The Influence of Fowlers & Wells

George Combe(1788 – 1858)

Johann Gaspar Spurzheim(1776 – 1832)

Charles Caldwell(1772 – 1853)

•Medical doctor, founder of University of Louisville School of Medicine•Studied under Gall in Paris and Benjamin Rush in Philadelphia•Wrote first book on phrenology published in the U.S., Phrenology Vindicated and Antiphrenology Unmasked, 1838

•German physician, Gall’s student and protegé•Broke from Gall in 1813, replaced term ‘organology’ with ‘phrenology’•Wrote Outlines of Phrenology and other phrenological tracts•Toured U.S. briefly in 1832, died in Boston

•Scottish lawyer and philosopher•Toured U.S. from 1838 – 1840•Wrote The Constitution of Man, 1828

Caldwell photo courtesy of the Caswell County Historical Society

b. October 11, 1809d. August 18, 1887

Born to Congregationalist minister and wife in Cohocton, NY

Trained for ministry at Amherst College

Opened Phrenological Cabinet in Philadelphia (1838) before moving to NYC in 1841

Founded The American Phrenological Journal in 1838

Started Fowlers and Wells publishing firm with brother, Lorenzo, and (later) sister, Charlotte, and brother-in-law Samuel R. Wells .

Practical Phrenology -

A system of self-analysis and self-improvement that was based on

phrenological science and adapted for use by the masses.

Uses:

•Self-Knowledge•Child Development and Education•Marriage Counseling•Vocational Guidance•Intellectual Self-Improvement•Moral Reform•Penal and Asylum Reform

“I think there is no class of men – not excepting clergymen, who have so good an opportunity of doing good as a practical phrenologist.” –Charlotte Fowler Wells

Features:

Phrenological Cabinet (museum of skulls, death masks, and busts)

Phrenological training center

Lecture hall

“Reading Room”

Publishing firm and office

Sales center (books, subscriptions, do-it-yourself kits)

Headquarters for the Vegetarian Society of America and meeting place for suffragists

Patent office

Lorenzo Niles FowlerAnalyst, Lecturer, Writer, Publisher

Wrote:The Principles of Phrenology and Physiology Applied to Man’s Social Relations, 1842 Marriage: Its History and Ceremonies, 1846

Samuel R. WellBusiness Manager, Writer, Publisher

Wrote:How to Do Business, 1857New Physiognomy, 1866How to Read Character, 1868

Lydia Folger FowlerDoctor, Writer, Educator

Wrote:

Familiar Lessons on Physiology, 1847Familiar Lessons on Phrenology, 1848

Charlotte Fowler WellsOffice Manager, Lecturer

Vice-President, AmericanInstitute of Phrenology

•Reformers often cited phrenology when championing movements such as abolition, women’s rights, and temperance

•Artists of the period sometimes sculpted figures to reflect phrenological ideals

•Lectures, including those on phrenology, were considered popular entertainment. Orson Fowler was ranked by one newspaper as one of the top 50 lecturers in the country

•‘Help Wanted’ ads asked for phrenological recommendations; Personal ads called for mates with compatible heads

•Modern phrases such as “high brow”, “low brow”, “well-rounded”, and “shrink” are believed to have phrenological roots

•Women dressed their hair to emphasize best phrenological features

Who are you indeed who would talk or sing to America?Have you studied out the land, its idioms and men?Have you learn'd the physiology, phrenology, politics,            geography, pride, freedom, friendship of the land?

- From “By Blue Ontario’s Shore”          

Walt Whitman

Edgar Allan Poe

Herman Melville

Mark Twain

“I would rather feel your spine than your skull, whoever you are.” -Ishmael in Moby Dick

“[He] was a phrenological curiosity: his head was one vast lump of Approbativeness; and though he was as ignorant and as void of intellect as a Hottentot, yet the great leveller and equalizer, Self-Conceit, made him believe himself fully as talented, learned and handsome as it is possible for a human being to be.”

