Report on the Sixth International Symposium on the History of Anaesthesia

Selma Harrison Calmes, M.D.*

English weather was at its very best for the Sixth International Symposium on the History of Anaesthesia (ISHA) held in lovely Cambridge, UK, September 14 to 18, 2005. About 200 attendees from many countries and their families enjoyed beautiful warm, sunny days, and only one day of rain. Sponsors of the meeting were the History of Anaesthesia Society (HAS), led by President Dr. Peter Morris, and the Department of Anaesthesia, West Suffolk Hospital, represented by Dr. Neil Adams. English and American attendees dominated, but there were delegates from Canada, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Spain, Slovenia, Sweden, Czech Republic, Syria, Egypt and Australia. Senior anesthetists such as Drs. Lucien Morris (US), Carlos Parsloe (Brazil), Tom Boulton (UK) and Sir Keith Sykes (UK) added their prestige-and their memories of anesthesia history. Organizers of previous ISHAs also were present, including Joseph Rupreht (Netherlands, he started the ISHAs!), Tom Boulton (UK, organized the 2nd ISHA), Michael Goerig (Germany, 4th ISHA) and Carlos Diz (Spain, 5th ISHA).

Most stayed at the meeting site, Queens’ College on the River Cam. This location gave good meeting facilities in an ancient setting. Queens’ College (founded by two English queens) dates to 1448 and is one of the 31 colleges that make up Cambridge University. Although the area we met in and stayed in is comparatively new (1972-1981), we also enjoyed the older parts of Queens’ College, such as the stunningly beautiful Old Hall (dates to before 1548, restored in 1961), where the Welcome Reception was held. We often passed through the Old Court, which is singled out as the most picturesque college court in Cambridge. Completed in 1449, this area is a perfect illustration of the College plan, with all essential features (chapel, library, hall, kitchens and living accommodation) around a single court. An ancient sundial, which also serves as a “moondial” (dates from 1733), rules over this court. (A real clock is nearby to assist those who can’t figure out the formidable sundial/moondial.) An arched passageway led from Old Court into the Cloister Court, whose north side is the only half-timbered building in Cambridge. The east corner of Cloister Court has the tower in which the noted scholar Erasmus of Rotterdam lodged from 1511-1514. (Erasmus was the logo for the first ISHA, so perhaps his ghost was looking over us as we came and went through Cloister Court.)

Cambridge is a bustling tourist town, as well as an academic center with a distinctly medieval aura. It is also a town full of music. On trips into town, beautiful choral music could be heard coming out of the various colleges’ chapels. Surprisingly, the first choral music we heard was American spirituals, which seemed out of place in a medieval city! It turns out American spirituals are currently very popular with the students. Announcements of various concerts were posted on most fences, confirming the impression that this is a town full of music. Beautiful gardens are also common in the colleges, and there was even a herd of cows grazing across the river from the very majestic King’s College Chapel. There were also many pubs to enjoy. “The Eagle” pub is especially important because this was where Watson and Crick made the announcement of the discovery of DNA in 1953. (The pub was the site for the announcement because this is where the two scientists spent most of their time, instead of their nearby lab.) “The Eagle” was also the pub for American and British aviators stationed nearby during World War II. They left graffiti on the ceiling of their room; this is still preserved.

Invited speakers and their topics included, in order of appearance:

1. David Wilkinson (St Bartholo-mew’s Hospital, London), who gave the “Blessed Chloroform Lecture.” Title was “To see oursel’s as others see us!” This reviewed how others see the specialty of anesthesiology and had a powerful message.

2. Rodney Westhorpe (Melbourne, Australia): “Dr. Geoffrey Kaye, a man of many parts.”

3. Roger Maltby (Calgary, Canada): “Some notable names in Anesthesia.”

4. Marten van Wijhe (Delden, The Netherlands): “Pain and Culture through time.”

5. Andrew Cunningham (Department of History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge University): “Death in Venice: Morgagni and pathology in Enlightenment Italy.”

6. Douglas Bacon (Rochester, Minnesota): “The ASA at 100: Reflections on the history of anesthesiology’s oldest surviving organization.”

7. Colin Suckling, Strathclyde, UK): “Inventor and Son: Recollections and reflections on the discovery of halothane.”

8. David Lai (Tacoma, Washington): “Pentothal postcards: Anaesthesia advertising from Abbott Labs.”

Three rooms of free papers were needed for the many individual submissions. This was an enthusiastic group of presenters, some people giving three, or even five, papers. A very wide range of topics was covered. Residents participated by competing for the Bullough Prize, donated by the wife of Dr. John Bullough after his death. The purpose of the £1,000 prize is to stimulate interest in the history of anesthesia at the resident level. The three finalists read their papers during an afternoon session, and judges determined the winner. Results were announced at the final banquet. First prize went to Jason McKeown at the University of Alabama at Birmingham for his paper, “Koller and Halstead at the University of Vienna in the 1870s.” Second prize went to Hugh M. Smith, M.D., Ph.D., from the Mayo Clinic for his paper, “Post-Operative Nausea and Vomiting and the Rise of Anaesthesia as a Surgical Specialty 1846-1946.” Third prize was to Matthew J. Mazurek, M.D., from the University of California at San Francisco for his paper, “Dr. Chauncey Leake and the Development of Divinyl Oxide from Bench to Bedside.”

