American Necrospecialists--the modern artisans of death

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American necrospecialists: the modern
artisans of death
Ingrid Fernandez
Published online: 08 Jul 2013.
To cite this article: Ingrid Fernandez (2013) American necrospecialists: the modern artisans of
death, Atlantic Studies, 10:3, 350-383, DOI: 10.1080/14788810.2013.813164
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American necrospecialists: the modern artisans of death
Ingrid Fernandez*
The principal goal of this project is to trace how the nineteenth-century
necrospecialist transformed a French import into a staple of American death-
care services, overcame initial stigma, and branded himself as performing a
crucial task within the social body. Professionalization of the funeral industry in
the USA as we know it today took place in the nineteenth century. The reasons
why the American necrospecialist occupies a unique position as compared to his
equivalent in France involves his separation from the medical profession,
regulatory bodies, and the widespread acceptance of the business side of death-
care management by the public. I will examine the development and legitimiza-
tion of the American funeral industry during the nineteenth century, from the
manner in which the technology crossed the Atlantic and inspired American
ingenuity to the rhetorical strategies utilized by those engaged in death-care
services to create a cultural mandate. I am using the case study of French chemist
and inventor Jean-Nicolas Gannal as a point of comparison with the case studies
of what I consider his American equivalents, Carl Lewis Barnes, Charles
McCurdy, and Auguste Renouard. This method allows us to analyze the way
in which these different individuals viewed their social role and promoted
themselves as trustworthy guardians of the dead. It also presents how their
success or failure comes as a result of specific cultural and political trends in the
nineteenth century.
Keywords: American funeral industry; nineteenth century; embalming;
memorialization; corpses; preservation technology
The emergence of the necrospecialist
Given the pervasiveness of the American funeral industry model, the principal goal
of this project is to trace how a group of American individuals from various quasi-
scientific and medical backgrounds in the nineteenth century reframed the death-
care industry based upon a French import Á the art of embalming at an affordable
cost. As with other imports, embalming as part of the funeral ritual had to be
socialized through a particular rhetoric created by these pioneers and still relevant to
the American funeral industry as we know it today. These necrospecialists, caretakers
of the corpse, overcame stigma and carved a crucial role for themselves as part of the
larger community. What constitutes the role of the necrospecialist in nineteenth-
century America? He allows extended intimacy between the corpse and the survivors
and facilitates the ritual of disposal. Part of this involves interpreting the
phenomenon of death for the bereaved and transforming it into a significant event
that can be streamlined without the loss of the individuality of the corpse. During the
nineteenth century, the American necrospecialist goes from being a quasi-specialist
not held in the highest esteem to a full-fledged professional endowed with significant
*Email: ingridf@stanford.edu
Atlantic Studies, 2013
Vol. 10, No. 3, 350Á383, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14788810.2013.813164
# 2013 Taylor & Francis
AtlanticStudies2013.10:350-383.

prestige. The reasons why the American necrospecialist occupies a unique position as
compared to his equivalents in European countries, specifically the case of France,
involves his separation from the medical profession, the government and clergy, and
the widespread acceptance of the business side of death-care management by the
public. I use the case of France because it is the country in which the notion of
affordable embalming for memorialization first emerges, although quickly black-
listed. Unlike in France, the growth of the American funeral industry resulted from
the lack of involvement of centralizing medical and governmental regulatory bodies,
which did not strongly come into being in the USA until the last two decades of the
nineteenth century. The separation from a medical regulatory body and state
intervention are crucial to the legitimization of the profession, which relies on
the testimony and work of those practicing embalming as well as the development of
cutting-edge technology for the preservation of human bodies as part of the
memorial ritual. The American necrospecialist reframes his work as an aesthetic
practice with moral value rather than a purely scientific or medical one. In the USA,
undertakers, embalmers, and, toward the end of the century, funeral directors,
rapidly emerged because of a demand for prolonged intimacy with the corpse which
called for practices of preservation and relocation. In contrast to those who dealt
with preservation of organic specimens in France, the American necrospecialist was
not necessarily trained in medicine or expected to be sanctioned by a national
government-appointed body or a medical board. This shapes the format of funerals
in the USA as compared to those in France from the nineteenth century to the
present.
Staging remembrance: the visuality of the dead and the corpse as final memory image
Cultural and psychological studies of death have focused on the identity of the dying
and the ramifications of the process of death on the survivors. These include the
works of Kathy Charmaz, Elizabeth Hallam, and Allan Kellehear among others.
Post-modernist theory has been applied to death as the excluded element in an
exchange value system by philosophers such as Jean Baudrillard and Zygmunt
Bauman. Finally, country-specific studies of dying and death also abound. In the
case of the USA, we have the work of Geoffrey Gorer on the disappearance of death;
James Farrell on the characteristics of the ‘‘American way of death;’’ Lewis Saum on
dying in nineteenth-century America in relation to popular culture; and Gary
Laderman on American attitudes toward death, with one text completely dedicated
to the nineteenth century and another to the twentieth century. One can characterize
these works under the subject of thanatology, ‘‘the description or study of the
phenomena of death and of psychological mechanisms for coping with them.’’1
Although thanatology also applies to forensic aspects of bodies, including signs of
death and changes during post-mortem decomposition, literature on this matter is
not as common as in-depth analyses of social practices in relation to the dead, which
continue to primarily focus on the living.
Death involves a physical and spiritual dimension and at different points in
history, the division between the two is not clear. For instance, the tradition of the
vanitas as well as the popularity of memento mori and images of la danse macabre (the
dance of death) suggest a desire for extended meditation on the passage from life to
death and its impact on both the body and the spiritual fate of the deceased. The
Atlantic Studies 351

Christian worldview at the core of medieval life emphasized the physicality of life as a
journey towards material dissolution. This involved a corpse tinged with mortality,
one that prompted reflection on the human as progressive, accumulating traits of
virtue that would lead to redemption through anxious confrontations with visual
imagery that at times deformed the body into foreign matter, such as cases where
worms attack the dead body. The living used the figuration of the corpse not only as
a reminder of the vulnerability and fallen status of mortal man, but also as an
impetus for identification with the state of future death as inevitable, grounding an
imperative of somber anticipation into the fabric of everyday life. French historian
Philippe Arie`s conceptualizes the ‘‘good death’’ in terms of these theological
considerations. Two figurations of the ‘‘good death’’ appear during medieval times.
The first consists of the emphasis on the deathbed as the integral moment
determining the fate of the deceased, during which the dying as well as other
members of the family and the community intercede for mercy and good providence.
The second figuration, prevalent in the later part of the middle ages, places
preparation for death as a life-long task and removes the focus from the moment of
death as one primarily taking place at the deathbed. Arie`s observes a trend toward
less conspicuous and more ritualized practices in the disposal of the dead as well as a
more controlled and private expression of grief that continue to crystallize from the
seventeenth century on.2
Once we get to the eighteenth century, explicit images of
bodies undergoing decomposition are replaced by clean skeletons, often animated
and socialized, and allegorical emblems including mirrors, time-keeping devices and
fleeting visions of the death’s head. Unlike the more physical confrontation of earlier
times, Arie`s describes the more pensive and distanced attitude towards death and the
corpse of the eighteenth century as indulgence in melancholy for its own sake, one
that ‘‘expressed a permanent sense of the constant though diffuse presence of death
at the heart of things. [. . .] The death of this later era of the macabre was both present
and remote’’.3
The sentimental interest in death as the final abode from ‘‘the troubled
seas and the quaking earth’’ continued throughout the eighteenth century and
gradually morphed into the great enamoring with death, darkness and the sublime of
the late eighteenth century and early nineteenth century present in the traditions of
German and British Romanticism and later, American Romanticism. During this
period of time, interpretations of life from a natural history perspective additionally
forged a strong tie between human existence and cyclical Nature, with a range of
resulting changes in perception. On the one hand, death increasingly figured as a part
of the natural order in the guise of wild nature. On the other hand, this same
application of science to death also subjected it to categorization and objectification,
which opened the possibility of human mastery over the natural. The significance of
this shift for Arie`s is quite great as it stands as the precursor of modern death and the
beginning of the end of a culture more in tune with this stage of life. I would like to
comment on the problems with this particular approach to the evolution of death,
although without discounting the validity of some of Arie`s’ insights.
To begin with, the movements Arie`s identifies as distinct and period-specific did
not follow each other in a linear manner, but must be seen as the process of the
accumulation of various strategies of knowledge about death and the dead that
encompass the larger history of our mortal awareness, our ability to control the terms
of our passing and the relationship constructed between the realms of the living and
the dead, which stages the passage from one mode of ‘‘being’’ to another. Secondly,
352 I. Fernandez

