Talk:Edgar Crookshank

I’m his great grandson and was surprised to find no entry about his personal life.. I don’t know much but I’ve been to Saint Hill and could see how he blew his dowry from marrying a Colfox by adding two wings to the house and having a boating lake built… my grandmother illustrated some of his books on bacteria..

Michael Hulls

ttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Edgar_Crookshank#/editor/0 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.18.190.157 (talk) 00:14, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Biased editing

CROOKSHANK, EDGAR MARCH, M.B. Lond. (Honours in Obst.) 1884, M.R.C.S. Eng. 1881 (King's Coll.); Exhib. and Gold Medallist in Anat. 1st M.B. Lond. 1879; Fell. King's Coll.; Mem. Roy. Micros. Soc. and Path. Soc.; Prof, of Comp. Path, and Bacteriol. King's Coll.; late House Surg. King's Coll. Hosp., and Civil Surg. Med. Staff Egyptian Campaign (Medal and Clasp, Tel-el-Kebir, and Khedive's Star). CDN99 Bit of a shock to find he was so well qualified? What is your justification for removing the text of his statements from out of his book? Are you suggesting he didn't write that? john 08:45, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

• No article on a person has every single achievement and title listed beside his/her name. Add some information with a NPOV, not just quote his books....--CDN99 11:49, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Yeah?, but we all know the real reason why you delete my text and links, so save us the speil. john 21:58, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
    • Please don't breach Wikipedia:Assume good faith. Lengthy quotations come under the guidelines of Wikipedia:Don't include copies of primary sources. As CDN99 says, it's also a matter of observation that no-one, whoever they happen to be, has credentials listed in such detail. Read through comparable biographies via Category:British surgeons and Category:British professors. 86.141.146.140 13:29, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
  • I did assume good faith until the facts showed I was being naive. And CDN99 has shown his true colours a few times . Someone with a POV on anti-vaccinators, in other words. john 20:36, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
• Hi Johnny, I've been watching your collection of evidence of "CDN 99 Bias" and that of numerous other users since the beginning. If you hope to use it someday for something, then you should provide links to the source of every quote :), otherwise it's no good. Also, keep in mind that all one has to do to demonstrate "Whale to Bias" is look at any of your contributions. --CDN99 18:32, 30 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Thanks for the tip. Bias is a distraction, the truth is what I am interested in. I think you medical people lost track of that a century ago. john 20:21, 31 January 2006 (UTC)
    • • If you're interested in the truth, help by working to create biographies that provide, like other Wikipedia biographies, a life story for the whole person instead of just reporting the bits pertinent to your field of interest. 86.139.250.97 18:06, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

So, was this man born? Did he die? It'd be helpful to know. Michael Ralston 03:55, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Ridge Hill / Saint Hill

Any evidence either way on whether they're the same or different? I was correlating the Times obituary, that said he lived at Ridge Hill Manor, with the official site for Saint Hill Manor. Tearlach 23:49, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Edgar is my great great grandfather. I was discussing family history with my grandpa,and I showed him the entry here, and he pointed out the error. His mother, Edgar's daughter, lived in both houses, and my grandpa went on visits to both manors as a child. I suppose my definitive evidence is the old Crookshank family photo albums my grandpa has, which have pictures of the entire area.

On an aside, I have Edgar's old microscope and perhaps hundreds of his slides and sample specimens. I know very little about any of it, almost as little as I know about my Crookshank heritage. Do you know of anyone who may be interested in it or could shed some light on its background?--Chulls 03:12, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! By itself, that comes under original research, but it serves me right for not checking more sources. Not sure why I didn't think of this before, but a glance at Multimap shows them both. I'll have a look at the Times archive in more detail. Are you interested in anything from there? They have PNG images of the original articles, such as his obituary. Tearlach 03:45, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

If you can send me a link to his obituary that would be great -I'm sure my grandpa would like to see it.--Chulls 04:20, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

OK: I've e-mailed you direct with a link. Tearlach 11:54, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Ridge Hill and Saint Hill are different properties. Saint Hill was the large house on the Estate and Ridge Hill was the 'smaller house' but on the same estate. Edgar is also my Great Great Grandfather, his son is my grandmother's father. My Grandmother was born in Saint Hill and lived with her parents in Ridge Hill. Chulls, I'm thinking you must be a side of the family I've never met, would be good to become acquainted Korniotis (talk) 11:33, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

