Chiropractic History Assignment Two views of the mystery machine. his is my favourite piece of equipment from the archives. It’s both elegant and curiously archaic looking as well as a mystery as to how it operated and what it was intended to do. There are only three things we know for sure: 1. It is deceptively heavy though not particularly large (it sits on a wood-framed, marble base). T 2. It looks vaguely sinister. 3. It was intended to generate sine waves. The only surviving note that we have identifying the instrument states that it is a “therapeutic current AC-DC generator/ high frequency static generator.” The device has a setting dial labelled “No. 2 Polysine Generator.” Steve Zoltai is the collections devel- opment librarian and archivist for CMCC and was previously the Assis- tant Executive Director of the Health Sciences Information Consortium of Toronto.He has worked for several public and private libraries and with the University of Toronto Archives. Steve comes by his interest in things historical honestly – he worked as a field archeologist for the Province of Manitoba. He can be contacted at [email protected]. Moving clockwise, the dial can be set to three AC modalities: surging wave, surging sinusoidal or rapid sinusoidal. Counter-clockwise, the dial can be set to three DC mo- dalities: galvanic, slow sinusoidal and surging galvanic. The setting dial is fl anked by two adjustable rheostats and a central dial measures the electrical output in milliamperes. The mechanical housing to the upper right appears to be a generator. A red-tinted light bulb fl anks the generator and is presumably there to indicate the strength of the current. On the other hand, it could only be there for show. An electrical cord extends from two connections at the back of the device. These connections are labelled AC. There are two additional connections at the back of the machine labelled PDCN. Presumably these connections had something to do with the DC current or may have been used to connect some additional piece of the equipment that could have come in contact with the patient. The machine is identified as manufactured by McIntosh, Chicago. No date of manu- facture is given, though my guess would be 1920s or earlier. I’d be greatly appreciative if our readers could contact me and give some insight into how this machine worked, what its intended therapeutic use was and some better idea of its age. I may be contacted at [email protected]. An “A” goes to Dr Tim Kunkel for his response to the Chiropractic History Assignment in our September issue! Dr. Tim Kunkel thinks he has the defi nitive answer to Photo 1 in our September Chiropractic History Assignment. The reason he thinks he recognizes the unit is that he has two of them. Apparently they are oscillating condensators. He had two portable versions of them custom built in India while he was there studying acupuncture and ho- meopathy in 1978. They were built in New Delhi through the Mahatma Gandhi Ashram Institute. 24 • CANADIAN CHIROPRACTOR |FEBRUARY 2008 www.canadianchiropractor.ca Steve Zoltai feature
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