author
Shearjashub Spooner
1809–1859
A 19th-century American doctor and dentist who also turned his curiosity toward writing, he moved easily between practical health advice and ambitious books on art and artists. His work offers a glimpse of a time when one person could be both a medical professional and a wide-ranging man of letters.
3 Audiobooks
About the author
Born in Vermont in 1809, Shearjashub Spooner trained as a physician and later worked as a dentist in New York. He is remembered as an American medical doctor and writer, a combination that shaped both the practical and scholarly sides of his career.
Spooner wrote Guide to Sound Teeth, an early popular book on dental care aimed at everyday readers. He also took on a much broader literary project with A Biographical History of the Fine Arts, a large reference work on painters, engravers, sculptors, and architects.
He retired in 1858 and died in 1859. Though not widely known today, his books show an energetic mind interested in both public health and the history of art.