Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.
|
Loading... The Fever of 1721: The Epidemic That Revolutionized Medicine and American Politics (original 2016; edition 2016)by Stephen Coss (Author)
Work InformationThe Fever of 1721: The Epidemic That Revolutionized Medicine and American Politics by Stephen Coss (2016)
  
Books Read in 2017 (826) No current Talk conversations about this book.   This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers. melydia | Nov 17, 2022 |   )1  EJFROMWI | Jan 2, 2022 | What this work lacks, however, was any particular new information about the actual epidemic and the fight to introduce inoculation (which was opposed by much of the medical establishment of the time, primarily because "slaves and Asiatics" were the source of the concept) to fight off the epidemic. Mather was an early champion of inoculation, but he does not redeem himself in these pages. He comes off as the same self-interested coward he was during the Salem witch trials. While Coss describes him as "well-meaning," nothing he cites suggests Mather acted other than from self-interest (albeit a self-interest in line with potential sufferers of smallpox). In any event, this is a crisp brief read without unnecessary flourish and is devoid of academic jargon. It is padded with material that follows up on the lives of the various main characters and their progeny through the revolutionary era, which has some intrinsic human interest but not particularly relevant to the work's thesis. (  ) Bostonseanachie | Dec 14, 2016 |  ) la2bkk | Nov 22, 2016 | This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.The audio narrator, Bob Sour, lends an authoritative voice to the story that kept my interest. The only drawback I had in listening to this book was that I tried to spread it out. In doing so, I found myself losing track of the various players and events of the story. I suggest a more compact listen to more easily keep track of the various threads. I’ll be recommending this book to others and I look forward to reading more from Stephen Coss. Note: I received a free copy of this book from the LibraryThing's Early Reviewers program. ( ) EllsbethB | Jul 26, 2016 |
 The history of a year can be revealing, if the right 12 months somehow encapsulate a crucial historical moment or trend. For his momentous year, Coss focuses on a small place, Boston. The Bay Colony’s capital had been founded in 1630 as a “city upon a hill,” built to beam a purified Christian faith to a fallen world. Not all settlers shared that goal, however, and the native peoples of the region routinely opposed it. And yet a later generation of Massachusetts men would help lead the struggle that culminated in American independence. It is easy to assume that the fierce Puritan flock of yore had somehow gestated the fiery patriots of 1776. In Coss’s telling, the troubles of 1721 represent a shift away from a colony of faith and toward the modern politics of representative government. So does the emergence of the first independent American newspaper, James Franklin’s New-England Courant, unsanctioned by the government and a training ground for the editor’s little brother, Benjamin. Coss’s story is a Whig version of history, in which past events helpfully point toward an enlightened present. All the scene needed was a touch of modern science and, voilà, the dark ages recede. Enter smallpox.... Awards
"More than fifty years before the American Revolution, Boston was in revolt against the tyrannies of the Crown, Puritan Authority, and Superstition. This is the story of a fateful year that prefigured the events of 1776. In The Fever of 1721, Stephen Coss brings to life an amazing cast of characters in a year that changed the course of medical history, American journalism, and colonial revolution, including Cotton Mather, the great Puritan preacher, son of the president of Harvard College; Zabdiel Boylston, a doctor whose name is on one of Boston's grand avenues; James and his younger brother Benjamin Franklin; and Elisha Cooke and his protege; Samuel Adams. During the worst smallpox epidemic in Boston history Mather convinced Doctor Boylston to try a procedure that he believed would prevent death--by making an incision in the arm of a healthy person and implanting it with smallpox. "Inoculation" led to vaccination, one of the most profound medical discoveries in history. Public outrage forced Boylston into hiding, and Mather's house was firebombed. A political fever also raged. Elisha Cooke was challenging the Crown for control of the colony and finally forced Royal Governor Samuel Shute to flee Massachusetts. Samuel Adams and the Patriots would build on this to resist the British in the run-up to the American Revolution. And a bold young printer James Franklin (who was on the wrong side of the controversy on inoculation), launched America's first independent newspaper and landed in jail. His teenage brother and apprentice, Benjamin Franklin, however, learned his trade in James's shop and became a father of the Independence movement. One by one, the atmosphere in Boston in 1721 simmered and ultimately boiled over, leading to the full drama of the American Revolution"-- No library descriptions found. |
LibraryThing Early Reviewers AlumStephen Coss's book The Fever of 1721: The Epidemic That Revolutionized Medicine and American Politics was available from LibraryThing Early Reviewers.  Current DiscussionsNonePopular covers
 Google Books — Loading...GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)616.9Technology Medicine and health Diseases Other diseasesLC ClassificationRatingAverage: (3.82)
Is this you?Become a LibraryThing Author. |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Wikipedia in English (1)
1