The actual profession of chiropractic – as a distinct form of health care – dates back to 1895. However, some of the earliest healers in the history of the world understood the relationship between health and the condition of the spine.
“The doctor of the future will give no medicine but will interest his patients in the care of the human frame, in diet and in the cause and prevention of disease.”
– Thomas Edison
Why Chiropractic
Herodotus, a contemporary of Hippocrates, gained fame curing diseases by correcting spinal abnormalities through therapeutic exercises. If the patient was too weak to exercise, Herodotus would manipulate the patient’s spine. The philosopher Aristotle was critical of Herodotus’ tonic-free approach because, “he made old men young and thus prolonged their lives too greatly.”
However, treatment of the spine was still crude and misunderstood until Daniel David (D.D.) Palmer discovered the specific spinal adjustment. D.D. defined Chiropractic as. A system for adjusting the segments of the spinal column, by hand only” He was also responsible for the earliest development of the philosophy of Chiropractic and provided the first definition for vertebral subluxation.
“I am not the first person to replace subluxated vertebrae, but I do claim to be the first person to replace displaced vertebrae by using the spinous and transverse processes as levers…and to develop the philosophy and science of chiropractic adjustments.” D.D. Palmer, Discoverer of Chiropractic I
D.D. Palmer was born in Ontario, Canada, in 1845, He moved to the United States when he was 20 years old. He spent the years after the Civil War teaching school, raising bees and selling sweet raspberries in the Iowa and Illinois .
First Adjustment
In 1885, D.D. study with Paul Caster and learned the techniques of magnetic healing, a common therapy of the time. Two years later, he moved to Davenport and opened the Palmer Cure and Infirmary.
On September 18, 1895, D.D. Palmer was working late in his office when a janitor, Harvey Lillard, began working nearby. . He approached the man and tried to strike up a conversation. He soon realized Lillard was deaf.
Patiently, Palmer managed to communicate with the man, and learned that he had normal hearing for most of his life. However, he had been over in a cramped, stooping position, and felt something “pop” in his back. When he stood up, he realized he couldn’t hear.
He ran his hand carefully down Lillard’s spine and felt one of the vertebra was not in its normal position. “I reasoned that if that vertebra was replaced, the man’s hearing should be restored,” he wrote in his notes afterward. “With this object in view, a half hour’s talk persuaded Mr. Lillard to allow me to replace it. I racked it into position by using the spinous process as a lever, and soon the man could hear as before.”
Harvey Lillard reported in the January 1897 issue of The Chiropractic that:
”I was deaf 17 years and I expected to always remain so, for I had doctored a great deal without any benefit. I had long ago made up my mind to not take any more ear treatments, for it did me no good. Last January Dr. Palmer told me that my deafness came from an injury in my spine. This was new to me; but it is a fact that my back was injured at the time I went deaf. Dr. Palmer treated me on the spine; in two treatments I could hear quite well. That was eight months ago. My hearing remains good.” Harvey Lillard, 320 W. Eleventh St., Davenport, Iowa, (Palmer 1897).
DD Palmer
D.D. Palmer found each of these conditions responded well to the adjustments which he was calling “hand treatments.” Later with the help of Reverend Samuel Weed they coined the term chiropractic — from the Greek words, Chiro, meaning (hand) and practic, meaning (practice or operation).
He renamed his clinic the Palmer School and Infirmary of Chiropractic. In 1898, he accepted his first students.
Although he never used drugs, under Palmer’s care fevers broke, pain ended, infections healed, vision improved, stomach disorders disappeared, and of course, hearing returned.
Often surprised at the effectiveness of his adjustments, D.D. Palmer returned to his studies of anatomy and physiology to learn more about the vital connection between the spine and one’s health.
He realized spinal adjustments to correct vertebral misalignments, or subluxations, was eliminating nerve interference that caused the patients’ complaints.
Why Chiropractic-History
In 1905, D.D. Palmer indicted for practicing medicine without a license. He was sentenced to 105 days in jail and was required to pay a $350 fine. D.D. served his time and paid his fine but this didn’t keep him from adjusting. His patients (including his jailor) came to his jail cell to get their adjustments.
D.D. continued his fight to promote Chiropractic publishing two books from 1906 to 1913, “The Science of Chiropractic” and “The Chiropractors Adjuster.” He adjusted patients until his death in Los Angeles at the age of 68.
D.D.’s son, Bartlett Joshua, was equally as enthusiastic about chiropractic as his father and continued his father’s work. Bartlett — or B.J. as he is now known — is credited with developing chiropractic into a clearly defined and unique health care system.
In 1924, B.J. had the first radio station west of the Mississippi, WOC (or, Wonders Of Chiropractic). . He was a world traveler, and drew an audience from all over the country. B.J. Palmer was also a prolific author and dynamic speaker, who spoke to audiences all over the world concerning chiropractic. He was described as having zeal and being a brilliant salesman and missionary when it came to chiropractic. The practice of chiropractic continued to be met with significant hostility from the medical community.
Today Chiropractic is licensed as a distinct healthcare profession in the United States. There are over 35 Chiropractic colleges throughout the world .
Today’s recognition of chiropractic is primarily based on the strength of the growing scientific research. Chiropractic is now the world’s third largest healthcare profession.
