Summary:
The Knick was inspired by the Knickerbocker
Hospital, founded in Harlem in 1862 to serve the poor. In
this 20-part TV series spread out over two seasons, the fictional Knick is somewhere in the lower half of
Manhattan around 1900. The time covered during the series is
not marked in any distinct way. The characters don’t age much, and although fashion
and customs remain static during the series, the scope and significance of
advancements that come into play were actually adopted over a longer time than the
episodes cover.
The
series builds on some known history. The central character, the chief surgeon Dr. John Thackery, is modeled on a famous surgeon of
the time, Dr. William Halsted, in both his surgical adventurism and in his drug
addictions. The character Dr. Algernon Edwards, who is an African-American,
Harvard-educated, and European-trained surgeon, is based in part on Dr. Louis
T. Wright, who became the first African-American surgeon at Harlem Hospital
during the first half of the 20th century.
Storylines
of human drama and folly run through the series. Among them are medical cases
both ordinary and bizarre, heroic successes and catastrophic failures, loves
won and lost, gilded lives and wretched existences, honor and corruption,
racism and more racism. Within and around these storylines are the scientific,
medical, and industrial advances of the period, as well as the social contexts
that form fin de siècle hospital care and
medical research in New York City.
Some
of the industrial advances we see adopted by the hospital include
electrification, telephone service, and electric-powered ambulances. We see
that transitions to these new technologies are not without risks and
catastrophes: patients and hospital staff are electrocuted, and when the ambulance batteries died -- a frequent occurrence-- many of the patients they carried died, too.
Medical advances integrated into various
episodes include x-rays, electric-powered suction devices, and an inflatable
balloon for intrauterine compression to stop bleeding. Thackery is a driven
researcher taking on some of the big problems of the day, such as making blood
transfusions safe, curing syphilis, and discovering the physiologic mechanisms
of drug addiction. We see how he learns at the cost of his patients, or rather
his subjects. We also glimpse movements directed at population health.
For example, epidemiological methods are applied to find the source of a
typhoid outbreak, which drew from the actual case of Mary Mallon (aka, Typhoid
Mary). Shown juxtaposed to the advances epidemiology was then
promising is the concurrent interest that was rising in eugenics and its broad
application to control for unwanted groups. Research ethics and regulations
were a long way off.
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