The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Jackson, Charles Thomas

JACKSON, Charles Thomas, American scientist: b. Plymouth. Mass., 21 June 1805; d. Somerville, Mass., 28 Aug. 1880. He was graduated at Harvard Medical College in 1829. He assisted in a geological and mineralogical survey of Nova Scotia, publishing his results in ‘Memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and Science.’ He went to Europe in 1829, spending his time in Germany, Italy and Paris. On his return he began practising at Boston, but abandoned this for the study of the sciences. In 1836 he became State Geologist of Maine, and later held the same post in Rhode Island 1839 and in New Hampshire 1840. He claimed to have been the first to indicate, in 1832, the applicability of electricity to telegraphic use, and also claimed, in 1842, to have been the discoverer of the anæsthetic effects of the inhalation of ether. In 1844 he conducted extensive research in the south shore lands of Lake Superior, and from 1847-49 was United States surveyor of mineral lands in Michigan. He received the monthly prize of 2,500 francs from the French Academy of Sciences in 1852. He published a ‘Manual of Etherization, with a History of its Discovery’ (1861), and several ‘Reports.’