The Midwest pioneer, his ills, cures, & doctors - University Library ...

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those among whom he hved and labored. They loved him
v/hen living, and mourned for him when dead."^
As indicated above, the pay of the country doctor was
uncertain, and when received, was often in the form of
produce. At the end of a year's service, including care in
two smallpox epidemics, an early Wisconsin doctor had
received $68 in cash.^ Even as late as 1861, when the population
of Chicago was more than one hundred thirty-five
thousand, the city physician received an annual salary of
only $600 and was required to furnish all medicines.* Another
doctor, at the forks of the Kalamazoo, apparently
for somewhat less than a year's work reaped much gratitude
and "For service, advice and medicine— 12^c," and
an old German physician in Illinois in 1842 received a stove
for sixteen office visits ("at 37 ^c"), solutions, and powders.°
Perhaps the patients were acting on the belief that
to pay the doctor in full would cause another illness in
the family. In a day of scarcity of specie and small change,
Indiana, in 1825 issued script bills "good for one dose
of medicine." These were known as "Puke Bills."
and prevalence of makeshifts, a Doctor Murdock of Brookville,
Creditorpatients
rarely came back for the second dose.^
Charges for medical services varied. Village and country
doctors were not organized and fees were not standardized.
Dr. Drake said that the ordinary charge was 25 cents
a mile, "one half being deducted and the other paid in
provender for his horse, or produce for his family." In the
earlier years the average country doctor would probably
settle for 25 to 50 cents for a local visit, or a dollar if he
sat up all night. The Indiana law of 1816 fixed fees at
1 2 Yz cents per mile of travel by day, double by night, but
these fees were not strictly adhered to. In the towns informal
agreements were sometimes made. Springfield, Illinois,
physicians, for instance, agreed in 1840 to the following
scale: daytime visit in town, $1; up to four miles, $2; each
additional mile, 50 cents; prices double for night visits;
verbal advice, $1; each dose of medicine, 50 cents; vaccination,
$1; natural parturition, $5 to $10; fractures, $5