and opened, i believe in march of this year, opened this building as the first african-american museum in the country. next friday night, c-span examines the history of the civil rights movement, with a tour of the medgar evers house in jackson, mississippi, the 1917 race riots in st. louis, martin luther king's letter from birmingham jail, the bombing of the 16th street baptist church, and more. marty young is the director of the pioneer heritage center at louisiana state university in shreveport. he gave c-span a tour of a doctors office from the civil war era and some of the surgical tools used at the time.

>> we are in our dr.'s office at the heritage center. pioneermedicine is -- medicine is a long stretch from where it is today. modern medicine has evolved over a short time, whereas pioneer medicine kind of stayed stagnant for a while, without a lot of changes. doingere still bloodletting, using leeches, doing things modern medicine has found upon. we know some of those have come full circle as well. things that wee take for granted today when we things likerk for, the instruments being as germ-free as possible, or the dr. has washed his hands before he decides to work on us. the tools are sterilized. modern painkillers. anesthetics. a lot of these things were

nowhere even on the radar yet for these doctors that were practicing. we use the term loosely for doctors when we are talking early medicine. a lot of doctors in our region were self-taught, or had worked under somebody else who had been self-taught. we were getting ready to retire. they would just learn as they went. this would be the room you would come into for possibly a tooth pulling, if they were going to take councils out, if they were going to remove an appendix, if they were going to deliver a baby, if you were going to do when i exam. -- do an eye exam. warmer weather, better days, people would sit outside and wait. middleas cold and nasty, of winter, everybody could easily be crammed into the exam room, with maybe just a sheet pulled across the patient. of any was not that huge important thing for them to have to have when you went to the doctor.

other things that would make it scary to come to the doctor during this time your time is, if you look at the exam table, the exam table is all metal. his is a mental exam table with a sterile -- exam table. would they sterilize it? no. would there be clean paper like we imagine today? no. manikin on here, but under our manikin is a groove bent into the center tray of the -- exam table. that groove runs into a pan which is called the blood pan and the blood groove. if the doctor was doing work, the blood would run around the side of the patient, under his back, into that groove, and into the pay him. the smaller pan would allow the larger panel on the floor. , do the surgery was done they sterilize it? no. bucket of water and a rag. they would wash it off. that would be about as clean as

they would get it, and the same for their tools. a good doctor would have a wash basin for washing their hands and a basin and a bar of soap. the soap was not antibacterial. it was basically homemade lye soap, but it was better than nothing. they would wash up if they could, and then they would start to do their work. nothing to render you unconscious for surgery. there is nothing to give you for paying. what we would call really good painkillers -- morphine had not been invented yet. been invented yet. let's say our manikin was breaking horses and was thrown and was landed wrong. wrotee landed, he maybe his light. we know it is broken, because his foot is pointing the wrong direction. they bring him into the doctor's office, maybe seven miles on a bumpy road with him bouncing around in the back of the wagon.

anddoctor looks at him gives him his best medical opinion. he goes, yes, it's broken. the doctor says, the first thing is we will have to try to get his boots off. our manikin does not have his boots on. to remove the boots, first thing you would have to do is rotate the leg back into the right position. that would just entail the ,octor rotating the leg back with him screaming and hollering the entire time. something else the doctors would do that they don't do today is, he would ask his buddies that brought him, i am going to need your help. their job would be to pin him to the table while the doctor did his work. let's say i was the person who brought him in. my job would be to do this and pin him to the table while the doctor rotated that put back into the right position. the doctor gets ready to take his boot off. bag, andround in his he might just pull his pocket knife out and go to cut the

leather on the boot. he may moan and groan and ask the why not cut his boots off? it may be the only pair of shoes he has. the doctor would have to decide whether to cut the boots off or go by his wishes. he would manage to manage -- wrestle the boot loose. leg is all bloody. the bone has been exposed through the skin. the dr. does his best. no painkillers, no x-ray. the doctor has to set the bone. the only way he knows how can be the first effort will be, he will take the heel and foot and apply pressure and poll and see if he can pull the bone under

the skin. somewhat, but doesn't work as well as it should. what is he going to do? he is going to take his fingers and put pressure on the broken own and push it back to the hole in the skin. he is going to rotate the bone until he thinks he feels the bones come together. at that point he is going to bandage it up. no plaster cast at this time. he is going to splint it. this involves two boards. two boards, one on each side of the leg. the wound would be bound. he would take the boards, laid them -- lay them side-by-side. tightly wrapped the board on and that will become the cast. within 10 days, maybe a little

