The bearded woman, children with malformations and premature babies in their incubator. The "freak fairs" were not rare in the first half of the twentieth century, a kind of "monster stop". Nowadays such an exhibition would be unthinkable, although there were already voices that doubted the ethics of this sample. Why display a premature baby inside an incubator as if it were a fairie monkey It wasn't going to be well received by everyone.
For many yes, they even paid to see them at fairs, in booths mounted to get the visitor's attention. Like those of any attraction. Only these had a commendable purpose: to continue carrying more premature babies with a technique that was not yet widespread in hospitals and that was still being perfected. A kind of mixture between the morbidity of human survival and the technical advances that allowed those previously condemned babies to get ahead in a box.
The history of the incubator is ancient and exciting, and when we analyzed it extensively we already talked about this type of exhibitions at the beginning of the 20th century that were taking place throughout the United States. Now the story of a doctor who investigated the incubators and allowed many premature children who had been evicted a few years ago to survive came to light. And this doctor exhibited those little ones in their "nests."
Dr. Martin Couney defended himself from criticism that in his day accused him of being an entrepreneur for wanting to get money from the babies saying that this collection allowed him to continue taking care of more and more children and continue improving the incubator technique, which at that time was still moving very slowly. Of course, if there was anyone grateful to this doctor, it was the families of premature babies.
There are testimonies of babies that he took forward, today old men and women, who also remember the figure of the doctor with gratitude and emotion, not caring that they were once "fair objects", seeing those exhibits as something anecdotal and curious at a time when the one that most tiny babies died.
The doctor himself estimated that between 1903 and 1943 he kept 7,500 of the 8,500 premature infants who went through his display incubators alive. There, the babies not only took care of the box that kept them warm and isolated, but the neonates were treated by doctors and nurses who took turns.
Anyway, we are facing a peculiar period of history, when the incubators were far from being extended in hospitals and offering the advances they have today thanks to people like this doctor who believed in the possibilities of this technique. You may not be labeled an opportunist if you needed money to continue researching and saving babies. More than a greedy businessman, I see him as a man proud of his work.
I want to think that in the incubator exhibits with the premature baby inside, the survival was admired and newborns were not put at risk. In addition, parents gave their consent to show their babies, perhaps aware that extending belief and confidence in the new technique would save more lives in the future.