If anyone else is interested in the history of Ridge Hill Manor and/or Saint Hill Manor, please contact me directly by email at perry[at]streeter.com. Pstreeter (talk) 13:23, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

Crookshank didn't advocate for Variolation

There is this claim in his biography section: "Instead of a cowpox-derived vaccine, he advocated the use of a more dangerous vaccination using attenuated smallpox." This seems to be false. In an 1894 letter to the editors of The Lancet, he states regarding (cowpox) vaccination: " I would leave to the discretion of the individual, under advice from his physician, believing that even variola-vaccine produces a very transient effect." (https://zenodo.org/records/1993352/files/article.pdf?download=1)

In a letter to the British Medical Journal from the same year he states: "SIR,-Surgeon-Major Pringle has been misled by the article in the BRITISH MEDICAL JOURNAL on my evidence before the Royal Vaccination Commission, and I must express regret that an article-I cannot call it a criticism-so one-sided and misleading, should have appeared in the JOURNAL of our Association. I have not recommended the old and dangerous plan of small-pox inoculation as a substitute for the present system of public vaccination. What I have recommended is clearly stated on p. 123 of my evidence. I would suggest that Surgeon-Major Pringle should read my work on the History and Pathology of Vaccination, and my evidence before the Commission, as I shall not be able to be present at the Bristol meeting, and any discussion with Surgeon-Major Pringle would not, under the circumstances I have referred to, be of any value whatever." (https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2404633/?page=1#supplementary-material1)

In the Public Health Journal from 1895 it is claimed that Crookshank, in a pamphlet, recommended "inoculation with due precautions with smallpox lymph for smallpox nurses and other attendants". (https://www.google.rs/books/edition/Public_Health/H3gCAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Professor+Crookshank+variolation&pg=PA290&printsec=frontcover)

This is kinda true, though what he wrote was the following: "One of the terms of reference of the Royal Vaccination Commission is to inquire what means other than vaccination can be used for diminishing the prevalence of small pox and how such means could be relied upon in place of vaccination. This must not be interpreted as indicating that protective inoculation as a voluntary measure might or should be abolished. There are many who have confidence in vaccination. No doubt the best plan is to select nurses and other attendants whose duties bring them into contact with small pox from those who have recovered from an attack of the disease and failing this they might with good reason prefer to be inoculated with due precautions with small pox lymph; but the compulsory inoculation of every member of the community with any kind of lymph or vaccine is in my opinion not only unnecessary but unjustifiable." (https://www.google.rs/books/edition/The_Lancet/l25gnWbixtkC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=The+Prevention+of+Small+Pox+with+special+reference+to+the+Origin+and+Development+of+the+Stamping+out+System&pg=PA1201&printsec=frontcover)

In his mentioned page 123 of his evidence to the Royal Commission he stated: "As regards vaccination, I would leave that question to the discretion of the individual, with liberty to take the advice of his medical adviser. Believing as I do that the stocks of vaccine lymph obtained from cow-pox, horse-pox, sheep-pox, cattle plague, and even attenuated variola-vaccine, produce, if any, a very transient effect, I should leave it to the individual to weigh on the one hand the advantages (if they exist) of 'vaccination,' and on the other the chances of infection with small-pox and the disadvantages and risks of 'vaccination.' A system of universal protective inoculation of healthy individuals as a means of warding off communicable diseases of man and animals has, in my opinion, had its day, but inoculation of individuals who are unfortunately the subjects of such diseases as rabies, tuberculosis, tetanus, is a new field of inquiry full of promise. In conclusion, I maintain that the State should protect the people from small-pox by a stamping-out system and by the encouragement of sanitary reforms, and not by any system of protective inoculation." (https://archive.org/details/b21361344/page/122/mode/2up?q=crookshank)

So all-in-all, he seems to have considered inoculation with smallpox as a last measure, producing a temporary protection for people of a specific profession and in close contact to the smallpox disease, but otherwise worthless, and certainly not intended for the whole of the population. In any case, the lymph(s) widely used at the time was and is considered by many (but not the majority, I believe) already to have been attenuated smallpox passed through animal bodies, rather than cowpox proper, so the question is kind of a moot point. ~2026-19705-62 (talk) 12:53, 30 March 2026 (UTC)