January 24 | Horace Wells

January 21, 1815 - January 24, 1848: Age 33

Next time you visit the dentist, spare a thought for Horace Wells, the young American dentist who had the bright idea that people should not be in pain while having their teeth fixed. Wells witnessed a demonstration of the effects of nitrous oxide, and immediately connected it with the notion of painless surgery, or at least distress-free surgery. The very next day he had himself put under and himself became the first dental patient to have a tooth removed painlessly.

At the time, other dentists were also experimenting with other kinds of anaesthesia, but Wells was determined to prove that nitrous oxide was the best. Unfortunately he staged a demonstration in front of medical students during which the gas was incorrectly administered, and the patient cried out in pain. He never lived it down.

Unfortunately he was prone to experimenting on himself in comparing the effects of various pain-killing drugs. Soon he became addicted to nitrous oxide, and on his birthday in 1848, January 21, he was arrested for causing a disturbance in a public place while high on chloroform. When he sobered up he wrote a letter confessing that he had provided sulfuric acid to a friend, who then went and throw on a local prostitute in revenge. He was so distraught that he dosed himself with chloroform, got high as a kite, and in a state of complete exhileration took the remainder of the sulfuric acid, ran out into the street, and threw it on some passing women.

"I cannot proceed," he wrote. "My hand is too unsteady and my whole frame is convulsed in agony. My brain is on fire."

He was allowed to go home for some personal items, on his promise to return to jail. An honourable man, he did just that, but the personal items he retrieved included more chloroform and a razor. In a note to his wife, he stated, "I feel that I am fast becoming a deranged man, or I would desist from this act. I can not live and keep my reason, and on this account God will forgive the deed. I can say no more."

He inhaled some chloroform to dull the pain, then cut his leg to the bone, slitting an artery. He was found dead in his cell the next morning, the empty bottle of chloroform by his side.

Sources: Wikipedia; Forbes, Malcolm, They Went That-A-Way, Simon and Shuster, New York, 1988.

November 8 | Doc Holliday

August 14, 1851 – November 8, 1887: Age 36

We know about Doc Holliday because of tuberculosis. It's also what killed him. John Henry Holliday was born in Georgia, received a good education (Latin, Greek, and dental school), and opened a dental practice in Atlanta. Shortly after that he was diagnosed with tuberculosis (by his uncle, a doctor) and advised that living in a warmer, drier climate would be good for his health.

He moved to Texas and, although he opened a dental practice, soon realized that gambling was a more lucrative and fun profession. He had a hot temper and got into a few gunfights around gambling issues, and this suited him, possibly because of the alcohol he took to control his cough, and possibly because he felt it was better to die of a gunshot than of tuberculosis. He acquired a reputation as someone willing to stand up and use force, and fell in famously with Wyatt Earp and his brothers. Together they moved to Arizona, and made history in the gunfight at the OK Corral in October 1881.

Holliday moved to Colorado in April 1882 and spent the rest of his short life there. In 1887, prematurely grey and sickly, he checked into a hotel with some hot springs hoping the waters would provide relief. They did not. From the website, Outlaws and Gunslingers:

On 8 November 1887, Doc awoke clear-eyed and asked for a drink of whiskey, which he drank with enjoyment. He looked at this bare feet and said, "This is funny." He then drew his last breath from the disease his uncle fourteen years earlier had said would kill him within two years. He had died in the winter, and the ground was frozen solid and covered in ice, preventing the hearse from making it up the steep narrow road to the graveyard on the mountaintop overlooking the town. The well-intentioned citizens of Glenwood Springs laid Doc to rest in an unmarked grave at the foot of the mesa until he could be transferred to the cemetery after the Spring thaws. According to the townsfolk, he never was.

As the years went by, Glenwood Springs grew outward, and today, Doc most likely lies buried in someone’s back yard. Although his grave has been lost, his tombstone rests in the Linwood Cemetery for all to see. It doesn’t even have his full name on it. It says simply "Doc Holliday."

Sources: Wikipedia, Outlaws and Gunslingers