This Famous Ether Daguerreotype Shows the Wrong Patient

In the whole plate daguerreotype the Getty Museum catalogs as "Early Operation Using Ether for Anesthesia," a young man lies on a table in a Boston amphitheater with both legs bare below the knee and his socks still on. Nine men crowd around him, and several of their faces are smeared by the length of the exposure. That plate has been in print since 1903, and for decades it has carried captions placing it on October 16, 1846, the morning ether was first demonstrated in public.[Read More]