1875

Establishment of American Neurological Association by 18 physicians in NYC, with Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases designated their official organ the following year (Brown, 2; Blustein II, 111). Wilhelm Erb publishes on the concept of tendon reflexes (muscle stretch reflexes), with first account of the use of the reflex hammer applied to the patellar tendon to elicit the patellar or knee-jerk reflex; publication was in Westphal’s Archiv für Psychiatrie und Nervenkrankheiten. Westphal reported the same observations in the same volume, but rejected the view that the knee jerk was a reflex (Schiller, II, 75, 78, 80; Lanska, 1543). “Erb and Westphal had hit upon the unique spot in the body where scientific purity and simplicity reign because only two neurons are involved in the reflex. They had struck a source of untapped knowledge – knowledge that previous generations of physiologists would have found useless” (Schiller II, 82).