Title
A Compend of Pharmacy (Quiz-Compends No. 11)
Author
F. E. Stewart, M.D., Ph.G.
Image
Description
A Compend of Pharmacy is a compact early twentieth-century pharmaceutical reference from Blakiston’s well-known Quiz-Compends series, intended for medical and pharmacy students requiring concise, examination-oriented instruction. Written by physician and pharmacist F. E. Stewart, the volume is based upon Joseph P. Remington’s Text-Book of Pharmacy and the United States Pharmacopoeia of 1890, reflecting the standards of American pharmaceutical education at the turn of the century.
This 1901 Fifth Revised Edition presents pharmacy in a highly condensed question-and-answer format. Topics include pharmaceutical metrology, heat and pharmaceutical operations, preparation methods, official preparations recognized by the United States Pharmacopoeia, inorganic and organic materia medica, and practical conversion tables for English and metric systems.
The work provides an excellent snapshot of pharmacy before the antibiotic era, when pharmacists routinely compounded preparations by hand and mastery of tinctures, extracts, syrups, powders, ointments, and official formulations was fundamental professional knowledge.
Condition
Original cloth binding with gilt spine and cover lettering. Moderate age-appropriate wear and rubbing to extremities. Interior appears clean and legible with expected toning from age. Solid collectible reference copy.
Gallery
Historical context
Blakiston’s Quiz-Compends were among the most recognizable medical student manuals of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Cheap, portable, and deliberately concise, they functioned as the medical equivalent of cram guides — small enough for a coat pocket but dense with facts intended to prepare students for examinations and clinical work. This pharmacy volume reflects an era when pharmacists were deeply involved in the preparation, standardization, and dispensing of medicinal products rather than simply distributing pre-manufactured medications.
Curious Facts, Ephemera, and Trivia
- This book is Quiz-Compends No. 11 in Blakiston’s educational series.
- It is based upon Remington’s Text-Book of Pharmacy — a work whose descendants remain influential today as Remington: The Science and Practice of Pharmacy.
- The text relies upon the United States Pharmacopoeia of 1890, preserving pharmaceutical standards from an era of tinctures, fluid extracts, collodions, cerates, troches, and compound preparations.
- The publisher advertised the series as manuals that students could “use in any college,” emphasizing portability, brevity, and exam preparation.
Excerpt
From the classification of official preparations:
“Made without percolation or maceration… Waters, Solutions… Spirits, Elixirs… Collodions… Powders, Triturations, Masses, Confections, Pills, Troches, Cerates, Ointments, Plasters, Papers, Suppositories.”
Why it is in the Cabinet
This volume captures pharmacy in its practical, hands-on era — before industrial pharmaceuticals transformed the profession. It belongs in the Cabinet as both a student survival manual and a compact record of historical American drug preparation, nomenclature, and pharmaceutical education.
Digital Edition / External Digital Copy
A digital edition of this work has been added to the Cabinet collection for research, preservation, and reference use.
View / Download Digital Copy:
A Compend of Pharmacy
Format: Searchable PDF (OCR processed)
Digital Source:
Internet Archive / external archival source.
Original Physical Source:
External digitization; preserved as part of the Cabinet’s digital medical library collection.
Usage Note:
This digital preservation copy is provided for historical research, educational use, and medical history reference purposes.
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