Exhibits of historic equipment were available during the meeting from the museum of the Association of Anesthetists of Great Britain and Ireland, the Wood Library-Museum and the Museum on the History of Anaesthesia at the University of Bonn, Germany.

Social events included a celebration of the ASA’s 100th anniversary. For this we visited some of the nearby sites in which America was involved during World War II. First, we traveled by bus to nearby Madingley to the Cambridge American Cemetery and Memorial, which is the only WW II American cemetery in the British Isles. This 30.5-acre cemetery was built in 1944 on land donated by Cambridge University. It now contains the graves of 3,812 American aviators who were killed in WW II (many more were moved back to the U.S., at their families’ requests, when this option became available in 1947). A very long, graniteWall of the Missing contains 5,126 names. The Memorial contains a devotional chapel and an impressive map, “The Mastery of the Atlantic-The Great Air Assault,” documenting the WW II situation in the Atlantic. (You can read more about this cemetery at www.abmc.gov/ca.)

We then went on to the American Air Museum in Britain, part of The Imperial War Museum’s aviation branch in Duxford. Duxford was originally a British airfield but was donated to the U.S. in April 1943. It was the base for the U.S.’s 8th Air Force during WW II; the essential bombing raids to destroy German manufacturing flew out of Duxford. Built with American donations as a memorial to the 30,000 American airmen killed during WW II, it opened about 1996. The building is considered an outstanding example of contemporary British architecture and has won architectural prizes. Its goal is to collect WW II aircraft and display them. (Learn more about Duxford and the American Air Museum at duxford.iwm.org.uk.) Surrounded by warplanes hanging from the ceiling as if in flight, including a C-47 wearing black and white invasion stripes (to help avoid collisions) like her father would have been in, AHA co-founder Selma Calmes gave a brief presentation about her father’s time in England preparing for D-Day with the 82nd Airborne, one of three airborne units that parachuted into Normandy in the early hours of D-Day. She also showed the letters he wrote about his adventures on D-Day, as well as items showing English life during the difficult years of WW II. The American celebration ended with an American-style dinner back at Queens’ College.

From the British side, the HAS released a new publication on Henry Hill Hickman, who advocated using inhaled gases to relieve the pain of surgery starting about 1823. This book is based on material collected by W.D.A. (Denis) Smith (d. 2000). A team of editors (Adrian Padfield, Edward Armitage, Frank Bennetts and Peter Drury) effectively cut the voluminous amount of material into a most attractive, neat story of Hickman’s life. They also arranged to distribute at the meeting the most recent volume in the Wood Library’s Careers series, on three notable British anesthetists (Ivan Magill, Robert Macintosh and Geoffrey Organe).

Tours included a trip to Ely (named for the eels who lived in the nearby, historic swamp lands), its 12th century cathedral, and the Fenlands. The Fenlands were previously a massive swamp that was finally able to be drained by Dutch engineers between 1600-1700 and is now pleasant farmland. A walking tour, “From leeches to DNA,” visited some of the notable medical spots in Cambridge. King Henry VIII founded the first Royal Chair of Medicine here in 1540. William Harvey discovered circulation of the blood in 1628, Stephen Hales first measured blood pressure in 1733 and Crick and Watson working in the Cavendish Lab announced the structure of DNA in1953.

The Sixth ISHA led to particularly close mixing, in my opinion. Eating together in the College dining hall led to many more opportunities to meet new friends. And, the late opening of the bar each night again led to a lot of friendships! The HAS, under Neil Adams’ leadership, did a wonderful job of organizing and dealing with the inevitable small problems. Neil’s family, by the way, deserves special thanks for all their hard work. His wife, daughter and son were on-site for the entire meeting and were great help, as well as being wonderful people. Neil’s Department of Anaesthesia colleagues at West Suffolk Hospital did a yeoman’s job of getting people to their rooms and with many other duties. The English spirit of fun was also very evident, especially the two antique cars that drove out to the American Air Museum. Many thanks go to the meeting sponsors for their hard work putting together this successful meeting. The Venue Committee met during this ISHA and decided the next meeting will be held in Crete, Greece, in 2009. ISHAs LIVE on!

*The History of Anaesthesia Society would like to acknowledge their thanks to Selma Calmes and to Doris  Cope for their kind permissions to use this article which appeared in The Bulletin of Anesthesia History, Volume 24, Number 4.

Click here to view the titles of papers presented at the symposium

Click here to see a selection of photos from the meeting