After seeing the "vintage" survival kit post recently, I thought I'd share this 1942 vintage Boy Scout First Aid Kit with the group:



One of the boys in my troop gave this to me as a gift last year. I think he was at a yard sale with his mom and dad, they decided to pick it up for their favorite Scoutmaster

Here's the inside, the contents are listed on the cover, there are a few things missing, but, the little bottle of Halazone tablets was still there, ("one tablet per pint of water... if water is grossly polluted, use 2 tablets"):



A few interesting notes from browsing the First Aid Guide from Johnson & Johnson back then:

- They were very big on tourniquet's back then, they mention them all over the place, almost as often as the phrase "send for a doctor". I guess doctors would actually come to you back then?

- The had a section on treatment for hanging! The section is called, "Suffocation by Strangulation"... "Suffocation may be produced by hanging. Act at once. Cut the noose, remove it from the neck. Loosen tight clothing. Perform artificial respiration."

- "Suffocation may also occur in accidents causing pressure on chest, such as falling earth or debris among trench diggers. Hold smelling salts to nose. If breathing does not return, perform artificial respiration."

- The recommended artificial respiration in 1942 was the Schafer or Prone Method. There's a very lengthy explanation, you essentially put the victim on their stomach, head turned to the side (so they don't re-ingest their vomit and seawater) kneel astride the victim, and then put your arms on either side of the lowest ribs, then thrust your body forward to force air movement in the lungs. It's funny that since 1942, we added rescue breathing, and chest compressions instead of back, but, are going back to drop the rescue breathing again.)

- Snake bites, yeah, we were still cuting things open with a razor and sucking the blood.

- "Don't fail to remove false teeth and chewing tobacco from the unconscious victim"

- In the "Poisons" section, they give you several improvised ways to induce vomiting: "For this purpose, make the injured take fair sized volumes of one of the following (use force if necessary)" then they give examples like mustard in water, soapy water, and greasy water. I love the "use force if necessary" part, "Ok punk, drink this greasy water so you can vomit the poison, or I'll shoot you!"

- After virtually every problem in the book: "give a useful stimulant such at hot strong tea or hot coffee"

- Medicated plasters were big for "strains"

- Under "Foreign Bodies"- "Occasionally, coins, false teeth, and other foreign bodies become lodged in the throat" Also in that section, they said you should not use needles and pins to probe for foreign objects in the ear or eye. I guess it's ok for probing elsewhere?

I better stop, this is getting too long. It was interesting to see how some things change, others stay the same. One thing they did a great job with was bandaging and splinting, I guess that hasn't changed much since WW II time!

That's pretty cool! I picked up a FAK a few years ago that was army surplus (probably Vietnam era), and the contents were pretty interesting.

I gotta say, though, that the hanging kind of makes sense, even if it IS a stretch. Boy Scouts DO rapell, after all, and with all the knots, it's concievable that someone might get tangled (esp when the kids are goofing around).

I don't think bandaging has changed much since the Romans

Thanks for the pics; I'm amazed at how intact everything still is!

Yes, doctors actually made house calls into the mid-50s or so, and they were priced so the people could actually pay the bill themselves.

Re: hanging. My parents said that there used to be some kind of magic shows where the person would be "hung", and when they were "unhung", they would step forward, smile and take a bow. Being less sophisticated back then, most people didn't know the hung person actually had a harness under his coat, and that harness was holding his weight. The noose was just part of the trick. But kids would try to find a way to do this "trick", and often they would practice in private with fatal results. IIRC, this was how Katherine Hepburn's younger brother died when they were both kids. (If you remember her.)

Sue

I recently discovered a mining first aid manual from my Grandfather's old home, it's dated 1935. Same type of info............one of the funny things in it referred to the use of "heavy dose of maalox for suspected poison injestion", not that it probably wouldnt hurt, it was just interesting to read.

