He said, “What in heck is Arum triphyllum?”.
I said, “That is plan Indian turnip?”.
He said, “Will you get me a barrel of it?”.
I replied, “Doctor, a barrel wouldnt do you any good, because I didnt help the next patient with the same thing”.
I am going to conclude this right away by saying it was four in the afternoon when he came into my office, and I had four or five patients waiting. I knew he had left many more patients in his office. It was seven oclock at night when we left that office. We both forgot all about our patients.
My secretary listened at the keyhole and heard the discussion in here and told my parents to go home.
That had its misfortune, too. I won a convert to homoeopathy between four oclock and seven oclock, but fate stepped in and he died shortly after that. I think some of you know the old story of William Pepper of the University of Pennsylvania, who likewise appeared in the office of Dr. Walter James, under similar circumstances. Dr. Pepper died before he could introduce homoeopathy in the University of Pennsylvania, which he promised to do.
Dr. A. PULFORD: I heard a little story the other day that I think gives a little of the other side of this. Two young men graduated at the same school. One was honest; the other, by the skin of his teeth. They went their separate ways. The one that was honest was walking; the other one riding along in his automobile, and he had a large mansion. They happened to meet in front of the home of the one who had gotten through by the skin of his teeth, and they talked matter over. Just at that time the factory let out and numerous people went by. After they passed, the honest man said to the other man, “How does it come that you have all of this while I walk?”.
He said, “Did you see that crowd walk by?”.
“Yes”.
“How many of those people do you think know enough to come in out of the rain”.
“Not many”.
He said, “You doctor the other few intelligent ones, and we doctor these,” and that is why they get ahead.
DR. SCHWARTZ: Many good citizens would like a change in government, but they are not organized against the party organization; and it is so in the field of medicine, unless we are organized and stand together for a definite aim and work together, we cant do much. We havent been highly organized, or at least we dont stick together.
There was a writer or the A.M.A. Journal in my office a year ago asking me to subscribe to the Journal. He knows Dr. Clayton, of Palatine, very well, a good homoeopath. We talked quite a while, and he told me that Dr. Clayton had told him many things and made him see the truth of it, and, in fact, Dr. Clayton had cured his child of a cough after he had had all kinds of treatment, and the remedy given to the child was Silica. I said, “Then why dont you throw in your lot, or at least learn something more of it?”.
Well, there was just a mercenary reason, he was writing and earning his living, and I think that is one of the Whys.
DR. CHARLES BOERICKE: I think the answer to the Why lies with the individual physician. The money is there if you are keen enough and salesman enough to get it. Today the Homoeopathic Foundation of California has approximately dollar 350,000 cold cash. We did have more than that prior to the depression, but our funds shrank. That money is to be used to build a homoeopathic hospital in San Francisco, and we hope very much, with the market going up, that we will be able to get that hospital within the next year.
Practically all of that money was left by individual legacies to the different homoeopathic physicians. In other words, Dr. Ward has that happy faculty of convincing them that on their decease they should turn over so much of their estate to the Homoeopathic Foundation.
Recently, one of Dr. Wards patients left a dollar 100,000 estate to the Foundation. He made one mistake, unfortunately,; he left the whole dollar 100,000 to the Foundation and the court ruled that the Foundation was a charitable organization and, therefore, according to the California State Law, we were only permitted to take one-third of it. That is why we have endeavored to establish the fact that the Homoeopathic Foundation of California is a scientific, non-charitable organization, in the event of such a contingency in the future. So, we have established laboratories and research work to bear out the fact that it is a non-charitable organization. We have, in the first place, a name that the patient can leave it to, the Homoeopathic Foundation.
If one of your patients here died, whom would you tell the patient to leave it to you? Maybe he wouldnt turn it over. To the International Hahnemannian Association? Maybe he would like to do that, but here we have a definite Foundation whose one and only established purpose is to foster the good of homoeopathy in any way the directors see fit that it should be accomplished. So, we have an organization where they can leave the money.
A year ago one of Dr. Angels patients died and left us 10,000. Six months ago another one of his patients died and left us 1,000. The entire amount of 350,000 has left by legacies, but the patients are tutored by the doctor prior to their decease and the legal matters are all arranged so there is no trouble when the patient dies.
DR. ROBERTS: We have a Foundation under a charter of the District of Columbia and it is that Foundation that is running a post graduate school. It is because of one individual that we are able to run that. What we need, and need desperately, is to enlarge that Foundation so that we can carry out the four-square proposition that the American Foundation for Homoeopathy has in view. If any of you people find some of your patients that are wanting to dispose of some of their money, if you can lead them to see it, send them to the American Foundation for Homoeopathy.
DR. MOORE: One great trouble about all that, is the homoeopathic patients take such a long time to die.
DR. ROBBERTS: Dr. McLaren has just asked me to say one more word, however, I dont know but it belongs to Dr. McLaren to do it.
Sir John Wier, as you know, is President of this Association this year. It is impossible for him to leave England on account of his relationship to the Royal family. Sir John wrote a while ago, questioning whether or not to place one hundred pounds for entertainment for this meeting, or to meet the suggestion of starting an endowment fund for the I.H.A. with that amount. In as much as he found that it was our custom to pay for our won dinners at these meetings, and to depend upon the unusual opportunity for meeting our distant confreres for sociability, he decided to begin the Endowment of the I.H.A. with that amount; and Dr. McLaren informed me that the amount was sent him for Sir John.
DR. FARRINGTON: We are glad to hear that. How little the profession knows really about homoeopathy. I can tell you stories, one after another, of my experiences. One of the most outstanding recently was an old physician 81 years old, very well preserved, who came to me from a town in Indiana. He apparently was perfectly well, except he had neuritis in the right arm. He said that he couldnt cure it. So he came up to see if I could prescribe for him. That man was a homoeopath and had practiced for fifty-six years. He did not perceive that the case had all the symptoms of Rhus tox. I know some other instances. For some reason they get into a rut.
The work of the American Foundation certainly ought to be supported. It is practically the only out and out post graduate course that we have with didactic lectures.
Second comes the Extension School in Chicago, which in the few years it has been running had about fifty subscribers equally divided between homoeopath and non-homoeopath. The letters of appreciation that are received from students who have taken this course, or are only partially through it, are enough to turn ones head. It is exceedingly interesting to notice that in the beginning they were confused and unable to grasp the idea, and especially grasp the idea of the homoeopathic concept of disease. They gradually get a little light on it until one of them wrote that a few weeks after he had finished his course that he had doubled his practice.
We have an arrangement with Dr. Roberts whereby we exchange names of applicants. Those that are unable to come to Boston and stay there during the time of the course are referred to the post graduate school in Chicago, and we in turn refer students to Boston when they can afford it. We cannot compete with the course that they are giving there. Those are the two institutions that are giving straight homoeopathic courses. We do not attempt any scientific course as they did in California. I must say they are there performing a marvelous thing.
DR. DIXON: There is one thing you have got to say about my papers, they are always very brief. I think Dr. Bryant talked longer than I did about it, which gratified me very much.
There are many ways of approaching good homoeopathy and there are many ways of approaching this idea of building up our foundation, but they have all failed dismally during the depression. It is the money we need. We have the plant and men to run it, and all we need is a little bit more money and a little bit more enthusiasm among these fellows that know they need it.
Akron, Ohio
President, I.H.A.