while there is no argument that rituals and practices in the treatment of dying change
from the Middle Ages to our present time, some of the essential issues concerning the
management of death continue to resonate throughout the centuries, as the work of
Kellehear demonstrates. Further, the agency of the deceased, the community and the
death-care specialists is more complicated than Arie`s admits. One of the major
problems with Arie`s’ historical narrative stems from its difficulty in reconciling
opposite or varying tendencies that occur simultaneously. In his attempt to create a
clean evolution of death with time-specific configurations or stages, he neglects the
negotiation and heterogeneity informing cultural narratives on the subject of dying,
which tend towards disparity, re-emergence of previous figurations, and re-
configuration of both individual and collective agency. This oversight is particularly
relevant in comparing the American and French cases during the nineteenth century.
According to Arie`s, the openness toward meditation on the physicality of death
that would affect each individual and the ethos promoting identification with the
corpse and realization of the transient nature of life radically change beginning in
the eighteenth century with the Age of Enlightenment, when human reason figures as
the opponent of death, with the latter increasingly taking a less prominent role in
everyday life. For many scholars following the work of Arie`s, the ‘‘turn of the tide’’
that leads to modern death as a process requiring distance, invisibility, and utmost
discretion emerges in the eighteenth century and completely solidifies in the
nineteenth century with the institutionalization and medicalization of the human
body and its natural processes. In fact, the nineteenth century stands as a period of
transition regarding attitudes and practices in the treatment of disease and death that
eventually leads to the disappearance of death. This is quite evident in the schema
presented by Arie`s, who describes the late eighteenth century as a culture exhibiting
death nostalgia in which mysticism and medicine coexist, with corpses, albeit in less
frightening terms, reaching the status of fetish objects. In contrast to this figuration
of the dead body as possessing a type of personality and vitality:
Nineteenth century medicine was to abandon this belief and adopt the thesis that death
does not exist in itself but is merely the separation of the soul and the body, the
distortion or absence of life. Death became pure negativity. It would no longer have any
meaning beyond the disease Á identified, named, and classified Á of which it was a final
stage.4
Arie`s pairs this stigmatized view of death with the aesthetic mechanization of the
phenomenon of dying through the emergence of the funeral industry and death-care
professionals. The funeral industry, which becomes significantly organized and
institutionalized in the mid-to-late nineteenth century represents another path
towards the denial of death, in this case, one mixing the scientific and the theatrical.
Arie`s supports his thesis with the example of funeral rituals in the USA as resembling
art installations. Within this death-denying culture, Arie`s locates the reversal of the
‘‘good death,’’ in which the individual was conscious and prepared, to the modern
death in hospitals, which he defines as what formerly stood for the accursed death,
‘‘the mors repentina et improvisa, a death that gives no warning.’’5
The second major factor at play in Arie`s’ historical evolution of death concerns
the agency of the dying individual. While in the Middle Ages, the individual was
responsible for the majority of activities concerning his/her death, modern death

relinquishes this control to professionals, with the deceased and the survivors heavily
relying on medical experts, funeral directors, and insurance agents in the preparation
for death, the manner in which the dying hour occurs, and the rituals for the disposal
of the remains. Bauman, following the highly influential theories of Michel Foucault
and Arie`s’ historical narrative, also locates emancipation from the chains of
mortality in the Enlightenment as part of its imperative of progress and reason
that finally allows humankind to be rid of the necessity of negative qualities in
everyday life, prompted by ignorance, parochiality, exploitation, and poverty. In
building culture as a vehicle of immortality, modernity deconstructs mortality,
leaving it ‘‘unadorned, naked, stripped of its significance,’’ a mere ‘‘waste in the
production of life; a useless leftover, the total stranger in the semiotically rich, busy,
confident world of adroit and ingenious actors.’’6
Bauman proposes individuals learn
to deal with the unknown factor posed by the death of the self by presenting the
creation of culture as the primary means for the transcendence of the human species
in the face of immanent biological finitude. He defines transcendence as the
culmination of two functions of culture: survival, in terms of extending the duration,
content and meaning of biological life and immortality, a future-oriented process of
creation that disavows the vulnerability and lack of value of the individual when
confronted with death. Cultural narratives of immortality thus give way to a life
‘‘forgetful of death, life lived as meaningful and worth living, life alive with purposes
instead of being crushed and incapacitated by purposelessness [. . .] a formidable
human achievement.’’7
Here, Bauman creates an antagonistic relation between
nature and culture, the former death-affirming and the latter death-denying, in which
the only way to preserve life involves a level of naı¨vete´ and self-deception that ignores
the biological dimension of our existence in the world. Culture becomes the safe-
house of a delusional form of existence out of tune with the flow of the universe that
by privileging one life form and a limited definition of liveliness based on
consciousness and forward progress, discards all other impersonal forms as secondary
and inconsequential. Death finds expression in metaphorical language or images of
the dead that connote rest and sleep, such as that seen in memorial photography in
late nineteenth-century America as well as in the careful embalming of the corpse to
remain life-like and recognizable to the survivors through the restoration of bodily
boundaries and the semblance to the pre-mortem identity of the deceased.
Kellehear identifies models of the evolution of death that are less linear and more
subject to variance and in which historical changes Á especially this pre-medical/post-
medical segmentation Á are not as clear-cut as in the works of Arie`s and Bauman and
also problematize the division between nature and culture that is taken for granted in
these works. Kellehear proposes two areas crucial to any study of the evolution of
death: the amount of control of the individual and those around him/her, or in other
words, anticipation versus sudden death, and the evaluation of the process of dying
based on the space in which it occurs, whether in a worldly or other-worldly realm.
Nature and culture come together through the creation of a personal approach to
death, in which the individual sees himself/herself as part of a larger process. Of
highest consequence, death rituals figure as cultural narratives constructed by the
human imagination dating back to the beginnings of civilization. Kellehear notes
early Western rituals exhibit an approach to dying that involves the post-mortem
vitality of the remains as a significant element in the transition from life to death. The
corpse was first interred, expected to undergo decay and disarticulation, and finally,
354 I. Fernandez

disinterred and removed to a site closer to the survivors, such as under the residence or
at the entrance. Within this context, ‘‘community rites support the ‘dying person’
during their dying as otherworldly journey.’’8
Dying was seen as a transformation of
the self at two levels. The corpse underwent biological deterioration in the
intermediate post-mortem state. In addition, the biological deterioration was under-
stood as part and parcel of the liberation of the soul from the body. The two processes,
bio-degradation and spiritual liberation, occurred simultaneously and were dependent
on the post-mortem life cycle of the corpse. This treatment of dying constituted a
significant amount of cultural activity in the development of the post-death journey of
the corpse, which places nature and the spirit as major players in this process of
transformation. Such cultural projects attempted to resolve the unknown and
unstable characteristics related to dying. Early communities in the West accepted
death as an inevitable part of life. However, this did not prevent them from seeking
greater knowledge of it in order to more effectively manage it and put it off as long as
possible. In other words, this type of response is not exclusive to the Age of
Enlightenment and modernity. As in ages to come, knowledge creation and
technology served two main purposes when dealing with death. First, awareness of
mortality required the investigation of signs of death that could be used to better
prepare for it. Secondly, technologies to improve one’s chances of extended survival
also reflected the desire to ward off death, without necessarily denying it. Kellehear
rebukes Bauman’s principle that culture serves to create immortality and instead views
it as a complex system to ‘‘assist and anticipate [death’s] eventuality in another place
beyond this life.’’9
I would even take it a step further by insisting that both Kellehear
and Bauman’s claims can co-exist and point to similar end goals. Immortality
encompasses the building of a place or mode of being beyond this life, one greater than
the biological life span of the individual. It is a strategy to contextualize dying in
human terms in order to emotionally and functionally prepare for its eventuality. This
preparation can be religious and secular in nature depending on the beliefs popular at
a particular point in time. Narratives of dying alluding to immortality of the life force
or the essence of the self (i.e. as soul or part of Universal Spirit considered within the
cycles of nature) can be readily found in all time periods Kellehear considers.
Kellehear views the move towards modernity as steadily continuing to attempt to
resolve the uncertainty associated with dying in terms of anticipation and
preparation. As a result, medicalization is only part of the story and the agency of
the individual does not disappear but takes a different form. Modernity has brought
about an expansion of the administration of dying to include regulatory models
concerned with health education and grief management both for the dying individual
and the survivors. Some of these are due to increased knowledge and technological
advance, which affect the biological dimension of dying. Others point to cultural
shifts in response to increased secularization and skepticism about the existence of an
afterlife, which reconfigure the concept of the endurance of the essence of the self. In
both cases, anxieties over death are managed in the context of the here-and-now,
which would imply the opposite of a culture of death denial. In fact, one can
interpret the masking of the corpse in memorialization as part of a culture’s version
the ‘‘good death.’’ In both France and the USA, memorialization rituals attempt to
deal with these abject elements of dying by restoring a ‘‘wholesome,’’ ‘‘natural,’’
‘‘peaceful,’’ and ‘‘slumbering’’ appearance of the corpse, which in turn constructs the
type of relation the living have with their dead.

