George Miller Beard

George Miller Beard completed his studies at the Yale college in 1862. He became a member of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of New York in 1886, and that year published Electricity as a tonic. His popular book Our home physician appeared in 1869.

«A quantitative truth is of all forms of truth the most absolute and satisfying, so quantitative error is of all forms of error the most complete and illusory.»
Popular Science Monthly, 1879; 14: 751.

George Miller Beard and Alphonse David Rockwell (1840-1933) were the leading American electrotherapists of the nineteenth century. Together they wrote A Practical Treatise on the Medical and Surgical Use of Electricity . . ., which is the most influential American treatise ever, published on electrotherapy. It is of special value today for its comprehensive and carefully documented historical analysis. In history, however, Rockwell will probably be longer remembered as the inventor of the electric chair.

• Electricity as a tonic. New York?, 1866.
• Our home physician. 1869.
• Neurasthenia, or nervous exhaustion.
  Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, 1869; 80: 217-221.
• Eating and drinking. 1871.
• Stimulants and narcotics. 1871.
• A Practical Treatise on the Medical and Surgical Use of Electricity, Including Localized and General Electrization.
  With Alphonse David Rockwell (1840-1933). New York, William Wood, 1871.
• Neurasthenia, or nervous exhaustion.
  Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, 1869; 80: 217-221.
• Hay-fever or summercatarrh. 1876.
• The Scientific Basis of Delusions. 1877.
• The Nature and Diagnosis of Neurasthenia.
  New York Medical Journal, 1879; 29.
• American Nervousness, With its Causes and Consequences.
  1880. (Nervous exhaustion, neurasthenia).
  Second edition edited by Beard.
  German translation by Albert Neisser (1855-1916), Leipzig, 1881, 1883.
• Sea sickness: its symptoms nature and treatment.
  1881. Recommending bromkalium.
• The case of Guiteau: a psychological study. 1882.
• Practical Treatise on Nervous Exhaustion (neurasthenia), its symptoms, nature, sequences, Treatment. New York, 1884.
• Sexual Neurasthenia. New York, 1884.
• Die sexuelle Neurasthenie, ihre Hygiene, Aetiologie, Symptome und Behandlung. Mit einem Capitel über die Diät für Nervenkranke. Deutsche Ausgabe. Wien, 1885.nX + 183 pages.
• Nervous Exhaustion.
  With Alphonse David Rockwell. New York, 1903.