Frontier Fever

School Library Journal

Gr 7 UpAn informative, interesting treatment of medicine as it was practiced (or malpracticed) on the U.S. frontier. Early methods and attitudes related to health care are interwoven with other social and political events that affected people pushing the settlements westward. European and Native American practices; the spread of disease, especially cholera; and the effect of the Civil War on medicine are among the topics included. The writing is lively, and the sepia-toned reproductions of graphics from a variety of historical collections extend the text. While there are other histories of medicine in the U.S. available, none focuses specifically on the frontier. This book should be useful for students needing information related to social history as well as to medical practices.Lois McCulley, Wichita Falls High School, TX

Mary Harris Veeder

The title reads "frontier," but the text actually covers medicine from the earliest days of the colonies until the end of the nineteenth century. Van Steenwyk frequently contrasts the ways of the European newcomers with those of the indigenous peoples (whose health she's careful not to sentimentalize) and provides some good background, including information on Civil War medicine, diseases and remedies used during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and the training of caregivers. There is also material about urban medicine. Reading this cover-to-cover will slow down any romantic impulse to time travel to the past without a modern medical arsenal.