The Early Age of Electrotherapy

The early eighteenth century marked the beginning of the age of electricity. Francis Hauksbee built the first efficient static electricityStatic electricity machine and Stephan Gray demonstrated that electricity could be conducted over a distance. Gray’s “flying boy” experiments started a trend of electrifying human subjects for public entertainment that ultimately led to early electrotherapy. The Leyden jar provided the first simple way to store electricity for both physical and medical experiments. Ben Franklin was a pivotal character in the history of electricity and neuroscience. His kite experiment proved that lightening was static electricityStatic electricity and his experiments on human subjects showed that electricity applied to the head caused loss of consciousness and retrograde amnesia. Early efforts at electrotherapy were promising although poorly documented and ripe with quackery. The dangers of electricity to the human body were appreciated for the first time.