In order to identify what stands for the ideal death, visual models must be placed
in a comparative context. This explains how death-care services become a cultural
institution to begin with as well as subsequent development. As Hallam has noted,
once the social identity of the person is replaced by the abject corpse, the material
reality of embodied death must be hidden through the memorialization ritual. In
other words, the boundaries of the ‘‘social’’ body, in the physical sense, must be
reconstructed.10
The visual transformation of corpse into the last memory image
becomes labor for a particular set of individuals, the thanatopracteurs in France and
the necrospecialists in the USA. The final product of this labor and the role played
by the individuals in the death-care profession are dependent upon cultural context.
Death-care services in the USA slowly became institutionalized and emerged as a
respectable profession during the nineteenth century. Several steps led to legitimiza-
tion. As Rachel Sherman and others have argued, ‘‘before practitioners of new
occupations can attempt to establish limited jurisdictions using institutional
supports, they must acquire a ‘cultural mandate’.’’11
A culture mandate translates
into the acceptance of an occupation as a form of work worthy of remuneration.
Nineteenth-century necrospecialists built a discourse legitimizing their work through
their adherence to the ‘‘good death’’ in both a physical and moral sense.
Capitalization on nationalist practices during and after the Civil War also aided
their rise to the rank of professionals. As far as how the cultural mandate influences
the visual presentation of the dead in the form of what is expected of the
professional, one major difference in the cases of France and the USA deal with
the desire to view or hide the dead body. Embalming techniques as part of death-care
services succeeded in the USA because of a culture that saw proximity to the corpse
as key to memorialization. In contrast, the French did not value the presence of the
corpse (in fact, saw it as morbid showmanship) as part of memorialization. Aries’
opinion as a French historian is a prime example. In discussing American funerals,
he ridicules the entire format of memorialization, including the exposure of the
corpse, stating: ‘‘In the tableaux vivants of the funeral parlour, people have
recognized the effects of a systematic denial of death in a society dedicated to
technology and happiness.’’12
For the French survivors and the public in the case of
prominent figures, the pre-death testimony and the focus on the last memory image
(in the simulacra of the death mask or portrait) of the individual while he/she was
alive become the markers of the identity of the deceased, the boundaries that need to
be restored. Embalming was unnecessary and more importantly, not a commodity in
demand when it came to death-care services.
The French thanatopracteur
The case in France was precisely the opposite of the USA in terms of freedom to
explore a fruitful commercial segment of the economy Á that presented by the need
to dispose of the dead. Regulation of medical and scientific practices served to
maintain the prestige of Paris as ‘‘an international center for medical study and a
major exporter of clinical and public health ideas and practices.’’13
From the onset,
the French Academy of Medicine remained skeptical of what they termed ‘‘secret
remedies,’’ processes or products that would be utilized to treat the human body
outside of standard medical practices. In the few cases approved, the government
became involved in obtaining the property rights of the remedy or treatment upon
356 I. Fernandez

the request of the Academy. This rigidity served to exclude individuals who were not
part of the medical elite, the ‘‘princes of Paris,’’ from practicing.14
Specialization
prevented cross-pollination among scientific disciplines. A chemist could never
assume his expertise, however wide, would accredit him as a medical doctor. This
extended to the treatment corpses. The famous Paris Morgue, for instance, was run
by forensic doctors. Their practices, as we will see, did not include embalming the
corpse.
As in the USA, death-care services became a profession in France due to demand
for disposal and memorialization. But its development tells a very different story. The
French funeral industry never quite recovered from its controversial beginnings.
Bodily preservation and viewing were not considered primary factors within the
industry. Rather, its focus laid in funeral pomp, hence the name pompes fune`bres,
which involved a multiplicity of accessories to be used during the funeral procession
from the home to the cemetery. This being the case, the profession was highly
commercialized during the nineteenth century and various authorities fought to keep
it under their jurisdiction. The early incarnation of the thanatopracteur (who was
more of a merchant than a technician) had to be approved by the city and worked
with authorities through a contract for specific services. Because a sizable profit
could be made, a certain ruthlessness characterized the type of characters attracted
to this business. Two examples affirm this position. Frochot’s decree of 1801 required
the professional be state-appointed, restricted his services to procuring an orderly
procession to the cemetery and a burial ceremonial, but did not regulate costs
associated with ‘‘accessories’’ and ‘‘presentation fees.’’15
The decree purposely
remained ambiguous when it came to the type of individuals who could provide
these services. This was not an oversight. M. Bobeé, manufacturer of funeral
paraphernalia, served as a consultant in the drawing of the legislation. After the
decree, the Department of the Seine granted Bobeé an exclusive contract for the
provision of ‘‘accessories’’ for funerals in Paris for a period of nine years. Soon,
another manufacturer, M. Bigot, muscled in to provide materials for funerals, an
action that went without reprimand from the State. The interminable, heated
disputed between Bobeé and new rivals like Bigot undermined morals claims related
to the role of the thanatopracteur. Parishes also bitterly fought for a profit margin in
this booming business. All parties accused the others of dishonorable manipulation
of the family in mourning and indecency to the memory of the dead. These battles
prominently appeared in newspapers, revealing all the sordid details. For instance,
two competitors could not resolve the issue of who was the primary service provider
for a particular funeral. Neither side budged. To place the issue of provider privilege
in the eyes of the authorities, the corpse was left in the middle of the street for three
days. The sanitary authorities were forced to resolve this glaring conflict. However,
this was not an isolated event. As a result, it is not surprising that the public,
although it had accepted the idea of commercial funerals, did not fully embrace the
social role of these emerging, business-savvy thanatopracteurs. Final reform to
protect the consumer was passed in 1904, granting cities complete regulation over the
individuals who could participate in the local funeral industry. The thanatopracteur
as a professional who is part of the State, upon the recommendation of the Academy
of Medicine, continues to be the dominant model for death-care services in
contemporary France.16

The American necrospecialist
In the USA, the prestige of the medical profession was not a primary concern.
During most of the nineteenth century, this profession was highly divided in terms of
both perspective and types of practices and lacked an authoritarian body. This
allowed characters of dubious academic backgrounds and training to openly serve
the public as medical doctors in all capacities, including services for the dead. The
necrospecialist was not primarily an expert in the medical sciences, but rather an
inventor and entrepreneur.
The quality of his work Á as seen on the treated corpse Á substituted for a
background in medicine. In some cases, like that of Auguste Renouard, this
professional developed his skills by chance and through trial and error. In other
cases, he possessed knowledge in chemistry and anatomy, but never regarded himself
as part of the medical profession. In fact, necrospecialists like Renouard and Barnes
resisted the medicalization of the corpse and took an approach to death the combined
emotion in the face of human loss as well as professional pragmatism. These
intermediaries between the living and the dead intricately understood the necroculture
of nineteenth-century America. As a result, they addressed the needs of their time by
finding a solution that allowed extended intimacy with the corpse. In a time when
modernization geographically distanced members of families and with the situation of
Civil War soldiers dying away from home, these innovators brought about a
revolution in the technology of bodily preservation that restored the traditional
figuration of the ‘‘good death.’’ One might ask the question, what was the intent of the
American necrospecialist? This is a complex line of inquiry involving public and
private interests. As a member of the necroculture of nineteenth-century America, this
individual understood the public demand and emotional need for the beautification of
the corpse as part of the ritual of disposal. Death-bed scenes and elaborate viewing of
the dead constituted experiences common to the average person. In conjunction to
this, he can also be seen as an opportunist. Bodies abounded for experimentation with
new technology, families did not question the business side of the profession or its
processes, solemnity rapidly replaced early scandal, and government regulation was
practically non-existent. These conditions allowed the American necrospecialist to
become a true scientific entrepreneur. Moreover, a personal interest and pride in
perfecting the technology drove many of these men to continue experimentation to
make the process of displaying cadavers as aesthetically pleasing as possible (Figure 1).
In contrast, experimentation with embalming technology in France was linked to
advances in chemistry and not an element present in common social exchange tied to
the aesthetics of memorialization. French chemists like Francois Chaussier and
Louis Jacques Thenard followed in the footsteps of renowned Dutch botanist and
anatomist, Frederik Ruysch, in creating formulas to better preserve anatomical
specimens.17
Neither chemist, least of all Ruysch for that matter, would have thought
to apply their invention to human bodies for memorialization. The two realms were
incompatible. Because of the limited scope of their profession as chemists and not
physicians, embalming techniques were constrained to the laboratory. These
individuals would have never imagined their invention could be streamlined and
made affordable as a part of the funeral ritual of the average person. Only French
chemist and inventor Jean-Nicolas Gannal possessed the capacity to visualize the
potential commercialization of embalming technology as part of the funeral
358 I. Fernandez

