Daniel David Palmer facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Daniel David Palmer
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| Born | March 7, 1845 |
| Died | October 20, 1913 (aged 68) |
| Occupation | Chiropractor |
| Spouse(s) | Lavinia McGee |
| Children | B. J. Palmer |
| Parent(s) | Thomas Palmer, Katherine McVay |
Daniel David Palmer (born March 7, 1845 – died October 20, 1913) was a Canadian American who founded chiropractic. Palmer was born in Pickering, Ontario, Canada. He moved to the United States in 1865. He was also interested in other types of alternative medicine, like magnetic healing. Palmer often disagreed with mainstream medicine, including ideas like vaccination.
Palmer believed that the human body had a strong natural ability to heal itself. He thought this healing power traveled through the nervous system. He suggested that if an organ was sick, it might not be getting enough "nerve supply." He called this a "spinal misalignment" or subluxation. He saw chiropractic as a way to fix these misalignments and bring back the normal nerve supply.
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Early Life and Interests
Daniel David Palmer was born in a small village called Brown's Corners. This area is now part of Ajax, Ontario. His parents were Thomas Palmer and Katherine McVay. He went to school until he was 11 years old. After that, he grew up in Port Perry.
When he was 20, Palmer moved to the United States with his family. He worked many different jobs, such as a beekeeper, a school teacher, and a grocery store owner. He was very interested in the health ideas popular at the time. These included magnetic healing and spiritualism. By the mid-1880s, Palmer was practicing magnetic healing in Burlington and Davenport, Iowa.
Founding Chiropractic
In 1895, Palmer was working as a magnetic healer in Davenport. He met Harvey Lillard, who was the janitor in his building. Lillard had trouble hearing. Palmer thought that a bump he felt on Lillard's back might be connected to his hearing problem. Palmer then treated Lillard's back. He later said that Lillard's hearing got better after this treatment. This event became very important in the history of chiropractic.
However, Harvey Lillard's daughter later told a different story. She said her father told her that Palmer overheard him telling a joke. Palmer then slapped Lillard on the back in a friendly way. A few days later, Lillard noticed his hearing had improved since the slap. This made Palmer think about treating the spine to help with health problems.
In 1896, D.D. Palmer's first ideas about chiropractic were similar to osteopathy. Osteopathy was a healing method started about ten years earlier. Both methods saw the body as a "machine" that could be adjusted to heal without drugs. Both used spinal adjustments to improve health. Chiropractors called spinal problems "subluxations" that affected the nervous system. Osteopaths called them "somatic dysfunction" that affected the circulatory system. Palmer said he was the first to use short, quick adjustments on specific parts of the spine.
Palmer's main idea was that problems with nerve flow caused all diseases. He believed that misaligned spinal bones affected this nerve flow. He thought that putting these bones back into place would restore health.
Chiropractic Grows
Palmer started teaching his new treatment methods to others. In 1897, he opened the Palmer School and Cure in Davenport. This school was later renamed Palmer College of Chiropractic. His son, B. J. Palmer, was one of his first students.
In 1906, Palmer faced legal issues in Iowa. He was accused of practicing medicine without a license. He chose to go to jail instead of paying a fine. He spent 17 days in jail before deciding to pay the fine. Soon after, he sold the chiropractic school to his son, B.J. Palmer. After selling the school, D.D. Palmer moved to the western United States. There, he helped start new chiropractic schools in Oklahoma, California, and Oregon.
Palmer's Beliefs
Spiritual Ideas
D.D. Palmer was interested in spiritualism. He said he "received chiropractic from the other world." He believed a deceased doctor named Dr. Jim Atkinson gave him ideas.
His son, B.J. Palmer, said that his father often went to spiritualist meetings. It was there that he first claimed to get messages from Dr. Jim Atkinson about chiropractic. Palmer thought that chiropractic had a religious side to it.
Magnetic Healing
Before he started chiropractic, Palmer was a magnetic healer. Like other healers of his time who didn't use drugs, Palmer tried to combine ideas from magnetic healing, science, and vitalism.
He faced opposition throughout his life. Some people called him a "crank" or a "quack."
Important Sayings
Here are some of D.D. Palmer's ideas in his own words:
- On Disease: "The kind of dis-ease depends upon what nerves are too tense or too slack." This means he believed nerve problems caused different illnesses.
- On Healing: "There can be no healing without Teaching..." He thought teaching was key to healing.
- On Causes: "There is a vast difference between treating effects and adjusting the causes." He believed in fixing the root cause of a problem, not just the symptoms.
Personal Life
Palmer was married six times during his life.
Later Life and Death
D.D. Palmer's relationship with his son, B. J. Palmer, was often difficult. This was especially true after he sold the school to B.J. They had many disagreements about how chiropractic should develop.
D.D. Palmer died in Los Angeles, California, on October 20, 1913. The official cause of his death was typhoid fever. However, some people believed his death was related to injuries he received earlier. Court records show that during a parade in August 1913, D.D. Palmer was hit by a car driven by B.J. Palmer. The courts found B.J. not responsible for his father's death.
A chiropractic historian named Joseph C. Keating, Jr. has called the idea that B.J. intentionally harmed his father a "myth." He mentioned an eyewitness who said D.D. stumbled and was not actually hit by the car. He also noted that a lawsuit against B.J. was dropped, and grand juries did not bring criminal charges against him.
