Hot Springs near what is now Buena Vista, Colorado. Shortly after this purchase, half interest went to George K. Hartenstein, a Buena Vista attorney and the husband to Dr. Adam's daughter. They invested around $50,000 to build a hotel/resort on the property. All materials were hauled to the site over the mountain from Colorado Springs as no train ran through that area. The Rev. and Dr. Adams, after leaving the region became involved with Mary Baker Eddy and the Christian Science movement. Some records say it was Rev. Adams who coined the phrase ‘Christian Science.

Dr. Adams would have views like this.

5. Dr. Genevieve M Tucker wrote Mother, Baby and Nursery: A Manuel for Mothers, a one hundred sixty plus page book, published by Roberts Brothers, copyright 1896. Her reason for writing the book is best explained in the preface. “the aim of this book is to be a guide to mothers, particularly young and inexperienced ones. It proposes to teach and help a mother understand her babe, to feed it properly, to place it in healthful surroundings, and to watch its growth and development with intelligence, and thus relieve in a measure the undue anxiety and nervous uncertainty of a new mother.” Dr. Tucker was appalled with the rate of infant mortality, and to that end as she says in her introduction, “decrease in infant mortality will be brought about more by strict hygiene and prevention of sickness then by any treatment of disease already begun, no matter how skillfully applied.” She practiced in Pueblo, Colorado. Around 1898 she was elected president of the Colorado Homeopathic Medical Society. The feeling was that Dr. Tucker could do much to unite the sometimes divided forces within the society and promote the cause of homeopathy. 

So there you have it. Five stories from the many women who ventured into the field normally held by men. Perhaps I will add more stories of these amazing women in the future. For now, it's back to research for a book on women doctors in Colorado prior to 1900, and one on the doctors who reside in Evergreen Cemetery in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Wishing everyone a passionate year of storytelling and the fulfillment of many dreams in 2017 and beyond.

Angela Raines is the pen name for Doris McCraw. Doris also writes haiku posted at – http://fivesevenfivepage.blogspot.com  Check out her other work and like her Amazon author page:  http://amzn.to/1I0YoeL