The itinerant horse physician

Introduction

The experiences of the Itinerant Horse Physician as recorded in the following pages can never again be duplicated, for matters veterinary have changed for the better throughout the regions he traversed. Still the deplorable conditions dependent upon unregulated veterinary practice of unqualified men calling themselves veterinarians, is yet a serious problem in far too many localities and states ; and this work cannot fail to help solve that problem by placing vividly before the whole profession and others interested the real calamity that unqualified veterinarians constitute to the live stock industry. Never before has the evil of the charlatanic veterinarian been portrayed in such glaring ugliness or condemned so tellingly.

It must not be thought that the author or the publisher hold out the example of the Itinerant Horse Physician for the emulation of the young practitioner; rather is it to show the folly of believing the largest and ripest berries are always to be found on the next bush. But along with considerable information of a scientific nature, many a lesson in self-reliance can be gleaned from these pages that will stand the young practitioner in good stead when he faces that greatest problem of a veterinary practice — the public.

The historical value of this record of experiences of the Itinerant Horse Physician is not

8 INTRODUCTION

to be minimized. Here we have delineated in the inimitable style of the author the evolution of farriery into the profession of veterinary medicine, concurrently with the attainment of professional accomplishments in older parts of the country, of which every veterinarian may be proud.

The historical value of the work and the interest which it arouses are enhanced not a little by the punctilious accuracy of the author as to places and dates ; by the fact that he has neither overdrawn nor underdrawn in his description of occurrences and by the unusual realism of the pen pictures of his characters. In only a few cases, and then only for very obvious reasons, have fictitious names of persons been employed.

The Publisher.

Chicago, April, 1916.

Chapter I

EARLY TRAINING VS. NATURAL INCLINATION

My father was in the tobacco business. When I was born he began to make plans for me, his first son, to follow in his footsteps, and had visions of an immense project in his line which was eventually to make me the tobacco king of the universe.

What I know about psychology is but little; however, I believe his plans were knocked into a cocked hat at the very moment when he allowed my first Santa Claus to bring me for my first Christmas on earth a stuffed specimen of the equine species.

As I have already remarked, my knowledge of psychology is very limited, but I do believe that, with the plans he made for me when I made my appearance in his family, he should have picked old Santa's stock over a little more carefully, and his first order for me should have been a wooden Indian.

While I lived with my father eighteen years, our home was on the western limits of the city of Milwaukee. A few blocks from our home lived an

I early showed a predilection for horses eccentric old man, who folks thereabouts called "Cowboy Charlie." He made a good living by trading horses and by taking city horses for pasturage at a couple of dollars the month. He was a sharp-witted old fellow and square and broad-minded to a fault. He had received a good education in the old country and had gravitated to the level of a horse jockey as the result of domestic disturbances induced by a flighty wife.

Here, with old Charlie, I spent my holidays and evenings after school. When my companions of the day were playing ball or other games I was with old Charlie, breaking broncos or swapping horses.

When I had finished school, my father took the bull by the horns, so to speak, and placed me in the wholesale leaf tobacco house, where I was to get my preliminary training for the work he had outlined for my future career. While I worked at this place I kept up my friendship with old Charlie and evenings and Sundays were spent in his company, and there, to old Charlie, I made my protests against the work which my father was forcing me to take up, and which was not to my liking. Every night we would talk about it and old Charlie sympathized with me always.

When I had been about a year in the leaf tobacco house I began to be so dissatisfied that every day became well-nigh unbearable. I longed for the open, for the roughness of the horse world, and my thoughts were never with my work.

It was about at this stage of my development that I made the acquaintance of a certain vet-

TRAINING VS. INCLINATION erinary surgeon, and he so imbued me with the spirit of his calling that I then and there decided that I had found my vocation. Prospectuses from various colleges, were applied for at once, and the tobacco business lost what little interest it yet held for me. But, now to break the news to the "governor."

This always seemed an easy matter when I was in one end of the town and he in another, but as soon as he stood before me I lost all courage and several months passed before I could even bring myself to think of the matter in his presence.

I had not been losing ground during this time.

My mother was fully informed of my intentions, and with her help I finally faced the issue. Never will I forget my father's anger on this occasion.

