Daniel David Palmer

Daniel David Palmer or DD Palmer (March 7, 1845 – October 20, 1913) was the founder of chiropractic.

Palmer was born in Port Perry, near Toronto, Canada, and at the age of twenty moved to the USA with his family. Palmer held various jobs as a beekeeper, school teacher, and grocery store owner, and had an interest in the various health philosophies of his day, such as magnetic healing, osteopathy, and spiritualism. Palmer practiced magnetic healing beginning in the mid-1880s in Burlington and Davenport, Iowa.

Palmer read medical journals of his time and followed developments throughout the world regarding anatomy and physiology. While working as a magnetic healer, he decided to find the cause of all disease, and his work lead to the foundation of chiropractic. His theories revolved around the concept that altered nerve flow was the cause of all disease, and that misaligned spinal vertebrae had an effect on the nerve flow. He postulated that restoring these vertebra to their proper alignment would restore health.

Palmer founded a school based on his work that would become the Palmer School of Chiropractic (PSC) (now Palmer Chiropractic College in 1897. By 1902, the school had graduated 15 chiropractors. At that point, Palmer was prosecuted under the new medical arts law in Iowa for practicing medicine without a license, and spent part of a 6 month sentence in jail as a result. Shortly after being prosecuted, he sold the school of chiropractic to his son, B. J. Palmer. As soon as the sale of the school was finalized, DD Palmer went the the west coast where he helped to found chiropractic schools in Oklahoma, California and Oregon.

The relationship with his son BJ was tenuous and often bitter, especially after the sale of his school. Their subsequent disagreements for the direction of the emerging field of chiropractic were evident in DD Palmer's writings. Even the circumstances surrounding his death were postulated to be attributable to BJ. Court records reflect that during a founders day parade in Davenport in August 1913, DD was marching on foot and was allegedly struck from behind by a car driven by BJ. Others denied he was struck by BJ's vehicle. He died later in Los Angeles, California, on October 20, 1913. The official cause of death was typhoid fever, though some believe it was the consequence of his injuries. The courts exonerated BJ of any responsibility for his father's death.

Palmer's fundamental idea

DD Palmer's effort to find a single cause for all disease led him to say:

A subluxated vertebra… is the cause of 95 percent of all diseases. …The other five percent is caused by displaced joints other than those of the vertebral column.

Palmer's mysticism

During the battle for licensure in California, in a letter of May 4, 1911 D.D. Palmer displayed his plan for the legal defense of chiropractic:

"You ask, what I think will be the final outcome of our law getting. It will be that we will have to build a boat similar to Christian Science and hoist a religious flag. I have received chiropractic from the other world, similar as did Mrs. Eddy. No other one has laid claim to that, NOT EVEN B.J. Exemption clauses instead of chiro laws by all means, and LET THAT EXEMPTION BE THE RIGHT TO PRACTICE OUR RELIGION. But we must have a religious head, one who is the founder, as did Christ, Mohamed, Jo. Smith, Mrs. Eddy, Martin Luther and other who have founded religions. I am the fountain head. I am the founder of chiropractic in its science, in its art, in its philosophy and in its religious phase."

Historical quotes

The following quotes are from DD Palmer's book, The Chiropractor's Adjuster (also called The Text-Book of the Science, Art and Philosophy of Chiropractic). The book was published in 1910 by the Portland Printing House Company of Portland, Oregon, and reprinted in 1966 by his grandson, David D. Palmer.

• Disease: “The kind of disease depends upon what nerves are too tense or too slack.”

• Chiropractic for intellectual abnormalities: “Chiropractors correct abnormalities of the intellect as well as those of the body.”

• Life and Religion: "I have answered the time-worn question — what is life?”: “The dualistic system — spirit and body — united by intellectual life — the soul — is the basis of this science of biology”

Further reading

• The Chiropractor's Adjuster (also called The Text-Book of the Science, Art and Philosophy of Chiropractic), Daniel David Palmer, Portland Printing House, 1910 (reprint: 1966).

References

• Palmer DD: Textbook of the Art, Science and Philosophy of Chiropractic 1910
• Bay-Mall.net - 'Chiropractic History'
• Chiropractic History Archive
• Keating J, 'D.D. Palmer's Lifeline'
• Palmer DD (1910) 'The Science, Art and Philosophy of Chiropractic' Portland, Oregon: Portland Printing House Co; Daniel David Palmer
• short history
• Westbrooks B (1982) The troubled legacy of Harvey Lillard: the black experience in chiropractic Chiropractic Hist 2:46­53
• Keating J 'Chiropractic History: A Primer', Sutherland Companies

External links

• Chiropractic History Archives: DD Palmer
• DD Palmer's Lifeline