Long, Crawford

Long, Crawford (Williamson) (1815–78) surgeon, anesthetist; born in Danielsville, Ga. Practicing in rural Georgia, he was the first doctor to use sulphuric ether as an anesthetic in an operation (1842)—he was removing a tumor from a patient's neck. Although he operated several more times with ether before 1846, he was apparently unaware of its full significance and did not publish a description of his procedure until 1849. By that time, W. T. G. Morton of Boston had filed a patent for discovery of ether in 1846 and Long would never get much credit or gain from claim to priority.