He allowed me to finish my plea and then the storm broke. When it was over I was packing a satchel and my brain was having a storm of its own. I had been ordered to leave the house. The "governor' ' was done with me.

But I did not leave the house that day. I knew my mother full well and I took a long time packing that satchel, and just as I was putting in the last pair of socks my mother came up and said

'Cowboy Charlie'

that Dad told her I might remain if I wanted to continue at my job in the leaf tobacco house. I took advantage of this truce and went back

I saved up some money and bought an anatomy and began to study nights

to work. I saved up some money and bought an anatomy and began to study nights, then, about three months after my first break with the

TRAINING VS. INCLINATION 13

"governor," I quit my job and went home and faced him again.

The storm that struck me the first time was as a gentle breeze compared to the one that I had now to encounter, but I weathered through it, backed up by mother. I was now in my eighteenth year, and as I look back to that day, now twelve years gone, I wonder at the ways of men, and at the ironies of fate. I have faced many storms since that day, brain storms and every other kind of storm, against which that second outburst of my father's was but a gentle love tap.

Chapter II A Practice Won And Lost In Milwaukee

After my resignation from the tobacco business, I became a student at a Milwaukee veterinary hospital and remained there for eight months prior to my entering college. At the termination of my apprenticeship in the Milwaukee institution, I matriculated in the Chicago Veterinary College and after three years of hard study I graduated with honors. This pleased my father, who had now been wholly won over to my view and who paid my way through college.

I had just become of age and at once opened up an office on the south side of Milwaukee.

Within a few months, I was doing a very fair practice and would probably have remained there permanently but for two reasons.

The first of these was my old friend Charlie. After I graduated our friendship continued and 1 took much delight in patching up various crippled and unsound steeds which came into his possession by various means and which he later sold again at good profit. This was all right and could do no harm. What did have effect on me was the fact that old Charlie had traveled much in his younger days. His stories of his travels gave me the wanderlust and old Charlie rather encouraged it in me. It did not set good with him to see me come out of school with colors flying and then squat in the place of my birth.

The second item which had some bearing on my future life was in the form of one of those imported German counts.

This gentlemen became very much attached to me and as he retained quite a good many of his foreign ideas about life, it became necessary for me to join in his numerous sprees. I say necessary; at least I thought so at that time. The Count had control of several dollars' worth of practice which was mine only so only as I was his friend.

I tried to hold up my end of the performance as well as he did his, but at the end of several months, I found that I was going under.

When one gets so that he can't begin the day without two or three doses of corn juice, he must be going under.

On top of this, and, of course, as a result thereof, more money seemed to be going out than was coming in. When my clients wanted me I could not be found and so my practice soon went from me.

I had enough good sense to see how things were turning out and before I went wholly on the rocks, I sold my horse and buggy, promised to pay my debts, and left for Texas.

Before I left, I took the United States Civil Service examination for Veterinary Inspector, and successfully passed it. This was in September, 1904.

Chapter III A New Start In The Great Southwest

When I left Milwaukee for Texas, I was a young fellow, just twenty-one, and had never been more than two hundred miles from home. I was a typical middle-westerner and my ideas of life and the world were pretty simple ones.

I had no more conception of what I would find in Texas than I now have of the next world. I selected Texas as a place to go to merely because the name had charms for me and because it was far away.

I had in my possession a letter from one of my instructors to the State Veterinarian of Texas and on this letter I banked for a start. The State Veterinarian at that time resided in Houston and to that point I purchased my ticket, taking advantage of the colonist rates then in force which gave me a ticket to Houston and return for twenty-two dollars and fifty cents. The return portion of this ticket I have still in my keeping and it is a highly treasured souvenir.

My route lay over the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul road to Kansas City and from Kansas City over the "Katy" (Missouri, Kansas & Texas), through the old Indian Territory. I remember, better than all else on this trip, the booming towns in the territory where oil had recently been struck. Never before, nor since, have I seen such an example of hustle and bustle.

I arrived in Houston on the sixth of October; and it was hot. I left the north with my winter clothes, as it was getting quite chilly there when I left. There, in Houston, for the first weeks I thought I would die from heat and I spent a great part of the time riding on the front end of street cars, where the breeze was strong, trying to keep cool.