ceremony, which, as we will see, he was unable to carry out. It is fair to say that
between heavy regulation and public distrust, Gannal never had a chance to begin
with. It was not a question of ingenuity, but one related to geographical location.
Gannal was an innovator in a system not particularly open to difference. One can see
him as a rebel, someone who challenged the French Medical Academy for its lack of
vision, as well as a business man Á one who miserably failed and, ironically, his
popularity in the USA is perhaps his highest achievement. In France, at the most, as
a 1938 article suggests, Gannal was regarded as no more than un curieux personnage
of the nineteenth century (see Figure 2).
In the USA, the necrospecialists’ responsibilities took concrete form as social
agents with loose ties to the hard sciences. Even if they practiced as scientists, or for
that matter, physicians, they were first and foremost the caretakers of the dead. These
individuals were tasked with orchestrating a ritual signifying a ‘‘good death,’’ which
meant a peaceful-looking or slumbering corpse not showing signs of disfiguration
through either the circumstances of the death or the processes of preservation. At the
same time and due to their specific application of embalming technology, the
founding fathers of the American funeral industry created a necro-etiquette for rites
of memorialization, producing manuals that taught the average individual the proper
way of undertaking the profession, from a firm knowledge of basic anatomy to
behavioral codes for dealing with the survivors during the ceremony. Finally,
nineteenth-century American necro-etiquette was characterized not so much in terms
of professional certification, but in relation to character traits, once again breaking
away from the scientific origins of the technology.
Occupational specialty and legitimization
American necrospecialists were often well-known in the community and trusted as
guardians of the dead, despite their lack of scientific knowledge. Communities relied
Figure 1. Experimentation and innovation. From The Art and Science of Embalming (1896),
p. 24.

on this intimate connection between their members as a stabilizing force for the
rooting of ancestry and legacy. In the American case, the issue of trust by the
community largely contributed to the acceptance and success of the necrospecialist.
Preparation of the dead, once performed by the family, was turned over to this
Figure 2. The eccentric M. Gannal, newspaper story, 1938. Courtesy of NYPL Digital Gallery.
360 I. Fernandez

professional. However, in order for the profession to develop, the survivors needed to
feel the necrospecialist was ‘‘one of the family’’ Á an individual who would faithfully
represent their vision of the ‘‘good death’’ and create a beautiful setting for the
survivors to view the departed one last time and be impressed with a pleasant final
memory image. Technological advancement and entrepreneurship in the preservation
of bodies, along with the desire for the experience of the ‘‘good death,’’ and Civil War
casualties combined to create a significantly higher demand for death-care services
around mid-century. In the formation of necrospecialization, embalming, the
imported cornerstone of the American funeral industry well into the present, held
a prominent role as part of the process of creating the ‘‘good death.’’ The
opportunity for innovation had no limits. In fact, government intervention during
the Civil War to regulate the profession came too late and had little effect. As a
result, necrospecialists obtained carte blanche to come up with a plausible and often
local cultural mandate. In the case of France, state intervention and scandal tainted
the possibility of a cultural mandate in which a new type of practice with a sound
moral basis supported by the entire community could emerge.
Prior to the mid nineteenth century, the USA, much as other countries in Europe,
regarded embalming as a practice to preserve anatomical specimens for scientific
instruction and research. Harold Oatfield notes the appropriation of this practice
and set of skills for the purpose of memorialization by offering two definitions of the
technique. According to Oatfield, on the one hand, ‘‘[e]mbalmment refers to old-style
preservation of the body, soaking and packing the cavities with chemicals, followed
by natural or induced dehydration.’’ On the other hand, embalming ‘‘refers only to
the modern method of preservation through arterial injection of chemicals.’’18
In the
USA, individuals with backgrounds in medicine and chemistry and familiar with
‘‘embalmment,’’ began experimenting with ‘‘embalming’’ for preservation of corpses
in rituals of memorialization. This application of the practice was not an American
innovation as many assume, but crosses the Atlantic through the translation of
Gannal’s History of Embalming by Richard Harlan in 1840. Gannal came up with
the ingenious idea of utilizing embalming techniques to preserve and beautify
corpses for funeral rituals. Because his methods were rejected and his public image
tainted, the widespread acceptance and re-formulated use of his invention once it
crossed the Atlantic have erased his contribution, making it seem an exclusively
American discovery that continues to define the American ‘‘way of death.’’
Embalming techniques emerging in nineteenth-century America addressed the
need of a necroculture privileging extended exposure and intimacy with the corpse.
At the level of aesthetics, the process not only preserves the body but also hides signs
of ravaging diseases and scarification. It restores the flexibility and tinge of the skin
and enhances natural pigmentation through the use of chemicals like arsenic to
accentuate a reddish color in the cheeks. During the Civil War, embalming became
the most effective way to maintain and transport bodies of dead soldiers to their
homes when they died in the field. Once the corpse returned home, the ‘‘good death’’
could be recreated and staged through the viewing portion of the memorialization
ritual. At the onset, embalmers forged partnerships with undertakers and commer-
cial manufacturers of embalming products. By the end of the nineteenth century, the
undertaker and embalmer had given way to the more prestigious profession of the
funeral director, a figure that continues to represent the American funeral industry.

It is a great error to think the profession bloomed naturally and without difficulty.
Embalming as part of death-care services allowed individuals to profit from the
prevalence of death and also experiment on and commercially use unclaimed corpses
of soldiers. Being a technological innovation at the time, it was not unusual for greedy
individuals to heavily charge for this service and exploit the emotional vulnerability of
the survivors. For instance, while at the beginning of the war, the price of embalming
stood at $50 for an officer and $25 for an enlisted man, these quickly rose to $80 and
$30, respectively.19
Embalmers with notorious reputations could charge up to $150 for
their services, not including the receptacle for transportation of the corpse. Some
necrospecialists even made their own coffins as well as preservatives. Others, mainly
those with shops, utilized unclaimed bodies as visual forms of advertisement and
prominently displayed corpses dressed in the finest clothes to attract passers-by.
Although the public expressed fascination for the wonders of the technology,
Americans were a bit skeptical of innovative methods of preservation when these
were to be applied to their loved ones. The visual presentation of beautified corpses as
key to the ‘‘good death’’ rapidly changed perception.
Early scandal also hindered public acceptance of the profession. During the
harsh times of the Civil War, the army felt the need to place restrictions on
necrospecialists because it felt their self-promotion had a demoralizing effect on the
troops and their relatives. With increasing cases of fraud and extortion, the War
Department issued General Order Number 39, ‘‘Order Concerning Embalmers,’’ in
March 1865. This order requiring licensing for necrospecialists based on ‘‘proof of
skill and ability as embalmers,’’ regulated the process of disinterment and fixed a
price scale for services. As James Lee observes, it constituted the first effort at
regulation of the funeral industry in the USA, yet individual states and practitioners
themselves did not achieve extended uniformity for another 30 years. The problem
here is obvious. By the time the government feebly intervened, the crisis was over.
Given this amount of early misgivings, how did American necrospecialists obtain a
‘‘culture mandate’’ and justify their work in the eyes of the public? The answer
contains elements that are material and spiritual. Individuals associated with death-
care underwent a process of self-regulation and public instruction, disseminating the
crafting of the ‘‘good death’’ as a professional service in line with a democratic and
egalitarian discourse popular at the time. The nature of the industry was one of
collaboration with manufacturers endorsing instruction courses and the more
representatives of the profession offering lectures and courses. Mentoring, manuals,
private workshops, and assistantships formed the necrospecialist’s body of instruction.
This easily stood in for professional certification. Above all, American nineteenth-
century necrospecialists achieved success because of this blurry type of expertise,
which was more aesthetic in quality than technical. They constructed a connection to
the natural sciences as well as ‘‘the will of God’’ in literature promoting their role as
key members of the social body with major emphasis on the beautification of the
corpse as the key feature in a ritual designed to peacefully let go of the dearly departed.
The making of the American necrospecialist
In his article ‘‘Embalmed Vision,’’ John Troyer argues that due to the prominent
presence of embalming, the locomotive to carry corpses from place to place, and
finally, the technology of photography applied to memorialization:
362 I. Fernandez