This manual also focused a lot on "man carry" techinques.........i guess evacuation was a top priority for the miners.

Sue, I've worked with several docs in the Detroit area that do house calls to invalid, usually older, patients. Apparently Medicare pays 2-3 times as much versus an office visit. Which probably equates to like $10.

I was surprised when I started reading the method of artificial respiration that was recommended in 1942. I mentioned it in the original note, but, does anyone know when the concept of rescue breathing and chest compressions started? The Schafer method that they refer to in this was interesting, but, I guess I thought that mouth to mouth went back a long way.

Best I can recall, I was first trained in CPR in the mid-'60's, give or take a few years...

I used to have one of those kits. It was a hand-me-down tho, contents had been replaced no telling how many times. Metal belt loops on the back, lid held shut by friction. If worn on the belt, lid guaranteed to pop open somewhere along the trail...

That's the one... now, if you had one... and were in Scouts in 1942, hmmm do the math... Maybe that's why you mentioned it was a hand me down, otherwise you'd be dating yourself a bit there OBG...

"...dating yourself a bit there OBG..."

Everyone tells me that I am dated...

I remember being sick at home as a kid in the mid-60's and the Family Doctor coming to our house. My parents had that same doctor for proabaly 40 years and his office was always in a couple of rooms off of his residence. I remember him as a gruff old guy but very personable as he knew you for the moment you were born (no keeping secrets from this doctor).

My boss has a similar metal First Aid Kit (white tin box, green lettering) to the one you showed. It was issued to Forestry Workers/Forest Firefighters around the 1960's, I have try and talk him out of it before he retires soon.

Mike

I first heard about chest compressions and rescue breathing in 1965 at a meeting of emergency care personnel. It apparently developed in the ER where they were aware that direct massage of the heart was effective in arrest situations; someone tried external compressions in situations when there wasn't enough time to open the chest. We were told that the Red Cross would be developing a formal course "soon."

In my initial First Aid course a few years earlier, we were instructed in the "back pressure, Arm lift" technique

I think we need to make a new forum for vintage kits and equipment. These articles and posts are good.

Maybe "well seasoned" is a nice way to say it?

I wonder what we're carrying in our "modern" FAK's that someone in future years will be laughing at? I guess in 50+ years people will have AED's built into their watch or something? No, they won't have watches then will they, the time will be thought implanted. They'll have some PDA implant that can keep your calendar, make video calls, play music, connect to the Web, remind you of your wife's birthday (maybe order the flowers and send a card for you), and restart your heart by just thinking about it? It'll probably tell you it's notifying your insurance company after the heart attack to increase your risk profile and your premium at the same time...

That's a great gift. I've never seen bandages (band-aids) that old, so I'm a little surprised that they look basically like what you'd find today. I wonder, do they have that little red string in them to tear open the package that I remember from bandages when I was younger?

as old as a kit like this is we have not really improved much
since then.,better tabs for making the water pure
and a antibiotic cream are about all the improvments made since then..and i'm thinking a common scout or home kit and
not the kits for the EMT with all the good stuff in in..

Good ol' Wikipedia - History of CPR

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_CPR

" They were very big on tourniquet's back then, they mention them all over the place,"...

IMO the thinking on tourniquets, lead by the military and combat use, is shifting back to more immediate and frequent use of them. I understand that every soldier in the field is advised to carry at least one tourniquet and medics carry half-dozen or more.

In the case of bleeding that is clearly more than insignificant the first move is often to save time by going directly to a tourniquet instead of slowly escalating the response from direct pressure to pressure points to tourniquet.

Starting with the tourniquet on the extremity saves time and allows the person to rapidly move on to the next wound or victim. The idea being that when the situation allows a tourniquet applied to a wound that doesn't require is easy to removed with little harm done as long as it is removed within a relatively short time. Replacing and correcting for blood loss is much more a problem.

Plus, if the bullets are still flying, one might not have time for direct pressure, etc...