The two doctors flipped to coin.

After it landed, one doctor went left to the other one right.

They marched off ten paces, then they turned, raised their pistols,

and prepared to kill each other.

Normally, of course, doctors save lives,

but in 1818, brawls between doctors were alarmingly common.

Not all of them ended like this one in a duel,

but one doctor in Philadelphia during that era agonized over how his colleagues,

quote, lived in an almost constant state of warfare.

The reason for this warfare was simple, competition.

The United States then turned out five times as many doctors per capita as some European countries,

so there was fierce competition for patients.

But this duel in 1818 was especially noteworthy.

That's because it kicked off a series of events that led to the formation

of the most powerful medical society in the United States.

That's right, the American Medical Association itself traces back

to this scusy skirmish and the backlash it provoked to find somehow some way

to prevent doctor on doctor murder.

From the Science History Institute, this is Sam Keen and the Disappearing Spoon,

a topsy, turvy, sciencey history podcast.

Where footnotes become the real story.

This duel began in Transylvania, not the homeland of Dracula,

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