Jane Todd Crawford
N 37° 48.494 W 079° 28.400
17S E 634389 N 4185636
Jane Todd Crawford underwent the the first abdominal surgery in 1809. Her birthplace was located near the marker.
Waymark Code: WM11FB
Location: Virginia, United States
Date Posted: 12/14/2006
Views: 30
In 1809, Dr. Ephraim McDowell was called to Green County, Kentucky, to see a patient, Mrs. Jane Crawford. Mrs. Crawford thought she was expecting twins. Upon examination, Dr. McDowell realized she had an ovarian tumor. After consultation with Mrs. Crawford, Dr. McDowell told her if she would travel to his home in Danville, he would perform the experimental surgery. Dr. McDowell returned home. Mrs. Crawford followed a few days later, sixty miles on horseback. She rested several days after her arrival.
Then on Christmas morning, 1809, Dr. McDowell began his historic operation. The ovarian tumor he removed from Mrs. Crawford weighed twenty-two and one-half pounds. The surgery was performed without benefit of anesthetic or antisepsis, neither of which was known to the medical profession at the time. Mrs. Crawford's surgery was successful. She returned to her home in Green County twenty-five days after the operation and lived another thirty-two years. This was the first successful removal of an ovarian tumor in the world.
A historic monument is located near Dr. McDowell's birthplace on Route 11 in Rockbridge County, just south of the Fairfield Community. Several members of the McDowell Family are buried in the McDowell Family Cemetery located just north of the Monument. The cemetery is located on private private property and can only be visited with the permission of the property owner. For more information on this site and to visit the Waymark WMB7D:
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visit link)
The text of the monument reads:
JANE TODD CRAWFORD
"Jane Todd, pioneer heroine of abdominal surgery, was born 12-23-1763 just west of here across Whistle Creek near Todd’s Mill. She married Thomas Crawford in 1794. In 1809 she rode 60 Mi. on horseback to the home of Dr. Ephraim McDowell in Danville, Kentucky., where she underwent the worlds first Ovariotomy. The ordeal lasted 25-min., without anesthesia. She recovered, lived 32 more years and died near Graysville, Indiana. The restored McDowell home is a surgical shrine."