{"id":301,"date":"2012-11-18T22:05:34","date_gmt":"2012-11-19T04:05:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/asylumeclectica.com\/sightseer\/?p=301"},"modified":"2013-11-04T20:24:30","modified_gmt":"2013-11-05T02:24:30","slug":"international-museum-of-surgical-science","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/?p=301","title":{"rendered":"International Museum Of Surgical Science"},"content":{"rendered":"

International Museum Of Surgical Science<\/a> (Chicago, Illinois)<\/strong>
\nA\u00a0Comtesse\u00a0<\/strong><\/span>Travelogue\u00a0<\/span><\/strong>through the morbid memorabilia in Chicago’s lovely lakeshore museum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The International\u00a0Museum of Surgical Science is located along Lake Shore Drive, just across\u00a0from Lake Michigan, in the Gold Coast neighborhood of lovely Chicago. The museum is housed in what was once the residence of Eleanor Robinson Countiss, the daughter of a Diamond Match Executive. Obviously, Daddy wanted “only the best” for his little girl. Of course, when the house was constructed in 1917, nobody could foresee that one day all manner of surgical implement would be stored in these hallowed halls. But that’s exactly what happened when the building fell into the surgeon’s hands of Dr. Max Thorek and the International College of Surgeons in 1950. The museum opened in 1954 and continues to this day.<\/span>I visited the museum on April 7, 2004 and found it to make for a very interesting stroll. A bit low-key on the morbidity scale, but there is still enough to keep the morbid mind happy. Here’s a snippet of what I saw…<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
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\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/span>Here are more ancient Roman surgical instruments.<\/td>\n\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/span>They also have some nasty looking amputation equipment, like this saw which probably dates from the 19th century. I wonder how many limbs this thing severed?<\/td>\n\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/span>This is a very nice amputation set from the 1800-1850 era. Again, imagine the stories that the saw could tell…<\/td>\n\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/span>\"\"I took a particular liking to these before and after images of girls suffering from osteological deformities, which purport to show the miraculous results of using the “bone crusher” treatment.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/span>And here is the “bone crusher” itself: “Osteoclasts, or bone crushers, were used during the early 1900s to produce intentional fractures in the limbs of children with birth deformities. The bone
\ncrusher applied pressure to the deformed bones, fracturing them in a controlled manner and then reset the fractured bones allowing them to heal correctly.” Oh, my limbs ache just thinking of it!!!<\/td>\n		\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/span>And where there are bone crushers, there must surely be artificial limbs! A nice assortment of them, in fact.<\/td>\n\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/span>Another view of the assorted limbs.<\/td>\n\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/span>And with one last loving look at a surgical kit, it was time to bid the museum adieu.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

International Museum Of Surgical Science (Chicago, Illinois) A\u00a0Comtesse\u00a0Travelogue\u00a0through the morbid memorabilia in Chicago’s lovely lakeshore museum. The International\u00a0Museum of Surgical Science is located along Lake Shore Drive, just across\u00a0from Lake Michigan, in the Gold Coast neighborhood of lovely Chicago. The … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,25],"tags":[84,91],"class_list":["post-301","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comtesse-travelogue","category-illinois","tag-medicine","tag-museum"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=301"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1510,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301\/revisions\/1510"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=301"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=301"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.decidedlygrim.net\/sightseer\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}