When I arrived and got out of the Grand Central Station, I got into one of the hotel buses standing at the curb and was taken to the Hotel Rice. I registered, and then went into the cafe; then I went back into the lobby and got my grip back and told the clerk to check me off the register again. I had found out that it would cost me about four dollars a day to stay there and in view of my cramped financial position, I had to change hotels.

I went from the Hotel Rice to the Bristol Hotel, where I could stay for two dollars a day. I remained a guest there for half a day.

After depositing my satchel at the Bristol Hotel, I began a search for the State Veterinarian, to whom I had a letter of introduction, and found him in a small wooden building very much like a small real estate office on a new town addition, on the corner of Famine and Prairie Avenues.

He was a fine, gentlemanly man and, as he was a native of the north, I soon came to feel at home. He was in need of an assistant but could not quite afford to pay me what I thought I was worth.

A NEW START 19

After haggling over my salary for several days, we agreed on a kind of partnership. All business done up to two hundred dollars each month was to be divided between us equally. All over that sum went to him in a lump. This arrangement made it possible for me to make a hundred dollars a month and I did so as long as I worked on this basis.

I found many things here during my first few months' stay which took a good bit of the middle-westerner out of me and which broadened my mind considerably. Also, I found that I would have to brush up on several points in my profession. I encountered many conditions and diseases here which were rare or unknown in the north.

When I had entered into the partnership above referred to I took a room with an elderly couple in the residence section and soon I was very much at home in my new surroundings. Only at certain times did I have a longing for my northern home and I will never forget how I was affected by the advertising signs of a certain brand of tobacco which was on the market at the time. It was called "Old North State"; everywhere on telephone poles, on fences and barns these signs were tacked up. "Use Good Old North State"; many weeks passed before I could read one of the signs without flinching.

Another difficulty I experienced in Houston during the early part of my stay there was in connection with the attitude of the whites towards the negroes. It was quite a long time before I could refrain from showing them courtesies which were considered out of place there. I had the middle-westener firm grounding on the equality of peoples and it hurt when I had to extract it.

But this was overcome in time and gave me no trouble later.

I had not been in Houston many weeks before I got the "happy-go-lucky spirit" of the south and west. I began to have visions of big deals in lands, in cattle and other big enterprises and I wanted to expand. Everybody who amounted to anything talked of big things; big oil strikes or cattle deals ; or a land sale of thousands of acres. My middle-west sense of proportion was torn into shreds and I began to get the wanderlust again ; wanted to see some of this big action.

To this day I have not entirely overcome that desire to move; it comes to the fore every now and then and it has cost me dearly more than once.

At just about the time when that hundred dollars per month was getting on my nerves, I received a commission from the United States Department of Agriculture as a veterinary inspector in the Bureau of Animal Industry, with orders to report for duty at Fort Worth, Texas. I have mentioned before that I took the civil service examination before leaving Milwaukee; this appointment followed it.

I had not notified the civil service commission of my change of address and the appointment letter had been sent to my home address in Milwaukee and forwarded to me by my father, reach-

A NEW START 21

ing me in Houston on the day on which I was to go on duty in Fort Worth.

The position paid only a hundred dollars a month also, but I thought it would give me an opportunity to satisfy my craving for a change of environment and so I wired my acceptance and left for my station that night.

Before leaving the State Veterinarian assured me that he would be pleased to have me return and continue in his employ if the government position should be unsuitable. I am not sure whether he made the assertion in good faith. Nevertheless, I was back in Houston inside of two weeks and he kept his word.

Arriving at Fort Worth, I was put on hog inspection in Armour's Packing House. Meat inspection at that time, as governed by government regulations, was a farce and in the light of my opportunities in other fields, I did not care to be a party to what I considered hoodwinking the public. The reader must remember that this was twelve years ago before the meat inspection law of 1906, before the publication of "The Jungle" and when congress was niggardly with the Department of Agriculture and looked upon meat inspection chiefly as a means of procuring export trade.

The climax of this part of my career was precipitated by a quarrel with the chief inspector who persisted in releasing animals which I condemned, and I resigned. He had been in the service so long that he had become calloused to conditions which were repugnant to me. As evidence that I was not entirely wrong about this I had the satisfaction to see him reduced to the rank of ordinary inspector soon thereafter.

