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Through the Victorian and Edwardian eras, various new health
movements emerged in the transition to the modern age of scientific
medicine. Strange medical devices and quack cures were pushed for
the curing of illnesses during this time, frequently using crude
remedies based on simplistic beliefs and the placebo effect.
Nowadays, some of these treatments appear absurd, even cruel.
Because some of these devices were properly used as appropriate
therapies, it's difficult to label them altogether as bogus
devices. This book takes a thorough look at unconventional medical
gadgets, as well as the strange devices and therapies used by both
fringe and legitimate healers, and places them in the perspective
of modern medicine. The author argues that quackery should not be
defined by the ineffectiveness of a therapy, but rather be based on
the fraudulent intent of the people who pushed dishonest and
deceptive remedies.
Western films have often been tributes to place and setting, with
the magnificent backdrops mirroring the wildness of the narratives.
As the splendid outdoor scenery of Westerns could not be found on a
studio back lot or on a Hollywood sound stage, the movies have been
filmed in the wide open spaces of the American West and beyond.
This book chronicles the history of filming Westerns on location,
from shooting on the East Coast in the early 1900s; through the use
of locations in Utah, Arizona, and California in the 1940s and
1950s; and filming Westerns in Mexico, Spain, and other parts of
the world in the 1960s. Also studied is the relationship between
the filming location timeline and the evolving motion picture
industry of the twentieth century, and how these factors shaped
audience perceptions of the "Real West.
The traditional view of the American West is that the frontier was
settled by colonists emigrating from the Atlantic Coast to the
Pacific shore. Spanish conquistadors, however, landed in Central
America 150 years before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock. This
is the story of how the Spanish pushed north from Mexico in the
1500s seeking riches, in the process colonizing the Southwest 250
years before the American influx of European settlers in the
mid-1800s. Much of the culture and many of the traditions brought
by these Spanish explorers have influenced what is present and
visible today. The wave of conquerors, soldiers, settlers, and men
of the church that flowed north from Mexico during the 1600s and
1700s eventually populated a vast area. Spanish explorers
established settlements over a broad section extending over the
Southwest from Texas to California as they searched for riches in
the form of gold and silver. Along with the original Spanish
conquistadors came missionaries who tried to convert the existing
native population to Christianity. This forced conversion of the
Pueblo and Plains Indians, and suppression of their native
religious beliefs, led to cultural clashes that eventually resulted
in outright rebellion, and affected the course of history in the
Southwest.
This book explores the role and influence of drink and drugs
(primarily opium) in the Old West, which for this book is
considered to be America west of the Mississippi from the
California gold rush of the 1840s to the closing of the Western
Frontier in roughly 1900. This period was the first time in
American history that heavy drinking and drug abuse became a major
social concern. Drinking was considered to be an accepted pursuit
for men at the time. Smoking opium was considered to be deviant and
associated with groups on the fringes of mainstream society, but
opium use and addiction by women was commonplace. This book
presents the background of both substances and how their use spread
across the West, at first for medicinal purposes--but how overuse
and abuse led to the Temperance Movement and eventually to National
Prohibition. This book reports the historical reality of alcohol
and opium use in the Old West without bias.
This book describes the evolution of the Western cowboy hero as a
mythic person created and propagated by dime novels, pulp fiction,
television and Hollywood movies. The expectations and demands of
readers, viewers, and movie makers have all influenced the public
perception of the Western hero. As a result, business interests
have commercialized the Western past as publishers and studios have
tried to make their image of the West be the most compelling to
ensure the largest audience. Because many of our contemporary
perceptions of the Western hero have come to us from Hollywood,
much of the book discusses his changing image in the movies. The
first chapter presents an overview of the Western hero. The rest of
the chapters trace the image of the hero and his place in the
fictional West from early novels and movies to the present, and
discuss how his image has evolved due to changing audience
expectations and economic pressures on various media to create a
profitable product.
