Stille, Alfred

Chemistry does not always enjoy the best of reputations. Many of our plants and refineries are still potentially dangerous and may pollute their surroundings. At the same time our society enjoys a high standard of living not in small measure through the results of chemistry, which few would give up. I believe that chemistry can and will be able to bring about an equilibrium between mankind s needs and our environmental concerns. Chemistry will continue to benefit mankind in the spirit of Alfred Nobel, a fellow chemist whose example continues to inspire us all. 

In seeking for an explanation of the fact that certain molecules which were saturated, according to old valency theory, still possessed the power to combine with other molecules, Alfred Werner,15 in 1S91, introduced his co-ordination theory which, altered and added to as it has been developed, he used to explain the existence of complex salts, and especially the large class of compounds known as the metal-ammines. It does not take into account the internal structure of the atoms linked together, but is concerned with the combining capacity... 

Spruce s Notes didn t appear in print until 1908. (They were edited by Alfred Russel Wallace, who simultaneously with Darwin conceived the theory of evolution.) Spruce suspected that additives were responsible for the psychoactivity of this beverage, although he noted that Banisteriopsis by itself was considered mentally active. The samples he sent to England for chemical analysis weren t located and assayed until more than a century later. Examined in 1966, they were still psychoactive. 

Swedish inventors Emmanuel Nobel and his son Alfred took an interest in this powerful liquid explosive and produced it commercially in 1862. However, its transportation and its handling were very hazardous, and eventually Alfred Nobel discovered that NG absorbed into a granular type of material (kieselguhr) was still explosive, but was much safer to handle and use than the straight liquid. This new invention, called dynamite, was difficult to ignite by the usual methods used for pure NG. Therefore, also in 1867, Alfred Nobel devised the blasting cap using mercury fulminate. With this development dynamite became the foundation of the commercial explosives industry. 

Medical supplies were not immune. Of all the medicinal substances, probably the single most prescribed was alcohol, which was useful not only as a stimulant remedy but also as a solvent and suspension medium for other drugs. The inability to obtain alcohol could have disastrous results, since no tincture or fluidextract could be compounded without it. Yet the war brought an even more urgent need for alcohol. Our guide to the materia medica. Dr. Alfred Stille, stated the conventional wisdom of his colleagues when he insisted that alcohol... 

Alfred Stille, Therapeutics and Materia Medica, Second Edition, 2 volumes (Philadelphia Blanchard and Lea, 1864), 2 501. 

Sources of information include George B. Wood and Franklin Bache, USD, Eleventh Edition (Philadelphia J. B. Lippincott, 1858) Alfred Stille, Therapeutics and Materia Medica, 2 volumes (Philadelphia Blanchard and Lea, 1864) and Henry Beasley, The Book of Prescriptions, Second Edition (Philadelphia Lindsay and Blakiston, 1865). 

Alfred Stille, Francis G. Smith, John Bell, John F. Meigs, and Samuel I wis, Report of a Committee of the Associate Members of the Sanitary Commission on Dysentery, Sanitary Commission, M (Philadelphia Collins, 1862), p. 6. 

Before examining Civil War pharmacy directly, it is essential to understand the therapeutic contexts in which that care was provided. This can be done by carefully reviewing the standard texts of the period. There are several authoritative guides The Pharmacopoeia of the United States of America, Fourth Decennial Edition (Philadelphia J. B. Lippincott, 1863) George B. Wood and Franklin Bache, The Dispensatory of the United States of America, Eleventh Edition (Philadelphia J. B. Lippincott, 1858) George B. Wood, A Treatise on the Practice of Medicine, 2 volumes. Fifth Edition (Philadelphia J. B. Lippincott, 1858) William Headland, The Action of Medicines in the System, Third Edition (Philadelphia Lindsay and Blakis-ton, 1859) and Alfred Stille, Therapeutics and Materia Medica, 2 volumes. Second Edition (Philadelphia Blanchard and Lea, 1864). Once the theory and practice of medicine during the war are understood, pharmacy begins to take on some familiar forms as the material expression of nineteenth-century medical rationalism. 

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