Destiny of the Republic - By Candice Millard Page 0,123

hanging wires and unfinished edges—that Bell had designed and built in the Volta Laboratory in a desperate attempt to save the president’s life.

In the Library of Congress’s Manuscript Division, I would like to thank Lia Apodaca, Fred Augustyn, Jennifer Brathodue, Patrick Kerwin, Bruce Kirby, and Joseph Jackson, with special thanks to Jeff Flannery, who patiently and kindly answered my many questions. At the National Museum of Health and Medicine, I am grateful to Kathleen Stocker, assistant archivist; Brian Spatola, anatomical collections; and, especially, the museum’s chief archivist, Michael Rhode. Michael made all my research there possible, helped me find items I never would have found without his guidance, and introduced me to one of my most valued scientific advisers.

I was very fortunate to spend much of my research time at the National Museum of American History. David Haberstitch, the incredibly knowledgeable curator of photographs in the Archives Center, helped me track down the unpublished memoirs of Charles Sumner Tainter, Bell’s assistant, who played a critical role in helping to build the induction balance. Judy Chelnick, associate curator in the museum’s Division of Medicine and Science, first told me about the various versions of the induction balance, which Bell donated to the museum in 1898, and then made arrangements for me to see them for myself. Judy also introduced me to Roger Sherman, also an associate curator in the Division of Medicine and Science, who patiently explained to me how the induction balance, in all its many manifestations, worked. Roger has a genius not only for understanding even the most complicated and arcane historical scientific instruments, but for explaining them in a way that others too might understand. I will be forever grateful for his help.

I also had the pleasure of doing a great deal of research in Ohio, my home state, and was extremely impressed with the libraries and archives I visited there. At Hiram College—known as the Western Reserve Eclectic Institute when Garfield was one of its students and teachers, and, later, its president—Jennifer Morrow, the college archivist, was unfailingly helpful, both while I was in the library, doing general research, and later, when I asked for her help in finding specific items long-distance. She always worked with astonishing speed, and found exactly what I was looking for. The Western Reserve Historical Society also has a large collection of Garfield papers, and I would like to thank reference supervisor Ann Sindelar for her generous help. Many thanks also go to the very knowledgeable guides at Lawnfield, Garfield’s beloved farmhouse, which is now a National Historic Site. I would strongly encourage anyone visiting the area to stop and see it. It is fascinating and beautifully preserved.

Thanks also go to Richard Tuske, director of the library for the New York City Bar; Anne Thacher, library director of the Stonington Historical Society; Dale Sauter, manuscript curator of the special collections department at East Carolina University; William Bushong at the White House Historical Association; Kathie Pohl, director of marketing and community relations for the City of Mentor; Mary Kramer at Lakeview Cemetery; Kathryn Murphy at the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf; and the staff of the Chicago Historical Society.

For help in understanding Garfield’s physical condition after the shooting and his autopsy report, I am very grateful to Dr. Paul Uhlig, who generously shared his time and exceptional knowledge. For advice on the science behind the induction balance, I would like to thank David Deatherage, an electrical engineer at Pearson Kent McKinley Raaf Engineers. For sending me a copy of his fine article about the medical aspects related to Garfield’s shooting, thanks go to Dr. Ibrahim Eltorai. I am also, and especially, deeply grateful to Dr. Dave Edmond Lounsbury, a brilliant internist who spent months answering my countless questions and pointing out details relating to Garfield’s condition and care that I had overlooked. Dave also read and reviewed every chapter in this book.

I would also like to thank those scholars who devoted many years of their lives to studying and writing about Garfield. I am grateful to Kenneth Ackerman for his compelling book Dark Horse, to Ira Rutkow for James A. Garfield in the American Presidents Series, and to John Shaw, both for his insightful biography of Lucretia Garfield and for his careful reading and editing of James and Lucretia’s letters to each other, which he compiled into a moving and illuminating book. I am indebted to Harry Garfield’s daughter, Lucretia Garfield Comer, who wrote Harry Garfield’s First Forty Years, and to