This book compares the reality of the Old West to how it is
portrayed in the escapist entertainment of Western movies: It has
the perspective of history rather than traditional analysis or
critical commentary. Starting with the early 1900s Western movies,
the narrative follows the evolution in look, style, and content as
the films matured from short vignettes of good-versus-bad into the
modern plots. The book compares the reality of the cowboys,
Indians, gunmen, lawmen, and soldiers who peopled the Old West to
how they are portrayed (real and fictional) on the silver screen.
Western stories and motion pictures are full of images of badmen
swaggering about the Old West, brought to justice only by valiant
lawmen shooting them down in daring gunfights. In reality, this
type of writing consists mostly of invented and anecdotal tales.
After a shootout, real lawmen doing their legitimate job in the Old
West did not simply walk away from a gunfight, as commonly depicted
in the movies. They had to face the legal system and justify a
shooting, the same as the criminals they arrested. To provide a
more realistic account of criminal justice, this book is a factual
history of crime and punishment in the Old West from about 1850 to
1900. The focus is how criminals in the Old West came into conflict
with the law and what happened after they were apprehended. This
book describes the entire criminal justice process, starting with
common crimes committed in the Old West, from crimes such as train
robbery and cattle theft, to criminal assault, and gunfights. The
narrative discusses methods of apprehension of criminals and the
final resolution of their crimes through the criminal justice
system, followed by the consequences for the lawbreaker, which
included local jail, state prisons, flogging, or (if the crime were
severe enough) hanging. Topics are illustrated using stories of
actual criminals, lawmen, and crimes as examples.
Modern spas are wellness resorts that offer beauty treatments,
massages and complementary therapies. Victorian spas were
sanitariums, providing "water cure" treatments supplemented by
massage, vibration, electricity and radioactivity. Rooted in the
palliative health reforms of the early 19th century, spas of the
Victorian Age grew out of the hydrotherapy institutions of the
1840s-an alternative to the horrors of bleeding and purging. The
regimen focused on diet, rest, cessation of alcohol and foods that
upset the stomach, stress reduction and plenty of water. The
treatments, though sometimes of a dubious nature, formed the
transition from the primitive methods of "heroic medicine" to the
era of scientifically based practices.
Sensationalistic literature is reading material that is intended to
shock, startle, excite, or arouse intense interest in a reader
through the use of subject matter, style, language, or artistic
expression. Readers throughout the ages have been fascinated by
lurid fiction about crime, assault, killings, thievery, kidnapping,
murder, and the associated villains of the worst type. This type of
reading material has provided escapism that has thrilled and
shocked readers from the appearance of dime novels around the time
of the American Civil War to the decline of the pulp magazines
after World War II and the transition into what have become today's
paperback novels. This popular history of dime novels and pulp
magazines during the time period from approximately 1850 to 1960
describes how sensational pulp literature filled a need among
readers and flowered during the evolving social conditions of the
Industrial Revolution. It provides a comprehensive story of why
pulp books and magazines appeared, what this type of literature
was, how it became popular, how it was the basis for the later pulp
magazines of the 1930s and 1940s, and then continued on into
today's thrillers.
Their heads filled with images of glory and battle, most young men
joined the frontier army only to endure a life of tedious drills,
bad meals, uncomfortable quarters, and ill-fitting uniforms.
Working hard seven days a week and in all weather, soldiers
frequently found themselves lonely and bored, with little
opportunity for advancement but many ways to be
punished????????????all for $13 a month. Focusing on the Indian
Wars period of the 1840s through the 1890s, Life of a Soldier on
the Western Frontier captures the daily challenges faced by the
typical enlisted man and explores the role soldiers played in the
conquering of the American frontier. In addition to describing the
nitty-gritty details of a soldier's daily life, this fascinating
study explores the Indian Wars from the perspective of both the
military and the Indians and examines all aspects of the
post????????????Civil War army, including its organization, its
weapons, and its personnel. The book also contains two appendices,
one summarizing significant battles and the other listing selected
western forts. Both include site locations and information for
visitors. Dozens of photos and several maps add to the reader's
understanding and enjoyment.
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