Cameron Heartometer Company
A History

Originally a small affiliated company of Cameron's Surgical Specialty Company, the Cameron Heartometer Company came to be in 1937, over twenty years after William J. Cameron had founded CSSC.  While the "parent company" was directed and managed by Will Cameron, the Cameron Heartometer division was the domain of his brother, Dr. Alexander Sebastian Cameron.  While CSSC carried a large line consisting of dozens of products, Cameron Heartometer Company concentrated on three cardiac instruments.   

The company's signature item, the Heartometer, was unique to the emerging line of electrocardiograms that flooded the medical market in the early twentieth century.  A semi-portable (office-to-office) instrument, the Heartometer was one of the first medical instruments to take measurements from visual means (lights actuated by the pulse), rather than by sound.  This insured the most accurate way of measuring and permanently recording systolic and diastolic blood pressures, pulse rate, the force and character of heart action and peripheral vascular circulation throughout the extremities.

Heartometers were based on the research of Mackenzie and Lewis, who pioneered graphic medical diagnosis, and also the efforts of Dr. Thomas K. Cureton, Professor and Director of Physical Education at the University of Illinois (Urbana) who adapted the Heartometer.  Results were printed directly onto "Heartographs," circular paper graphs that could be interpreted by medical professionals with minimal training.  The Heartographs were processed in two colors on special paper to record action of the heart in 1/5th seconds and, in addition, were specially engraved and precision calibrated to accurately record blood pressure readings.  The aforementioned Dr. Cureton also standardized the methods of quantitation of the Heartographs and directed several years of research work on the basis of validity of these graphs for predicting physical endurance performances.  His studies were focused on various training programs at the University of Illinois, and indicated the relative status of cardiovascular condition among normal subjects, especially athletes. 

Early company literature boasted:

"A deaf doctor can now measure blood pressures as accurately as a doctor with perfect hearing!  Losses of interpretative ability through age, outside noises, head colds, etc., are no longer a problem.  No stethoscope is employed!"

Heartometers, each of which came featuring an engraved plaque with its owner's name and also featured a protective storage case, were originally encased in wood, later bakelite (first black and later a brown swirled-pattern version) and finally in a faux wooden veneer, measured 17" x 13" x5" and weighed in at 20 pounds.  Industry copyrights such as "Visual and graphic methods of Cardio vascular diagnosis" and "The Heartometer in the Field of Physical Education" were issued and promoted extensively.

Two years after the premier of the Heartometer, the Cameron Cardiorespirograph arrived on the market, in 1939.  Like the Heartometer, this precision instrument recorded systolic and diastolic blood pressures and pulse rate.  Additionally, it recorded the heart action from an arm band over the brachial artery, the patient's respiratory rate and their respiratory excursion.  While the Heartometer's results were printed on a Heartograph, and were meant more for office visits and check ups, the Cardiorespirograph made its recordings onto either 100'  or 200' rolls that traveled 21 inches per minute and was for use during surgical procedures.  It is not exactly clear how long the Cardiorespirograph was manufactured.  Literature was still being produced in 1947 and parts were still available in 1957, but the machine was probably not produced past about 1961.

Then there was the Cameronometer, premiering in 1954.  A small, battery powered portable unit, it measured blood pressure readings with precision.  This devise provided a new method that eliminated the variables of auscultation.  Through visible means (lights actuated by pulse action) systolic and diastolic blood pressures, in addition to pulse pressure, were measurable from the extremities without the use of a stethoscope.  As with the Heartometer, the Cameronometer was very mechanical in nature.  It did not employ electronic tubes or relays, but depended upon a metal sylphon bellows that was actuated by the pulse.  This mechanical movement was translated into light action.  In essence, sounds were not the actuating force.  There seems to have been two models of the Cameronometer, an early bakelite case model (with the "Cameron" name plate on the bottom) and a subsequent unit (Model 80-1170) in a plastic case that was serviced well into the late 1960s.

