In this first comprehensive biography of Dr. Arthur Edward Spohn, authors Jane Clements Monday, Frances Brannen Vick, and Charles W. Monday Jr., MD, illuminate the remarkable nineteenth-century story of a trailblazing physician who helped to modernize the practice of medicine in Texas. Arthur Spohn was unusually innovative for the time and exceptionally dedicated to improving medical care. Among his many surgical innovations was the development of a specialized tourniquet for “bloodless operations” that was later adopted as a field instrument by militaries throughout the world. To this day, he holds the world record for the removal of the largest tumor—328 pounds—from a patient who fully recovered. Recognizing the need for modern medical care in South Texas, Spohn, with the help of Alice King, raised funds to open the first hospital in Corpus Christi. Today, his name and institutional legacy live on in the region through the Christus Spohn Health System, the largest hospital system in South Texas. This biography of a medical pioneer recreates for readers the medical, regional, and family worlds in which Spohn moved, making it an important contribution not only to the history of South Texas but also to the history of modern medicine.

The reader will probably feel a greater interest in perusing the following pages than would have if the regions to which they had not been recently overrun by war The Visit to Texas was made during a period of profound peace when the traveler had no enemy to dread and could lie down in any grove in peace and security I had time to observe at leisure the face of nature the manners and circumstances of the inhabitants and to learn facts and opinions which could have been obtained in a state of general excitement and danger as has recently occurred A stranger visiting Texas since the commencement of the late hostilities could not be expected to form a correct idea of its condition in times of peace and prosperity I would not be very likely to meet with such information as the most experienced and intelligent of the inhabitants could give for these have been deeply engaged in public affairs and indeed much of their time absent from home I would have found agriculture and other kinds of business interrupted and in many instances habitations and estates totally deserted At the same time a regard for his own safety would have naturally prevented him from attending to those objects and incidents which enliven a journey and become agreeably assoc ciated with facts worthy of recollection On the contrary if a person who had eleven traversed that country during a period of public tranquility enjoyed its natural beauties admired the vast results of human enterprise and partaken of the hospitality which awaited every visitor had revisited it within the few past months he would have 4 have found a deep and painful interest in comparing past with present times and the better understood the circumstances of war from his acquaintance with scenes of peace This volume will present a brief history of the late hostilities in Texas which will not be placed at the beginning but at the close of the volume for the reader may be supposed to be in the condition in which the author was when about to enter the country for the first time and to need such information concerning it as was then presented to his view Some alterations have been made since the first edition in the narrative but not such as materially to change its plan The Appendix however is wholly new and contains a particular account of the battle of Salado nearly as communicated verbally by one of the soldiers engaged in it as it well illustrates the nature of warfare in that country and being the first engagement had much influence on the contest.

"The Nation has lost sight of its public health goals and has allowed the system of public health to fall into 'disarray'," from The Future of Public Health. This startling book contains proposals for ensuring that public health service programs are efficient and effective enough to deal not only with the topics of today, but also with those of tomorrow. In addition, the authors make recommendations for core functions in public health assessment, policy development, and service assurances, and identify the level of government--federal, state, and local--at which these functions would best be handled.