# "McTeague"... Unlicensed doctors and dentists in the 1890s **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 1, 2006, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695 "2006-03-01T23:49:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2006, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/1 "2006-03-01T23:49:02Z")
For those who are unfamiliar with it, Frank Norris’ _McTeague_ is set in 1899 in San Francisco, and deals with the travails of an unlicensed dentist who is caught by the City and forced to cease practicing. In the story, he has been working at it for the preceding 10 or 12 years, having learned practical dentists’ technique by working as another’s assistant, but is such a stupid great oaf as to be unable to comprehend the science behind the practice. What I want to know now is, was the state of the dental profession in 1890 such that someone such as Norris’ character could have simply rented an office and started working as a dentist, and no questions asked? How about for medical doctors? ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2006, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/2 "2006-03-02T00:16:22Z")
Greedy aren’t we? (There’s my extent of jokes about the OP). The 1890s were before the institution of agencies like the FDA and there weren’t even many medical schools in the country. All-knowing doctors were still a few years in the offing. I’m certain others know when formal certification for dentists started. I’m thinking that it would have been a Progressive Era reform. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2006, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/3 "2006-03-02T14:48:37Z")
In the 19th Century, a college diploma was not needed in any State of the Union to practice Medicine, Dentistry, or even Surgery! :eek: The professions of Pharmcist & Doctor were often, & frequently, interchangable or combined. There were “medical schools” that were little more than “Joe’s Big School O’ Good Doctorin”, that gave diplomas after 3 months of training. :eek: :eek: ---
**Author:** ![irishgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8edcca/32.png) [@irishgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/irishgirl)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2006, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/4 "2006-03-02T15:22:34Z")
Well, to be fair, in the early 19th century, medical treatment was pretty much laxatives, emetics, heavy metal salts and narcotics with the Surgery was your basic amputations and possibly the odd tonsillectomy or adenoidectomy, and if you were really, really good, something fancy like an appendicectomy. How much training could you need? I’m only half joking. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2006, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/5 "2006-03-02T15:57:26Z")
Was “Doc” holliday 9of Wyatt earp fame) a licensed dentist? the fact that he was a tuberculosis victim probably made prospective patients think twice, though! ---
**Author:** ![The\_Scrivener](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@The\_Scrivener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Scrivener)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2006, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/6 "2006-03-02T18:15:52Z")
Slight hijack – one of the chief impulses behind the professionalization and self-regulation of physicians via the American Medical Association was the emergent medical profession’s interest in the suppression of their chief rival (in obstetrics, anyway), midwives, through the passage of legislation banning the unlicensed from practicing medicine. I don’t remember which history book I read it in, but at one point, midwives were racking up significantly better survivor stats than the “doctors” of their era and were usually in higher demand by their patients, as well. (Perhaps this was largely due to midwives being, IIRC, much more likely to wash their hands and arms thoroughly before proceeding – and being less likely to have just visited another patient with, say, typhus, cholera, smallpox…?) Admittedly, the statistics were grim enough no matter who was consulted. In the premodern (or, at least, preindustrial) era, about one in ten women would die in or shortly following childbirth. This [history of the modern American medical school establishment](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0801852587/002-4898273-6439249?v=glance&n=283155) is not the book I’m trying to remember, but the synopsis in the link pertains to this thread – namely, that as of the late-19th-C., there were a couple of dozen “medical schools” in the USA, typically requiring a whopping eight months’ worth of study, with no comprehensive exams. :eek: No mention of the competitive threat posed by midwifery in the synopsis, but that’s more of a Marxist and Women’s History angle, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2006, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/7 "2006-03-02T20:21:20Z")
Interesting responses, which raise another question. Now, in _McTeague_, Norris makes it plain that the ‘dentist’ is too stupid to benefit from education, having been too dullwitted to get anything out of the books he had bought, in order to form one of the major premises of the novel. However, IRL, when these professions became more regulated and the boom was lowered on uneducated practitioners, could some of them still stay in practice, perhaps by sitting for a licensing examination? ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2006, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/8 "2006-03-02T23:32:08Z")
