70. Cranium

This skull was part of a human skeleton that was used for demonstrations by Dr. Edward Elisha Stonestreet (1830-1903), probably in the frame building that he used as his Rockville office for half a century (1852-1903). Once located on the corner of Commerce Lane (now Montgomery Avenue) and Monroe Street, the office is now located on the Beall-Dawson House grounds, where it is administered by Montgomery History as the Stonestreet Medical Museum.

An examination by the Smithsonian in 2015 determined that this is a complete cranium of a Caucasian male approximately aged 45-54. It shows two marks of trephination - when a circular piece of the skull is removed to provide surgical access to hematomas and other brain injuries. On this cranium, the trephinations are not from trauma, but from practice attempts likely using this instrument which is also in the collection.

Dr. Stonestreet was a Montgomery County native educated at the University of Maryland Medical School in Baltimore, 1850-1852. Stonestreet’s daughter Ella married Dr. Otis Mills Linthicum (1866-1926), also a University of Maryland graduate. Their son, Dr. William Abner Linthicum (1902-1991), was the donor of this skull. A Rockville native and graduate of the Johns Hopkins Medical School, Dr. William Linthicum served on the staffs of Suburban and Montgomery General hospitals and was a president of the Montgomery County Medical Society.

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