History of Chiropractic

Early Egyptian, Greek, Hindu, and Chinese manuscripts reveal that chiropractic types of treatment have been employed since antiquity. Such practices also existed during the Middle Ages, with techniques for bone manipulation passed from parent to child, while early Native Americans had children walk barefoot on an injured back to ease pain. Modern chiropractic, however, is said to have been founded by Daniel David Palmer, a Canadian-born Iowa grocer and so-called "magnetic healer."

Palmer claimed to have discovered the potential for chiropractic therapy in 1895, when he was consulted by a patient who had become deaf 17 years earlier while stooping in a mine. Palmer asserted that he saw a prominent, painful vertebra in the patient's upper spine and, in adjusting it, restored the man's hearing.

Three years later Palmer established the Palmer College of Chiropractic, in Davenport, Iowa, and in 1910 his textbook, The Science, Art and Philosophy of Chiropractic, was published. In this book Palmer described chiropractic as "the science of adjusting by hand any and all luxations of the articular joints of the human body; more especially, the articulations of the spinal column, for the purpose of freeing any and all impinged nerves which cause deranged functions."

Before Palmer's death, in 1913, his son, Bartlett Joshua, joined him in developing methods of modern chiropractic. Bartlett's son, David Daniel, also became a leader in the field, emphasizing manual manipulation of the spine as the principal chiropractic procedure.