As I said, I resigned and went back to Houston and took up my work where I had left off. I was in a restful frame of mind again and for about two months I was satisfied that Houston just suited me.

The hot weather kept right up and on Christmas day there came a nice warm rain. This rain interfered with the proper Christmas festivities as they are conducted there, which is on the order of our Fourth of July celebration in the north — fireworks and all that goes with it.

Speaking of Fourth of July celebrations brings to my mind a type of native which I frequently encountered in east Texas and who gave me much concern at first. They are "old timers'' who do not seem to know that the Civil War is over and forgotten. To them every man from the north is a hated "Yank" and in some of the "back-in-the-sticks" places in east Texas it is best not to speak too plainly about your place of birth if you happen to be from the north side of the Mason-Dixon line.

The month of February came and I began to get the spring fever. I had now been in Texas four months and I wanted to see more of it. I began to look around for a location with a view of going into practice on my own hook again, and after some casting about, I decided to go to Temple, in Bell County, one of the best farming counties in Texas.

A NEW START 23

I had not saved a dollar in Houston during the four months and had to borrow some money to get started in Temple. I thought I could well afford to do so considering what bonanza location Temple seemed to be. It was then a town of about ten thousand people and a few miles away is Belton, the county seat, also a good town. An electric railway connects them. In neither of these towns nor in any town within a radius of fifty miles was there a graduate veterinarian.

The surrounding country was thickly settled with good farmers and it looked like a fine opening.

I stayed there about six weeks. During those six weeks, I earned about six dollars.

After I had been there a few weeks and saw how things were going, I made application for reinstatement in the government service and through the good offices of my friend, the State Veterinarian in Houston, I was given an assignment on Colonel Dean's force in the quarantine division. This meant field work, in the open, and suited me exactly.

I had been corresponding with a classmate of mine who had located in Massachusetts. He wanted to come west. Although I had done little or no business in Temple, I could see no reason for it, I can't see any reason to this day, why there was no business there. I sincerely believed that the business was there and would come in time. I wrote my former classmate about the situation and he came and took my office a few days before my government job went into effect.

He remained there three months and had to borrow money to get out of town, as I had to do also when I left there.

I borrowed money to get in and start and then borrowed more to get out and quit.

Chapter IV Practice In Texas

When I first began to practice my profession in Texas I made the discovery that there were a number of diseases among animals which I had never seen in the northern animals.

The first one of these was anthrax, and, by the way, one of the first cases that came into my hands after my arrival in Texas was a case of anthrax in a horse. I remember the case very well. It was on a hot Sunday afternoon, and the horse in question was a driver stabled in a private stable in the residence section in Houston. The animal was taken sick about noon and the owner called me at about two in the afternoon. When 1 arrived, the owner stated that the sickness came on suddenly ; the horse had been standing, quietly eating, when suddenly he stopped eating and seemed somewhat delirious. Very soon thereafter he went down. I found him down, showing some delirium. On various parts of his body, but mostly in front of the trachea and under the belly, he had an edematous swelling. The owner stated these came on since he was taken sick.

The visible membranes showed echymoses ; the temperature was quite high.

The owner was a pleasant chap and did not try to "think what is the matter with him," but when I told him I thought his horse had anthrax, he disagreed with me; he said he thought it was charbon. I explained that charbon and anthrax were the same and complimented him on his ability to diagnose the case. He stated that he was quite familiar with this disease, having been raised in the low-lands of east Texas. "But," he said, "folks hereabouts always call in charbon. "

Of course I remembered the synonyms of anthrax.

The horse died in about three hours, having had, no doubt, the apoplectic form.

Anthrax, or charbon, was very common in that country in those days. Even within the city it was not rare. I clearly remember an instance in my experience occurring in a small dairy which was conducted in the residence portion of Houston. Three or four cows died in two days with anthrax.

So common was the disease that many people would not call in the veterinarian at all, recognizing the disease themselves and "just letting them die."

This was no doubt one of the reasons why the disease was so common; almost no preventive measures were taken and carcasses were not properly destroyed.

