1785-1853

American Physician and Physiologist

William Beaumont, physician and physiologist, achieved international fame for the research on human digestion he performed on Alexis St. Martin, who became known as "the man with a hole in his stomach." Beaumont's work is important not only in terms of his scientific observations, but as a landmark in the history of human experimentation and biomedical ethics.

Beaumont was born in Lebanon, Connecticut, into a poor farming family. Although Beaumont had little formal education, he was able to leave the family farm at age twenty-one and become schoolmaster in the village of Champlain, New York. His teaching position allowed him to save enough money to become a medical apprentice to Dr. Benjamin Chandler. The year that Beaumont spent with Chandler was his only formal medical training. Nevertheless, Beaumont joined the army as surgeon's mate during the War of 1812. Attempts to establish...