the dead body was placed in a space of death stripped of any adverse smells,
appearances, and ultimately of human death itself. The corpse was no longer controlled
by biological death in the late nineteenth century; rather, human control over the corpse
and the ‘‘death’’ it presented became mediated by human actors.20
While the proposition that the ‘‘beautiful death’’ corresponds to the ‘‘good death’’ in
nineteenth-century America is plausible, there is more at stake in the way the corpse
becomes the focal point for a diverse set of individuals. Given the preference for
intimacy with the dead prior to the Civil War and the overwhelming presence of death
during the war Á which the public did not shy away from Á America was far from being
a death-denying culture. I suggest the opposite is true. The emphasis on a ‘‘good
death’’ pervaded the collective sensibilities of the time, but it does not amount to a by-
passing of biological death. In the nineteenth century, the public was consistently
attracted to ‘‘scientific’’ and even ‘‘quasi-scientific’’ practices in the handling of
corpses. Medical museums and photography exhibits demonstrating the casualties of
the war (including typology of injuries) enjoyed great popularity and patronage.
Moreover, diffusion of information about the embalming process reached the public.
American necrospecialists went to great lengths to promote their products and
services, sometimes even in conjunction with manufacturing companies and the new
‘‘embalming schools’’ that taught the average individual how to reach professional
specialization. As a result of this publicity, embalming became a booming occupation.
Following the steps of French entrepreneur Gannal, American necrospecialists
such as Auguste Renouard, Charles McCurdy, and Carl Lewis Barnes produced
handbooks and detailed guides on the nature of their services. The texts explicitly
delineated every step of the not-too-gentle physical reality of embalming, which
required removing the blood and organs and forcibly stuffing the body with
preservative fluid. Some necrospecialists surfaced in a highly public role, becoming
renowned as originators, innovators, and instructors. Renouard travelled the country
offering short-term workshops for future necrospecialists, often sponsored by the
manufacturers of preservation products. Barnes created his own school. McCurdy
promoted the embalming technique as a break with the past and a step toward
progress and modernity. Unlike in France, the nineteenth-century necrospecialist was
not interested in medicalizing the body or making his services too technical to be
understood by the lay public.21
The rhetoric was anti-elitist. In fact, many of the
instruction manuals were meant to be reader-friendly reference guides for individuals
who might or might not have a medical background. American necrospecialists were,
above all, entrepreneurs who shared a common interest in subtly displaying their
craft on corpses. They understood corpses were valuable materials of culture. Unlike
in European embalming case studies (usually reserved for the famous and
monarchs), their focus was democratic in nature. The materials of culture consisted
of the body of the common man as well as that of the elite. The participants in
cultural role came from the same stock as their customers. As a result, their approach
to the profession was simultaneously pragmatic and emotive, although soberly so.
American necrospecialists contributed a unique product Á the treated cadaver at an
affordable cost. They prolonged the physical interaction between the living and the
dead and effectively informed the public as to how they were achieving these results.
They never denied the presence of biological death on bodies and the utilization of
artifice, but opened public discourse on it and justified it as a way to create a positive

last memory image of the deceased that would in turn assist the survivors in
overcoming the loss.
Nineteenth-century American necrospecialists possessed an attunement to public
demand for a model of dealing with dying and death, one obsessed with the surface
of the body as a marker of moral character. To fulfill this need, they developed
memorialization rituals placing death on display. Accounts from nineteenth-century
funeral viewings reveal a fascination with the treated corpse as an object of beauty.
Viewing the dead did not represent a denial of death or the disappearance of the
physical body. The image of the treated corpse stood for the inevitable acknowl-
edgement of the presence of death in life, which did not hinder the possibility of
spiritual immortality of the soul. The necrospecialist relied on a rhetoric combining
his adherence to Nature/the natural as well as the divine. He promoted the profession
as one with the ability to connect all the parts Á individual and universal, mortal and
divine, past and present Á through ritualistic grace in the corpse’s treatment.
In France, attention to the condition of the corpse prior to burial was negligible.
Even in the cases of great figures, the bulk of attention remained on the funeral
procession and the burial ceremony, both involving closed caskets. The death scene
was not unlike that in the USA. Especially in cases of wealthy or notorious families,
the death-bed scenario played for a number of days and allowed those who were
simply curious or wanted to pay their last respects to populate the site, although
(important to note) not the interior of the home.22
Nonetheless, the corpse did not
figure as the major player in death-bed rituals. Constant reports as to condition of the
individual about to die reached the public and this element constituted what was
newsworthy. This rhetoric does not involve discourse on the abject corpse, but the last
glory of the living individual in the style of the Romantic death. Victor Hugo serves as
a case study of the death of a person of interest who was also an artist. In the last
throes of life, Hugo composed beautiful prose describing his physical and spiritual
condition. Newspapers enthusiastically published his death-bed agonies. Like the
average individual, once he expired, the corpse was left to begin the process of decay in
the death chamber. For the affluent or in the case of major cultural figures like Hugo,
the equivalent of bodily preservation through embalming was attained through the
skill of a respectable artist who preserved the memory image by faithfully rendering
the character of the great man through the creation of a death mask or a portrait of
the dead.23
This simulacrum, a stand-in for the corpse, completely substituted the
latter. The death mask or portrait became the image venerated at the funeral,
published in the press, and reproduced in souvenirs. Unlike the Americans, the French
did not find much value in staring real death (a real corpse) in the face.
Death on display remained morbid and associated with spectacle for the lower
classes. Real corpses, including those of murder victims, were put on display at the
Paris Morgue until these reached a state of decomposition that would, if allowed to
proceed further, prevent an autopsy.24
The Paris Morgue afforded the inquisitive a
grand spectacle of fleshy death on display behind a large glass window covered by a
curtain, which would reveal the latest specimens, seven days a week, from dawn to
dusk.25
It is important to note that this served as a display of scientific innovation
and invention, a lecture hall/entertainment hall for the average Parisian as well as
tourists. Unlike in the USA, corpses were not meant to arouse awe, admiration, or
solemnity. They served as curiosities among amounting curiosities brought about
through rapid technological innovation.
364 I. Fernandez

Necro-wisdom: reading the necrospecialists
J. N. Gannal: egalitarian bodily preservation and institutional resistance
It might be difficult to believe that the American ‘‘way of death’’ is, in essence, an
import. Embalming in Europe, at least from the fourteenth century onward, had a
specific use. It was employed to preserve the bodies of royalty and famous figures
expected to be on display. Its other application consisted of anatomical embalming
for pedagogic and research purposes. Only medical specialists had access to this
knowledge, with formulas often kept secret. The case of France serves as a worthy
comparative example for analyzing the development of the necrospecialist in the
USA. What we consider modern embalming began in the nineteenth century with
innovations in chemistry, primarily the work of French chemist and inventor Gannal.
Gannal diverged from traditional embalming practices in three ways. He did not
belong to the medical establishment. In fact, his initial presentation and promotion
of the technology was seen as an affront to the medical community. Secondly,
Gannal patented the process in 1837 and applied it to rites of memorialization. As
Trompette and Lemonnier note, he pioneered ‘‘the practice of embalming to corpses
destined to be buried.’’26
Thirdly, Gannal aimed to democratize the practice not only
by training individuals without a medical background, but by making the process
affordable. It will not come as a surprise that Gannal quickly came into conflict with
the French Medical Board. Not only did physicians question the purpose of Gannal’s
studies, but they reproached his lack of a medical degree as scandalous and
disreputable, denouncing his patent to the extent of black-listing it.27
As we have
seen, the scientific disciplines in France, unlike in the USA, did not frequently
overlap, and medical specialties excluded hybrid individuals like Gannal. Moreover,
the Medical Academy approached Gannal as a mere charlatan, a procurer of the
‘‘secret remedies’’ they wanted to bring to light through complete disclosure or
altogether disregard as anti-scientific. The business side of Gannal’s proposition was
at odds with the ‘‘pure’’ medical advancement sanctioned by the Academy. Lastly,
Gannal was a shameless self-promoter, very far from the model of objectivity
expected of a man of medical training. In sum, his rhetoric failed due to character
flaws at a point in time of high scrutiny, both by the medical and scientific
communities and the public. As a result of these factors, the practice of embalming
would only gain popularity in France in the 1980s, with Gannal’s innovation
forgotten for over a century. Nonetheless, this eccentric and pioneering inventor
deserves credit for inspiring American necrospecialists. His formula for preservation
fluid became the basic model for embalming in the USA. But although Gannal and
the American necrospecialist shared the purpose of democratizing the technology,
the former presented his place in history and social role in a completely different light
from the practitioners in the USA.
Gannal’s History of Embalming and of Preparations in Anatomy, Pathology, and
Natural History (1838) remains mostly theoretical. As the title suggests, it was not
meant as a guide for the amateur embalmer or presented cases from ordinary life.
Rather, it is a historical work, filled with anecdotes tracing the origin of the practice
and its use to preserve the bodies of remarkable characters. Further, despite his
publicized democratic intentions, Gannal maintained his formula secret. He justified
his withholding because as an inventor rather than a scientist, he did not feel
obligated to share his discovery. Gannal consistently presented himself as a specialist

