If you were a Missourian in the middle of the nineteenth century and were accustomed to the inadequately trained doctors of the day and quacks who sold everything from snake oil to kerosene and denatured alcohol as a cure, a man who claimed to specialize in surgery would be something to talk about. If he was good – in fact, if he was great – the talk would become more positive. It happened with Dr. Augustus Charles Bernays.

AOWM – October 13