Another disease which was very common there was tetanus. Very few horses died from it, however; it seemed to run a very mild course. The latter point made it necessary for me to change my prognosis in tetanus cases; in Wisconsin we usually gave a very unfavorable prognosis because the mortality there from tetanus was very high. Here, in Texas, I discovered that I

PRACTICE IN TEXAS 27

could usually give a very favorable prognosis for cases of tetanus.

The disease which gave me the most trouble when I first began to practice in east Texas was the botryomycotic infection commonly known as 1 "summer sores."

Some of my experiences with this condition were most discouraging and I did not make much progress with my handling of these cases until an old practitioner "put me next" to a few things. Most of the practitioners with whom I discussed this disease had only a very poor understanding of the pathology of it; most of them had never heard of botryomyces. Some of them attributed the condition to the fllaria irritans. A few of them ascribed the condition to cancerous processes, calling it cancer. Nearly every one had a different form of treatment for this disease ; and most of the treatments did not accomplish very much.

I remember one instance which occurred while I was in Texas in which a very competent veterinarian diagnosed a botryomycotic infection of the genitals in a stallion as dourine. I mention this merely to illustrate how little even the local practitioners knew about botryomycosis at the time of which I write.

One condition which I expected to find in the south was insolation, or heat stroke. Great was my surprise when an old practitioner in Houston told me that this condition was practically never seen there. Later I found this to be true. I had one or two cases of "over-heating" in a mild form, but regular sun-stroke such as we get in the north, I never encountered in the south.

An interesting point along therapeutic lines I learned in the extreme western part of Texas, where the altitude is very high, being sometimes 5,000 feet above sea level. This point was in regard to the treatment of pneumonia, and other febrile conditions, but pneumonia most especially, and consists in the fact that one must be very careful in the use of heart depressants such as acetanilid, phenacetin, all coal-tar products, and even quinin.

The doctor who treats his pneumonia cases there as most of us do in the lower altitudes will have many deaths, usually in the first day or two of the attack. Pneumonia patients in those altitudes truly die of heart exhaustion, and few fatal cases live over a few days. It is a good place in which to take lessons in the treatment of this disease — lessons that are valuable in any altitude.

Chapter V

A whole year had gone by now since my graduation and I had nothing except a little experience to show for it. Money I had none, and what was worse, I was in debt.

I owed several friends money in Milwaukee and also in Houston. Likewise in Temple where I had had to borrow money to get out of town.

I was now twenty-two years old and in good health. I was full of life and the world looked bright to me in spite of my misfortune.

So far only one occurrence had the effect of sadness on me and that was a notice which I received, while in Temple, of the death — selfinflicted — of my old friend Charlie. Aside from this, I could see nothing but cheerful success ahead of me, as I began my duties for the second time in the government service. As my work this time would be inspecting animals on the hoof at various ranches and stock yards, I looked forward to my new appointment with much interest.

My first appointment as veterinary official in the Bureau of Animal Industry was in the fall cf 1904, shortly after my arrival in Texas. By a strange coincidence I was to go on duty at Fort Worth, Texas.

The position at that time paid only $1,200.00 a year, and the veterinarian went by the title of "Meat Inspector."

The inspection, as it was carried out then, was very slipshod and unscientific. Under instructions, I sat for nine hours, with a short lunch period, in a chair inspecting hog viscera. I was supplied with a pronged stick for poking any particular set into position for a better view. Unless a gross pathological process was present, it was impossible to detect abnormalities.

This system of inspection did not agree with

I was sent to Colorado City, Texas, to inspect cattle for interstate

shipment

my ideas of "value received," and when my superior persisted in releasing the few carcasses which I did hold up in spite of this poor method of inspection, I resigned. I had been on the job only two weeks.

When I was reinstated in the service, in the spring of 1905, I went into the quarantine division.

In this division I found an entirely different state of affairs. The inspectors were capable and efficient fellows, and did their work well.

My orders were to report for duty at Fort Worth to Dr. Wallace (who has since died), there to get my instructions and to be "broken in." After ten days, I was supposed to be "broke in" sufficiently and was sent to Colorado City, Texas, to inspect cattle, out of the modified quarantine area, for inter-state shipment. My instructions were to report to Dan McCunningham, inspector in charge at Colorado City, and work under his orders; but when I arrived McCunningham was away making an inspection.