Discoverers of Anaesthesia—2 WILLIAM THOMAS GREEN MORTON (1819–1868)

Morton took up the practice of dentistry at Farmington, Connecticut, in mid‐1841, when nearly twenty‐two years old. He was essentially self taught, but did receive some instruction at the hands of Horace Wells, an accomplished dentist in nearby Hartford. Morton moved to Boston in late 1843, after Wells, who had invented an improved way of making dental plates, formed a partnership with him. There Morton continued the practice after the partnership was dissolved a few months later, and afterwards attended lectures at Harvard Medical School, from which he did not graduate. Being desirous—even desperate—to find some method of annulling or relieving the pain of tooth extraction in order to fit patients with dental plates and increase his successful practice even more, Morton harkened back to Wells's experiments with nitrous oxide and began experimenting on his own. After many unsuccessful attempts, he was advised by C. T. Jackson to employ sulphuric ether for the purpose, with Jackson telling him how to use it. On September 30, 1846, after administering sulphuric ether to a random patient, he made his first successful painless extraction, with more cases following. The advertisement of his painless extraction was seen by the Massachusetts General Hospital surgeon Henry J. Bigelow, who, after observing him make a number of painless extractions, urged a trial of Morton's still secret compound at a surgical operation. This took place at the General on 16 October 1846—and history recorded the rest!