in competition for profit, arguing, ‘‘I have consequently abstained from giving in
totality the means employed in this operation, reserving to myself the care of this
process on the request of families and physicians.’’28
He carved out a unique role for
his services by labeling himself as an ‘‘artist’’ following two principles: nature and the
noble sentiments of affection, respect, and veneration in the treatment of cherished
bodies ‘‘snatched from affection by the hand of death.’’29
Gannal used this text to
present his invention to the Board of Physicians. Given this already hostile audience,
he legitimized his work by placing himself in a long history of death-care specialists
beginning with the Guanches and the Ancient Egyptians. He then traced European
embalming practices in the studies of Clauderus, Derasieres, Debils, Ruysch, and
Swammerdam.30
Gannal followed a self-serving rhetoric in his narration of history.
He detailed each of his forefathers’ methods and immediately pointed to their
inadequacy. He objected to methods that resulted in ‘‘superficial embalming,’’
processes that failed because of their limited duration. Gannal additionally
condemned the mutilation of the body during the process as not following the
ways of nature. While ‘‘[n]ature covers with a little snow the traveler who scales the
mountain, then, after centuries, returns the body unaltered,’’ man ‘‘mutilates in vain
their inanimate spoils; in vain he penetrates with aromatics and preservative juices,
remains, which putrefaction reclaims and seizes.’’31
Subsequently, he established
himself as the finder of a solution through progress in organic chemistry, a field, he
argued, that should be elevated to an exact science. He constructed his vocational
‘‘calling’’ into an art based on the sciences of the natural world and removed from
the banality of everyday life. Gannal was always larger than life. Part of Gannal’s
self-promotion rested on his practical knowledge of embalming obtained in the
course of his experiments, which he details at length. In the end, according to his
text, he discovers the ideal process, one involving: ‘‘[a] substance easy to manage
without danger to the operator;’’ affordable tools and preservation fluid; an
operation that can be completed in half an hour; no mutilation of the corpse; and
finally, ‘‘[i]n place of a substance discolored, leathery, and dried, reserving more or
less the human form, my process preserves the subject, such as it is, at the moment of
death, with the color and suppleness proper to each tissue.’’32
Despite his claims to
perfection, Gannal, as Harlan later noted, often exaggerated and close inspection of
his specimens revealed the limits of his innovations. This potentially explains the
rejection of his invention by the Board.
The second theme of Gannal’s manuscript relates to the need for the
medicalization of the human body as a source of knowledge. He emphasized the
inappropriateness of artificial anatomical models used as learning tools, the type that
‘‘can never support a comparison with the proper matter of the organs.’’33
The
human body presented the perfect object for technological innovation. With such
statements, he invalidates his initial claim of noble sentiments, and depersonalizes
human bodies in the description of his experiments. In other words, he follows the
extreme medicalization of the corpse as a source of knowledge that was the norm in
Europe. Quoting from his precise notes, he informs the reader:
On the 16th
of August, I injected a subject with eight quarts of acetate of alumine at
twenty degrees. This corpse, placed upon the table without any other preparation, was
preserved perfectly well for the period of one month; at the end of this period, it might
be perceived that the nostrils, the eyelids, and the extremities of the ears, commenced
366 I. Fernandez

drying, as well as the hands and feet. In order to remedy this inconvenience, I covered
one half of the subject with a layer of varnish. At the end of two months, it was easy to
remark, that the part subjected to the action of the air had considerably diminished in
volume, and was less useful for dissection. Finally, at the end of January, 1836, the
varnished parts, not dissected, were still well preserved, whilst the rest was completely
dried, mummified.34
Several factors stand out in this description. Gannal always refers to the person he
experiments on as a subject, a corpse, or a set of parts. He does not mention gender,
age, manner of death, or anything that would humanize his specimen. This lack of
interest in the personhood of the corpse is accentuated by his precision regarding
numerical values such as the temperature, amount of fluid injected, and period of
exposure. Once the specimen begins to decompose and does not react to his methods,
it becomes less useful not only to Gannal in his quest for improved preservative fluid,
but for dissection in general. It has been wasted. Notice Gannal always utilizes first-
person narration, with the manuscript centering on his achievements rather than the
organic biological material he works upon. Gannal’s continued self-referencing
sharply contrasts with a manuscript he characterizes as summarizing the feats of
other embalming specialists who have left ‘‘interesting documents up to the present
time scattered throughout so many works.’’35
It also problematizes the conceptua-
lization of his social role as a specialist in death-care services because Gannal’s
remarks are often inconsistent. He concludes the introduction to the text by claiming
‘‘a duty I owed, to place at the disposition of my fellow citizens the means of
continuing some relations with the remains of persons whom they had held dear.’’36
Gannal gives us an interpretation of the necrospecialist as communicator between
the living and the dead, which is not unlike that of the American necrospecialist.
That said, his description of method later in the text contrasts with the sober, dutiful,
unselfish tone he takes in the introduction. Always chasing notoriety, he positions
himself at the center of the text with the technology and the corpses acting as
supporting cast. The show can never proceed without Gannal. As we will see, the
American necrospecialist goes to great lengths to minimize his presence in the text,
more generally discussing the profession and procedures associated with it. Further,
he does not feel the need to justify his role through a connection to history, but
privileges character traits. The American necrospecialist, unlike Gannal, continu-
ously emphasizes the moral duty his services fulfill for the survivors and in
preserving the integrity of the corpse. The essence of his practice consists in the
inconspicuous orchestration of the interaction between the living and the dead.
Gannal could never play a supporting role when discussing his grand innovation.
Carl Lewis Barnes: the moral duty of the necrospecialist
Gannal provided the formula for embalming fluid. Historians locate the origins of
modern embalming in the patents of American ‘‘physician’’ Thomas H. Holmes, who
notoriously prepared the corpse of Colonel Ellsworth, the first casualty of the
American Civil War.37
Holmes’ medical background, like that of other necrospecia-
lists, is debatable. After successfully embalming for some time during and after the
war, Holmes returned to Brooklyn and engaged in various business enterprises,
including a health spa that eventually bankrupted him. Even though he can be
viewed as the founding father of modern embalming, he never wrote on the novelty