– From Jul’us Caesar

“A good-hearted old Irish nurse (whom I shall not forget in my will) took me up one day by the heels, when I was making more noise than was necessary, and, swinging me around... Knocked my head into a cocked hat against the bedpost. This, I say, decided my fate and made my fortune. A bump arose and turned out to be as pretty an organ of order as one shall see... Which has made me the distinguished man of business that I am.” -From “The Business Man”

“To teach learners those organic conditions which indicate character is the first object of this manual. And to render it accessible to all, it… crowds into the fewest words and pages just what learners need to know… ‘Short yet clear,’ is its motto.” –From The New Illustrated Self-Instructor in Phrenology and Physiology by O.S. and L.N. Fowler

“How would it not be well to employ, or settle, a practical phrenologist in every town… to give advice to parents respecting the children… If the phrenologist be also a physiologist, as should be the case, he would advise how to keep them well so they would need no physician with his pills, potions and plasters.” -From a lecture by O.S. FowlerSource: The Traveling Phrenologist in the White Mountains, Joseph Becker,

Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, September 9, 1882

Greater rights for ‘the common man’:

•Expanded suffrage•Broadened education and higher literacy rates

Economic shift brought on by the Industrial Age:

•Mass production/publication•Faster transportation•Breakdown of agrarian society•Greater opportunity in cities•Lack of guidance for the young

“Mothers would have no trouble in properly bringing up their children, nor would there be dissension between husband and wife if the individual marks written upon each human cranium were but understood.” - Charlotte Fowler Wells

“Husbands and wives, having quarrelled and separated, being ‘unequally yoked’ or, from the unrestrained indulgence of antagonistic faculties, have applied to me for examination and advice, which has subsequently been adopted, and they now rejoice under the foliage of the domestic olive-branch… Husband and wives are beginning to regulate their connubial habits, and settle their disputes… by the aid of phrenology.” – Nelson Sizer

Some titles by O.S. Fowler:

Matrimony, or Phrenology and Physiology applied to the selection of Suitable Companions for LifeLove and ParentageAmativenessCreative and Sexual Science

“Learn to know yourself before losing years

of your best time in experiments. If you have

not the physical and mental capability for a

mechanic it would be unwise to adopt that

calling, and have to change for something

else after vainly trying a few years to

accomplish only an unsuccess.”

– From a lecture by O.S. Fowler

“Find out your peculiarities of mind, and

decide at once on the profession or business

you wish to pursue… then cultivate the

faculties that are necessary to quality you for

success in the calling you have chosen.”

- Lorenzo Fowler

“Bright red hair should marry jet black.”

“Red-whiskered men should marry brunettes.”

“Curls should not marry curls.”

Those very fleshy should not marry those equally so,

but those too spare and slim”

“Strongly feminized men should marry strongly

masculinized women.”

“Will each of those, to whom this friendly memento

is sent, please cut out this extra leaf, mark in the

right hand dotted spaces, left blank for that purpose,

the sizes of their respective organs, according to

their own charts.. And return the same together with

their daguerrotype… to me.”

– Included in book of verses by poet Jesse W.

Goodrich, along with his own phrenological readingSource: The University of Delaware Special Collections

1847 – Memory and Intellectual Improvement, by O.S. FowlerHereditary Descent: Its Laws and Facts Applied to Human Improvement, by O.S. FowlerSelf-Culture and Perfection of Character Including the Management of Youth , by O.S. Fowler

1848 – Physiology Animal and Mental: Applied to the Preservation and Restoration of Health of Body and Power of Mind, by O.S. Fowler

1851 – Matrimony, or, Phrenology and Physiology Applied to the Selection of Congenial Companions for Life, by O.S. Fowler

1852 – Love and Parentage Applied to the Improvement of Off-spring, by O.S. Fowler

1853 – The Illustrated Self-Instructor in Phrenology and Physiology, by O.S. and L.N. Fowler

1854 – Tobacco Diseases, with a Remedy for the Habit, by Joel Shew

1856 – How to Behave: A Pocket Manual of Republican Etiquette, by Samuel Wells

1857 – How to Do Business, by Samuel WellsHow to Write, by D.H. Jacques

1858 – Home Treatment for Sexual Abuses, by Russell Trall

1859 – Hints Toward Physical Perfection, by Russell Trall

The term self-help (or self-improvement) refers to self-guided improvement —economically, intellectually, or emotionally—often with a substantial psychological basis.

Samuel Smiles (1812-1904) published the first self-consciously personal-development "self-help" book — entitled Self-Help — in 1859. Its opening sentence: "Heaven helps those who help themselves."

Sociologist Micki McGee argues in her 2005 book Self-Help, Inc. that the burgeoning self-improvement industry masks Americans' economic anxieties during a period of economic decline. She sees Americans as "belabored" — at work on themselves, inventing and re-inventing themselves so as to remain employed and employable.