> [@Spectre of Pithecanthropus](#): > > Interesting responses, which raise another question. Now, in _McTeague_, Norris makes it plain that the ‘dentist’ is too stupid to benefit from education, having been too dullwitted to get anything out of the books he had bought, in order to form one of the major premises of the novel. > > However, IRL, when these professions became more regulated and the boom was lowered on uneducated practitioners, could some of them still stay in practice, perhaps by sitting for a licensing examination? That depended on the locale. Some places shut em down, others offered em a competency exam, others just “Grandfathered” them in. ---
**Author:** ![rippingtons\_fan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rippingtons_fan/32/11767_2.png) [@rippingtons\_fan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rippingtons_fan)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2006, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/9 "2006-03-03T21:46:29Z")
An excellent source of information on this subject can be found in a book titled: The Good Old Days–They Were Terrible by Otto Bettmann of the Bettmann Archives. Quack medicine was just one of many hazards people had to face in the 19th Century. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2006, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/10 "2006-03-04T02:36:33Z")
Norris researched **McTeague** (a favorite of mine) extensively, so I doubt he’d make a mistake. The closest information I can find is that in Oregon (not far from California, where **McTeague** is set) doctors (not dentists) were required to be licensed starting in 1889. However, the requirements were only that they graduate medical school or, if practicing, register within 60 days of the law’s passage. Assuming California passed a similar law for dentists, it would be quite possible the Mac wouldn’t have heard about it and not registered in time. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2006, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/11 "2006-03-04T20:48:50Z")
It wasn’t until after 1910 when the [Flexner Report](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report) was issued that standards and accreditation became the watchword for North American medical schools. Proprietary schools were shut down, and it was the expectation that a medical school should accept only academically qualified HS grads with at least an additional two years of college science, that the curriculum should be 4 years long, and that the medical school should be affiliated with a university. ---
**Author:** ![Tess\_of\_the\_Derbyville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Tess\_of\_the\_Derbyville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tess_of_the_Derbyville)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2006, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/12 "2006-03-05T04:14:13Z")
Louisville had a medical college as of [1837](http://www.louisville.edu/medschool/history.htm), which seemed to be highly regarded. My great, great uncle studied there. I’m not sure what kind of degree he earned, if any, but he did serve as a country doctor for 40 years in our hometown, making his rounds on horseback into the 1930’s. ---
**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2006, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/13 "2006-03-06T17:14:38Z")
My grandfather practiced dentistry as a hobby - on friends and neighbors, they tell me. I don’t think he charged them. He was born in 1890 and I am guessing he was doing this in perhaps the 1910s or 20s. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2006, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/14 "2006-03-06T17:28:22Z")
> [@Napier](#): > > My grandfather practiced dentistry as a hobby - on friends and neighbors, they tell me. I don’t think he charged them. > > He was born in 1890 and I am guessing he was doing this in perhaps the 1910s or 20s. Oh, what a jolly bundle o laughs your grandpappy was! :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2006, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/15 "2006-03-06T22:49:04Z")
> [@Qadgop the Mercotan](#): > > It wasn’t until after 1910 when the [Flexner Report](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report) was issued that standards and accreditation became the watchword for North American medical schools. Proprietary schools were shut down, and it was the expectation that a medical school should accept only academically qualified HS grads with at least an additional two years of college science, that the curriculum should be 4 years long, and that the medical school should be affiliated with a university. Interesting in that they didn’t seem to care about an undergraduate degree but were more concerned that the student should have units in specific subjects. My father got his MD in 1948, and before medical school spent only two years at UCLA on a wartime accelerated premed program. He never got a bachelor’s degree. Nowadays it seems that you have to have a bachelor’s degree to get into med school, and, moreover, it makes no difference what the undergraduate major is. At least, that’s what some med school catalogs and websites say. My grandfather seems to have been an example of the pharmacist/physician. He had an MD degree from 1913 or 1914, and a “Pharmaceutical Chemist” degree from 1909. This last must have been at most a two-year program; otherwise I can’t reconcile it with the fact that he was only 19 y.o.a. in 1909. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2006, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcteague-unlicensed-doctors-and-dentists-in-the-1890s/346695/16 "2006-03-06T22:50:05Z")
> [@Napier](#): > > My grandfather practiced dentistry as a hobby - on friends and neighbors, they tell me. I don’t think he charged them. > > He was born in 1890 and I am guessing he was doing this in perhaps the 1910s or 20s. Reminds me of a particular Three Stooges short…“I’ve got my doctor book right here! We’ll have you fixed up in no time.”