In the 1800s, ether and nitrous oxide parties were popular.
They were parties where people would hang out, inhale ether and laughing gas, and act stupid.
According to one account (The Chapel Hill weekly. (Chapel Hill, N.C.), 25 May 1934.), ether parties were extremely popular in Georgia, U.S.
According to Dr. MacNider, “They were so much pleased with the effects that they frequently used it and induced others to use it, and the practice became quite fashionable in the county and some of the contiguous counties. On numerous occasions I inhaled the ether for its exhilarating properties and would frequently, a short time subsequently, discover bruises or painful spots on my person which I had no recollection of causing, and which I felt satisfied were received while under the influence of ether.”
Dr. MacNider was not the only doctor to notice the numbing effects of nitrous oxide at the laughing gas parties.
“Around 1800 Sir Humphry Davy did experiments with nitrous oxide. He gathered together some of his friends, including Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and asked them to inhale the gas. In short order his guests became giddy and were ‘feeling no pain.'”(Reader’s Digest Stories Behind Everyday Things, p. 20.)
It wasn’t long before a Boston dentist, W.T.G. Morton began using it successfully on his patients.
