Heirs Of General Practice

Heirs of General Practice is a frieze of glimpses of young doctors with patients of every age—about a dozen physicians in all, who belong to the new medical specialty called family practice. They are people who have addressed themselves to a need for a unifying generalism in a world that has become greatly subdivided by specialization, physicians who work with the "unquantifiable idea that a doctor who treats your grandmother, your father, your niece, and your daughter will be more adroit in treating you." These young men and women are seen in their examining rooms in various rural communities in Maine, but Maine is only the example. Their medical objectives, their successes, the professional obstacles they do and do not overcome are representative of any place family practitioners are working. While essential medical background is provided, McPhee's masterful approach to a trend significant to all of us is replete with affecting, and often amusing, stories about both doctors and their charges.

This book explores the development and viability of Germany’s sub-national monarchies in the decades before their sudden demise in 1918. It does so by focusing on the men who turned out to be the last ones to inherit the crowns of the country’s three smaller kingdoms: Prince Ludwig of Bavaria, Prince Friedrich August of Saxony and Prince Wilhelm of Württemberg. Imperial Germany was not a monolithic block, but a motley federation of more than twenty allied regional monarchies, headed by the Kaiser. When the German Reich became a republic at the end of the First World War, all of these kings, grand dukes, dukes and princes were swept away within a fortnight. By examining the lives, experiences and functions of these three men as heirs to the throne during the decades when they prepared themselves for their predestined role as king, this study investigates what the future of the German model of constitutional monarchy looked like before it was so abruptly discarded.

Bringing together an international team of specialists, this volume considers the place of royal heirs within their families, their education and accommodation, their ability to overcome succession crises, the consequences of the death of an heir and finally the roles royal heirs played during the First World War.