Cameron's Surgical Specialty Company and its affiliated companies, including Cameron Heartometer, took a drastic business turn in September 1953 when Alex's brother Will Cameron passed away.  The following February Alex  became the Chairman of the Board and President of Cameron’s Surgical Specialty Company, subsequently bringing his son Alex and son-in-law Noel in as executives.  Alex held this position until July 24, 1957, when Cameron's Surgical Specialty Company was sold, a process that was complicated by a large sum of money that Will had borrowed from the company over time.  Cameron’s Surgical’s assets were acquired by George K. Hendrick, apparently for Howard B. Carroll, and eventually merged with Chicago's Miller Surgical Company to became the Cameron-Miller Surgical Company.  This company still exists in Chicago, using that hybrid name.  At this same time (July 24, 1957) Alex was granted exclusive distributorship of the Cameron Heartometer and its three primary instruments.  In addition to his other duties, Alex had been heading this line since at least 1942 and had great hopes for its future.  The agreement stated that after approximately one and a half years of operating in space Cameron’s Surgical facilities (which operated under that name but with new ownership until at least 1959) that the Cameron Heartometer Corporation would be conditionally transferred to him, effective January 31, 1959, along with any assets or debt obligations.  Articles of Incorporation for the Cameron Heartometer Corporation were filed with Cook County on February 18, 1959 and assignment of the company to Alex, complete with its assets, trademarks and patents took place two days later, on February 20th.

As the company letterhead demonstrates, beginning in 1959 Cameron Heartometer was interchangeably known as both a "Company" and "Corporation."  While a handful of documents do indicate that they had departed from their original name, the vast majority of records still bear the name "Cameron Heartometer Company."  During that year of great change, 1959, Alex and his team moved production from the large downtown Cameron’s Surgical offices to a small facility at 6449 N. Newark Ave. , Chicago.  As part of their agreement with the new owners of Cameron's Surgical, they were able to bring selected tools, materials, equipment and parts, ensuring that the Heartometer would continue to meet the needs of doctors worldwide.  As for Alex's team, it was rather small.  It was basically he and his son, Alexander Wilnor Cameron, along with the occasional intern or assistant back in the fabrication room.  Together, "Dad and Bud" began the process of bringing the Heartometer up to snuff.  In 1961 they launched a new and improved model, with a faux wooden veneer.  While parts were brought over for the Cardiorespirograph and Cameronometer, they do not seem to have been produced but rather "supported" (repaired and maintained). 

Alex put long hours promoting the Heartometer and giving formal lectures on the theories behind its use.  He established a network of well over 3,000 doctors, organizations, governmental entities and universities, all operating Heartometers.  Customers were spread across 49 of the United States (Alaska, while it was the only state with no recorded customers, must also have been a Cameron market).  In addition, seven Canadian provinces had numerous Heartometers in cities, both large and small.  The company catered to doctors in other countries: Belgium, New Zealand, Australia, Japan and the Philippines.  Since Cameron's Surgical had offices in England at one time, it is theorized that there were clients there also.  Unfortunately, only one-half of the company records survived, so there is no way to substantiate this.

From the year 1944 through 1965 Alex went on the long sales road.  Usually accompanied by his wife Grace, they would drive from state to state, province to province.  As an example, in 1948 he was almost constantly driving: from February 8th to September 11th, stopping in at least 14 states.  These trips were to both large and small cities.  His childhood in a small town showed Alex that quality medical care was especially important in these areas, where hospitals were almost non-existent.  He was also a frequent speaker at many venues, including Kiwanis Clubs, and attended numerous trade shows with his son through the mid 1970s.

Under Alex's guidance over the next two decades the Heartometer enjoyed moderate success, with one unit even going to the Moon on an Apollo mission.  Over 13 million Heartographs were made worldwide, each with its tell-tale red and green ink cardiac markings.  In the mid 1970s, with Alex advancing in years and the option of retooling the ageing Heartometer in an increasingly microcircuit era cost prohibitive, Cameron Heartometer Company closed its doors.  It was an impressive five decade run for a machine that, for the most part, relied on a concept conceived in the 1920s.  Heartometers are still out there, being employed in numerous physician's practices by loyal users.  In the words of one doctor, in 2005: "Let me tell you what is gathering dust in MY office.  My electrocardiograph!  Why?  Because my Cameron Heartometer still outperforms it and gives me more information, faster and more accurately than the EKG."  There are also models, in various states of disrepair, stored in attics, antique stores and even - more recently - at online auction websites.  Several have earned a place in medical history, being displayed in museums, a testimony to its popularity and a living legacy for Dr. Alexander Sebastian Cameron.

Where is your Heartometer?  How is it displayed?  Please let us know!