longer, the house starts getting a foul order. there may be flies. the biggest fear is it has gotten infected. an infection was not something he wanted to get. with gangrene sitting in, they didn't have antibiotics. you hadn't hope your body was strong enough to fight it off. curefection set in, the was imputation. would say, i was afraid it would happen. one reason was the doctor had his fingers in the wound. but he had to do what he had to do. now the infection is there. the doctor would have to come above the area and remove the lake. the first imputation would be at the knee. they would come up the mid part

of the thigh and you something -- and imputation get. amputation kit. most doctors would be practiced and amputations, especially after the american civil war, because they had had many patients to work on. it was the root to go -- route to go. the first tool would be the scalpel. these are not nice and delicate. it is long and narrow with a sharp edge. the reason for the length is because the blade would to be pushed through the thigh. then they would take the bone saw. small --saw is very has very small teeth.

it would be used to saw through the bone. they waste -- would saw as close as they could. they would cut it higher than the flash and then folded over the bone. it and stitch it. that would make be stumped. you -- they would stitch it. that would make be stumped. but it was a very effective surgery done really. farmers.rs were tenant they were also what words -- was called saddlebag doctors. out and roam the countryside and go to small communities. we have a great example of what the doctors would carry. not only with a have a saddlebag with the surgical kits in it,

but we have a great example of a dr.'s kit with all the medicines he would have had and it needed. individually held by leather straps and whatnot. the bottles lean out. to doctors can gain access them. he would have kept spoons in smaller portions of medicines and whatnot. this would have all been closed by the dr. on horseback. this would be his medical bag. a lot of medicines were based -- opium.oa or sometimes they did not have true medical properties but they had -- made you feel good. locally, and they would use for medicines, things like dandelions'twas great for when you are constipated. willow bark.

you can boil it down and scrape the residue out of the pot. it was a great early painkiller. one of my favorites was a tree called tickle tongue. that is what they would use prior to dental work. it you can suck on it and it would make your mouth don't him. not as good as novocain but better than nothing. office and pharmacy was here. there were jars of ground-up powders and whatnot. he would make his own pills and medicines that way. the used to things that would grow naturally. some of them did have medicinal purposes and actually worked. some of them did not. a lot of these recipes, they did not call them prescriptions, called for things that are poisonous.

there are recipes that call for -- required three drops of hemlock. hemlock is very poisonous. there are several that call for crushed up buckeye seeds. buckeyes are poisonous. a little could cure you. a lot could kill you. he would have your -- his pharmacy, scales for measuring the powders and whatnot. this also was the dentist's office. dental work is one of the scariest things people would had to have done. we have our dental chair and double jewel -- dental drail. it is a drill that runs off a treadle. ours is missing a few pieces. you would use foot power to get the belt turning.

you can hear it, nice and squeaky. you can imagine the sound. that is what would cause the drillbit to turn to read the dentist would use that to drill your teeth. the dental chair is a true dental chair. and medical chair that would have been used. this was used around 1856. by a local doctor. south of town, here. trueblue medical chair. the reason we know this is by the design. and by its function. if you foot tunnel here, -- foot here, the chair can lean back and you get a lot of angle for the patient. the absence ofs any arms.

in order for the doctor to pull a tooth, he had to keep you as a mobile as he could. the patient would sit in the chair. the doctor would step over the patient in into the chair so he could work on the mouth. basically keep his body from moving around so much. pulling of teeth, like today but without the novocain. plyers weresed -- used. one of my favorite was a tool called a to ski. -- tooth key. it consists of a handle, shaft, and hook. iswill imagine the fingertip the end of a tooth or read hang this at the edge of the tooth and rotate it around. using just manpower, you would rotate the tooth out of the gum line.

we always hear about george washington having wooden teeth. they weren't always wooden. mathe years went by, they de dentures and false teeth. if we look, we have ivory teeth. or porcelain. porcelain was used, too. the unique thing about these is they are toxic. the base that they made and used, they use lead. you poppies in your mouth. your mouth. in you are feeling sickly. told -- he tells you to stay off your feet for a few days. you won't wear your dentures while you are in bed. you sit -- set them on the table. you get to feeling better and

put your teeth back in. you feel sick again. you can get lead poisoning just from wearing your dentures. we talked about the doctors. regionally, when you look at if we go 1849, the records show there were only 87 doctors in the western half of louisiana. when youretty scarce talk about a whole state. the doctors, we talked about them moving around. they were much needed. we always tell the kids on the tour is, the next time you go to your doctor, be sure to shake himor her hand and tell her -- him or her thank you. >>