of the practice and considered it, first and foremost, a business enterprise. Carl Lewis
Barnes, however, wrote and taught extensively. He represents one of the strongest
proponents for professionalization of the necrospecialist in American nineteenth-
century culture as a major institution that could self-regulate and serve an important
need (both pragmatic and emotional) involving all members of the community. A
physician by trade, Barnes not only invented embalming tools and improved
preservation fluids, but also initiated the largest chain of death-care services schools
in the USA, with branches in New York, Chicago, Boston, Minneapolis, and
Dallas.38
Most fascinating in this social context are his meditations on the
significance of his profession and the manner he inserted his practice into cultural
discourses of the time through his publications. Barnes, unlike Gannal, approached
innovation cautiously and without much pomp and circumstance. His demeanor, at
once pragmatic, emotionally attuned to the needs of his clients, and humble, is
distinctively American. It will come as no surprise that Barnes praised Gannal’s
ingenuity but severely denounced the latter’s lack of moral duty to the occupation.
Published in 1896, The Art and Science of Embalming: Descriptive and Operative
constitutes a work of encyclopedic dimension. The manuscript’s subheading
summarizes this ambitious endeavor, ‘‘[a] practical and comprehensive treatise on
Modern Embalming, together with a description of the Anatomy and Chemistry of
the Human Body.’’ Barnes’ piece serves many purposes. As he describes in the preface
to the first edition, his undertaking of the work is prompted by ‘‘[t]here being no work
in the field which completely covered all the different topics necessary to complete a
course in embalming.’’ At the time, the book acted as a guide to the more complex,
scientific aspects of the trade with: an overview of death, putrefaction, human
anatomy, chemistry of the human body, cavity embalming, arterial embalming, needle
embalming, treatment of special cases, sanitary science, contagious and infectious
diseases, preservative solutions, rules for the transportation of the dead, dissection
wound and the danger of blood poisoning for the specialist, the rigors of funeral
directing, a self-scoring quiz, and a ‘‘self-pronouncing’’ dictionary. As a practicing
necrospecialist, Barnes understood many in the profession had been impeded from
attending college ‘‘on account of business cares.’’ His manual allowed these
individuals ‘‘by consulting a practical work on embalming [to] become acquainted
with the modern ideas and the late discoveries which have been put forward in the last
five years.’’ He later emphasizes the utilitarian purpose of the book by mentioning his
target audience: the student, the beginner, the practitioner, and the expert. The book
omits complex language occluding meaning, and includes detailed photographs and
engravings that ‘‘would appeal more direct to the mind’’ (see Figures 3 and 4).
The text is user-friendly and distances itself from medical pedagogical literature.
Diverging from Gannal’s model, Barnes’ manual completely ignores the more
technically rigorous audience, separating the profession from the field of medicine.
Finally, Barnes does what Gannal would consider the unthinkable. He removes
himself from center-stage by humbly submitting the manuscript to ‘‘the judgment of
the embalmers of America,’’ the market that should rightfully determine the success
or failure of his publication.39
Barnes’ introduction to the second edition demonstrates the hybrid nature of the
American necrospecialist and testifies to the various forces that came to shape the
funeral industry, both governmental and non-governmental. It mentions the first
edition’s success and approval by such diverse groups as the specialists themselves,
368 I. Fernandez

the Presidents of State and National Funeral Directors Associations, the Presidents
of State and National Embalmers Associations, and learned authorities on the
subject including anatomists, members of State Boards and prominent scientific
innovators. In the French case, as we saw, legitimization was solely obtained
thorough the institution of medicine. Not so for Barnes. The market for the text goes
beyond the field of medicine and its sanctioning, or lack thereof, and in no way
interferes with continuous innovation in this related, but separate field. The second
edition of Barnes’ text included color plates to enhance the appeal of ‘‘ocular
demonstration.’’ Significant reference to the multidisciplinary nature of the ideal
necrospecialist appears in the final chapter, ‘‘The Funeral Director Himself.’’ In
defining the funeral director, Barnes insists on the quality of being a ‘‘thorough
gentleman [. . .] one who has the skill of the anatomist, the nerve of the surgeon, the
untiring patience and ingenuity of the chemist; in all, a broad-minded, well-informed
man.’’ Barnes privileges character traits over professional qualifications given by an
institutionalized body. In short, the American necrospecialist is a man of honor who
dedicates his life to carrying out a duty to society. Despite the more difficult aspects
he encounters, he does ‘‘not exchange his role for any other part of life’s drama.’’40
Unlike Gannal, Barnes seldom breaks from third-person narration. He is an
observer of practices rather than the dominant player in the story. His style is casual.
Barnes begins the first chapter with anecdotes of masterpieces composed under the
strain of dying, including English painter Hogarth’s last work, ‘‘The End of All
Things’’ and Mozart’s ‘‘Requiem.’’ He then indulges the reader with a generic
meditation on the human instinct to apprehend the coming of death, with scientific
and literary case studies. Both Dr. John Hunter, who had designed a model of death
based on the inevitable self-destruction of living organisms, and playwright William
Shakespeare, receive the same weight as possible insiders on the human condition.
Barnes mentions historical examples briefly, serving as illustrations of the continuous
Figure 3. Detailed photograph arterial injection. From The Art and Science of Embalming
(1896), p. 231.

challenge of facing death. Unlike Gannal, he does not particularly see himself as part
of this history. His prose reads more like a running commentary than a claim of
historical knowledge, at times bringing in religious allusions, as when he mentions
that the body is destined to be ‘‘entirely reduced to the dust from which it came.’’41
Death figures as a normal part of life. In the ideal death, Barnes proposes, ‘‘[d]ivine
nature, I believe, intended that we should go out of the world as unconsciously as we
came into it.’’42
Notice the appeal to the collective with the utilization of ‘‘we’’ as well
as identification with the dying in the wish for a painless death. The medical
distancing of specialist from corpse as specimen does not seem as prominent as in
Gannal’s text. The only time Barnes refers to corpses as ‘‘subjects’’ is when discussing
extreme cases.
Like Gannal, Barnes includes case studies by notable innovators, although
instead of a linear historical path, he finds it more useful to place them according to
the typology of the corpses treated (bodies in water, bodies in dry climates, drowned
bodies). The manuscript concentrates on the description of anatomy, bodily states,
instruments, and step-by-step procedures of embalming. He mostly refers to the
Figure 4. Plate 7. Heart and great vessels (numbered guide on opposite page). From The Art
and Science of Embalming (1896), p. 104.
370 I. Fernandez

corpse as the body, especially in its ideal form for treatment, one of ‘‘suppleness, so
that nothing will impede the circulation at any point.’’43
Barnes mentions these
conditions as if these corpses continued to possess liveliness, whether on their own
through protest and impediment to the work of the specialist or through the
chemicals themselves, which restore circulation to the body. Barnes never figures as
the central character of his text, except when he introduces his own invention, ‘‘The
Barnes Needle Process,’’ over halfway into the manuscript (see Figure 5).
In the most history-heavy section of the text, he states:
Nations as widely separated, geographically, as the Assyrians and Persians, in the old
world, and the Mexicans and Peruvians, in the new world, have attempted to preserve
the bodies of their dead. Each nation employed its own peculiar method, and the success
which they attained varied, not with the intelligence of the people, but with the climate
peculiar to the country.44
The passage gives us insight into what Barnes deemed important. He identifies a
necrophilic sensibility common to various nations in the desire to preserve not ‘‘the’’
dead, but ‘‘their’’ dead. This constitutes an emotive appeal that creates a collective
human imperative standing as the basis of the profession. The human involvement
with their dead is nonetheless particular and tied to the nationalistic practices of each
community. Not only is the local human presence involved in the preservation of the
dead, but even the geographical climate leaves its imprint on the corpse. Barnes does
not pass judgment on the practices of others, but only notes the lack of uniformity in
the practice after ‘‘the days of the Egyptian embalmer came to a sudden halt and the
art was lost.’’45
From the time of the Greeks onward, the imperative to preserve the
dead is tested by ‘‘theory coupled to theory, fact coupled to fact’’ and hence, ‘‘a
scientific truth was born.’’ Although he perceives a sense of the artistic in the
practice, it is more of a naturalistic and intuitive type of art driven by an emotional
need. While Gannal paints a grand, personal masterpiece, Barnes traces one in the
continuity of manners of confronting death throughout history. The constant and
earnest search for perfection by Barnes as well as his colleagues endows this art with
a social purpose, trading the role of artist for that of craftsman.
Barnes stresses the collaborative nature of the profession. In discussing advances
in embalming fluids, he notes the ‘‘very high degree’’ of experimental success and
credits some of the progress to discoveries in bacteriological science. In promoting
his own discovery, he de-emphasizes his role and presents it as a common-sense
answer to challenges plaguing the treatment of corpses, mainly the possibility of
mutilation and disfigurement. Barnes will, from this point on, refer to his invention
by its name and treats his own case studies not as experiments but as circumstances
when the process was useful, as in the case of an individual who had died from
apoplexy. His invention does not comprise the sole alternative. Unlike Gannal, he
never finds the perfect solution because the material he must work with is quite
unstable. The pre-mortem condition of the body and the manner of death frequently
affect the options the necrospecialist has as well as the decisions he makes. In this
reading of the corpse, control over the body is still desirable, but acknowledged as
improbable.
Barnes visualized a very specific role for the necrospecialist within the larger
social body. In his chapter on Arterial Embalming, he analyzes the moral duties of

the professional, a subject Gannal very briefly touches upon. This method, he tells
the reader, was first practiced by Ruysch. But Ruysch failed in his duty to culture
because ‘‘on account of his selfish nature, he died without leaving the world with the
secret of his process or the chemicals employed.’’46
He then denounces the selfish
attitude of Gannal, who, as we saw, kept many of his processes secret. Although
Gannal is relevant to Barnes because he awakens interest in the practice, Suquet, who
disputed some of Gannal’s claims and was credited with the latter’s innovations,
emerges as the real hero in this battle for occupational legitimacy. Such judgment is
justified, Barnes continues, because ‘‘any person making a discovery that is of so
much importance to the whole world, who jealously keeps it secret, is not deserving
of the honor of being the discoverer.’’47
The duty of the specialist requires a
contribution to the local level of knowledge and to future generations. It represents
a true fatherhood within this ancestral model. The theme of occupational
foundation-building remains essential to Barnes’ concept of moral duty. The
collective archive that crystallizes as ‘‘the profession’’ takes precedence over any
individual, however gifted.
Figure 5. The Barnes Needle Process. From The Art and Science of Embalming (1896), p. 251.
372 I. Fernandez

