Popular Science magazine featured ultraviolet branding of newborns in its December 1938 issue. Though believed to be "harmless" at the time, there are very good reasons this is not being done today.

Link: Modern Mechanix - Yesterday's Tomorrow Today

More at the Pink Tentacle...

Full gallery at the Tohoku University Library...

The February 1933 issue of Modern Mechanix magazine was claiming that spending a time in a human dishwasher will effectively help with weight loss, according to unnamed "eminent medical authorities".

Link...

(hat tip: BoingBoing)

From medieval times through the Enlightenment conjoined twins were viewed as monsters. Their existence simultaneously horrified and amazed the common person. The established medical explanation of the day, from Hippocrates, reasoned that a conjoined twin was simply the result of there being too much seed available at conception for just one child, but not enough for two distinct beings. Even so, popular theories fueled the public's fear and wonder by suggesting that conjoined twins were the result of impure conception or the witnessing of some evil or traumatic event during pregnancy.

Books depicting all sorts of monsters, both real and imagined, were extremely popular among the literate during this period. The authors often copied extensively from each other, bringing long told tales with new illustrations to another generation of the fascinated. Images of conjoined twins from some of the more popular works by Jacob Locher, Fortunio Liceti, the respected surgeon Ambroise Pare, and the anonymous author of Aristotle's Compleat Masterpiece are displayed...

View the exhibit online: From 'Monsters' to Modern Medical Miracles - Selected moments in the history of conjoined twins from medieval to modern times

(hat tip: BoingBoing)

The National Museum of Health and Medicine has been uploading pictures to Flickr since September 2006. We've transcribed, of course, all information that we have for each picture, but have also been posting some for which we have relatively little information, such as Library of Congress is doing, with the hope that a Flickr user will recognize them and be able to tell us more.

We've been uploading the hard way, mostly one picture at a time, choosing from among the several hundred thousand we've been digitizing over the last three years. Until that database goes live, this is our way of sharing our favorite photos from our many collections.

Flickr Set 1...
Flickr Set 2...
Flickr Set 3...

(hat tip: Boing Boing via Morbid Anatomy)

The image above is of an ear trumpet, a hearing aid made using a conch shell. On the right is a breast pump from the mid 1800's that's unusually made from pewter.

Check out the rest of the collection at Phisick Medical Antiques...

Flashback: Phisick Medical Antiques

Undoubtedly this drew protests and controversy from the medical community, while the 1950's FBI investigated him as a possible communist attempting to subvert American society. The FBI cleared him of suspicion, while the FDA turned its attention on the orgone accumulators as an unapproved medical device Reich was inappropriately advocating the use of. This led to court, which Reich decided not to visit, and that led him to receive a contempt charge and a prison sentence.

Reich died in prison 50 years ago to date while serving a two year sentence, requesting in his will that his private scientific writings and diaries be released only 50 years after his death. Now that the papers are coming out, some of the mystery surrounding the man may be revealed, perhaps even the motivation that guided his later life.

For now we'll continue to stay skeptical about the orgone accumulator, seeing how Albert Einstein apparently himself tested and did not confirm Reich's claims of the device's action, asking him, "I hope that this will develop your skepticism".

Reason Magazine has compiled a good set of links regarding the man, his work, and the surrounding controversy.

From the press statement:

Unseen photography and footage of Britain's faceless war wounded will be displayed alongside contemporary uniform sculptures tracing their surgery, rehabilitation and recovery, at a groundbreaking new exhibition opening on 10 November at the National Army Museum.

Faces of Battle charts the stories of the men whose faces were blown away in battle in the First World War, and the pioneering medics who fought to enable them to face life again. The conflict saw injuries inflicted on a scale and intensity unseen before. Trenches dug to protect the bodies of soldiers from powerful new weapons could not protect their heads - exposed to sniper fire over the parapets, or to the shrapnel and artillery hailing down on them from across No Mans Land.

Surgeon Harold Gillies, posted to France in 1915, quickly realised that the number and severity of facial casualties would be vast, and successfully argued for the establishment of a special ward - ultimately, a specialist hospital - for the treatment of the facially wounded. At the start of the Battle of the Somme, he prepared his team for 200 casualties. Two thousand arrived.

Gillies' work was revolutionary, and yet is little remembered. Most field surgeons, faced with blasted faces, simply stitched together the edges of wounds to stop infection. As wounds healed and scar tissue contracted, the skin of men's faces would become twisted and not only disfiguring, but disabling. Men returned from the horrors of the front terrified to face their loved ones. Gillies' technique used bones and cartilage to reconstruct faces, and pioneered the extraordinary 'tubed pedical' method of skin grafting, in the days before skin grafts were possible. Multiple surgeries were required and the patients were kept in hospital for years at a time.

Wikipedia entry on Harold Gillies ...

Press release: FACES OF BATTLE Untold stories of suffering, heroism and hope (.PDF)

National Army Museum : Galleries and Exhibitions ...

BBC: In pictures: Faces of Battle ...

Each atlas is linked to a brief Author & Title Description, which offers an historical discussion of the work, its author, the artists, and the illustration technique. The Bibliographic Information link provides a bibliographical description of the atlas, so users will know which edition was scanned and if there are any characteristics special to the Library's copy.

Link: Historical Anatomies on the Web...

(hat tip: Boing Boing)