Barnes defines the necrospecialists’ cultural mandate as the bearers of the burden
of mortality. It is in this aspect of his specialty that he finds the link to the rest of the
social body. The last chapter of the book extensively explores the nature of this moral
and social obligation. The American necrospecialist does not attempt to hide the
reality of death. In the case of Barnes, he sees himself in partnership with the
bereaved family, although he is clear in his affirmation that the necrospecialist should
never be a mourner but a coordinator who tangibly marks the passage from life to
death. Barnes expounds upon the relationship between the survivors and the
necrospecialist, in this case in the more complex figure of the funeral director:
The undertaker should [. . .] relieve the bereaved family of all responsibility, and should,
as early as prudent, learn the desires and arrangements they wish made, and thus relieve
them of a burden they should under no circumstances carry, in addition to the one
already upon them.48
Barnes refers to the caretaking of the corpse as an element that exacerbates the
family’s grief. The encounter with death by the survivors is part of the process of
memorialization. The bereaved family cannot escape the burden of the loss and
awareness of mortality. The necrospecialist interprets the survivors’ wishes in relation
to the corpse and carries these out as part of the rite of passage. In many ways, the
necrospecialist appears as an extension of the family. He takes up where the family
leaves in the construction of the memorial ritual. Moreover, he stands as a
foundational figure in the larger context of the community. As such, his cultural
mandate encompasses on the one hand, the human needs of the survivors, but also a
spiritual intuition validated by God. Religious language is not encountered in
Gannal’s text because the empirical imperative should come from following nature,
in adherence to a philosophical tradition that separates the natural and the spiritual.
For Barnes, this required and, in some sense, divine attunement is emphasized in the
following passage:
The undertaker should, like the old family physician whom the entire community
‘‘swear by,’’ have the confidence of the people. He must show himself a man not simply
approved by men but by God, one whom they can turn their dead and loved ones over
to in perfect confidence, knowing-not wishing or hoping, but knowing-they will be
cared for as tenderly as if done by a member of the family, and with just as much
reverence and respect.49
Barnes legitimizes his role in the community through an appeal to the collective. He
begins by placing himself at the same level as the more accepted profession of
the physician and, like the latter, his duty is to the people. Part of his cultural
mandate also originates with the will of God. More than anything else, the
necrospecialist must earn a reputation as a trusted man, who tenderly and
meticulously cares for the corpse. Corpses figure as crucial to the cohesion of the
whole community. Barnes even goes a step further in the egalitarian spirit of
American nation-building in the next paragraph, when he addresses the issue of class.
The moral duty of the necrospecialist includes a leveling of the playing field that
mirrors the function of death. He takes it upon himself to ensure ‘‘that the wife of a
poor peasant is as dear to him as was Victoria, in all her crowned honor and
gorgeous attire, to the lamented Prince Albert.’’50
In other words, a figure like Queen

Victoria, who happens to be one of the most famous embalming cases in history,
should not be treated any differently than the corpse of a common individual when it
comes to the dignity of the remains and the specialist’s craftsmanship upon the body.
Like Gannal, Barnes saw embalming as democratic and part of his moral duty was to
make it available to all despite economic status. The treated corpse is more than a
mere object; it symbolizes the first step towards equality and the valorization of rich
cultural material that is deposited into history as the ancestral background and point
of reference for future generations.
Barnes identifies humility as the most significant dimension of the necrospecia-
list. A comparison to Gannal is unnecessary in regard to this quality. The American
necrospecialist takes on a significant task as the guardian of the dead. Barnes’
individual expresses this self-appointed mandate through reticence, sober demeanor,
and the staged appearance of genteel poverty. The necrospecialist’s behavior attests
to his moral duty as a public figure and his occupational legitimacy because ‘‘[t]he
public looks upon [him] as a person singled out and set apart and worthy of an
esteem not accorded [to] persons engaged in the ordinary business of life.’’51
As such,
he figures as the humble stage director who, although self-consciously undercutting
his presence in the ritual, constantly accentuates the practical need for his services
and expertise in the process of mourning.
Charles McCurdy: the break with the past through technology
Charles McCurdy, although coming from a background in chemistry, enacted a
rhetorical strategy similar to that of Barnes. His reliance on the state-of-the-art
emerging from scientific research places him close to Gannal. McCurdy was one of
the first figures in American history to offer a compendium of the literature on
embalming. He drew a specific place for the practice independent from the medical
profession, or for that matter, the past. Like Barnes’ book, his 1896 article,
‘‘Embalming and Embalming Fluids,’’ begins with a generic meditation upon the
ubiquitous presence of death in all aspects of life. Individuals, through a common
element of their nature, ‘‘seem to pay greater respect to man in death than in life.’’
One does not achieve an untarnished image until one ‘‘joins the silent majority.’’ In
making a case for embalming, McCurdy appeals to a collective post-mortem
veneration that he feels unites all nations. His remarks upon his historical precedents
are rather broad and abstract, lacking the precision of Gannal’s tracing of a legacy.
McCurdy conceives of burial grounds as containing, ‘‘[t]he ancestry of man, this
earth! Who can compute its dwellers.’’52
He provides a description of embalming
early in his text, comparing the ancient and the modern rationale for the practice. He
states, ‘‘[e]mbalming in Oriental thought signifies to preserve, to bituminize, to
mummify; in modern language it means to impregnate with poison, or aromatics; to
prevent or arrest putrefaction.’’53
This summarizes the main premise of his work.
McCurdy is a disciple of scientific advancement, a cutting-edge necrospecialist who
desires to break with the limitations on embalming that he sees as belonging to the
past. Similar to Gannal’s argument, the craft of his predecessors, even close
predecessors, can be improved upon. The manuscript briefly presents a historical
evolution of the ‘‘lost art’’ outlining the technology used at different points in history.
But McCurdy makes clear that reference to the Egyptian methods of embalming and
those emerging after the spread of Christianity belong to a distant era. As soon as he
374 I. Fernandez

describes modern embalming, he informs the reader of the deity he worships with
manifesto-like rhetoric:
But enough of the past with its blackened mummies, its disjointed history, and its
mystified theology! Passing over the interim we come now to the full brightness of
funeral science and medical skill in the dawn of the twentieth century.54
McCurdy establishes a need for a newly anointed specialization Á not undertaking,
which retains its connection to cabinet-making Á but funeral science. The structure of
his argument reminds us of Gannal’s positioning. The past acts as a foil, one literally
represented by darkness Á blackened mummies Á as well as ignorance and lack of
order. Then, there emerges the sublime brightness of scientific development. One of
the most bizarre parts of this manuscript revolves around McCurdy’s own status.
Even though he mentions medical skill, he was himself not a doctor but a professor
of chemistry. In addition, McCurdy had only served as an assistant embalmer when
he wrote this article. He divulges this detail later on in the text, when he admits to a
deficiency in practical knowledge and extended experience, and relates his relevant
duties as an assistant to ‘‘masters in the art.’’55
His claim to legitimacy cannot be
based on personal experience, as was the case of Gannal and Barnes and will be the
case with Renouard. Perhaps this explains why his rhetoric focuses on the inferiority
of the past in contrast to ‘‘the scientific model,’’ which he associates with modernity
and his own attitudes.
Like Gannal, McCurdy utilizes scientific novelty as the basis of his moral
‘‘calling.’’ He informs the reader that embalming should not be seen as feat of past
generations. Rather, he turns to his own time, arguing:
In fact, the methods of embalming as taught and practiced in the present, demand a
higher order of intelligence, a more thorough knowledge of the anatomy of the body, a
steadier judgment, and a more skillful hand that was at any time required of or
presented by the ancients who relied upon atmospheric influences for the preservation of
their dead.56
McCurdy bases the success of the necrospecialist not so much on professional
certification, but personal qualities and the intuitive ability to follow the scientific
method. He promotes a regime of personalized learning and self-discipline. McCurdy
devotes an entire section of his article to resources available for those interested in
joining what he calls ‘‘progressive’’ undertaking. These include manuals and
periodicals, short-term courses in embalming schools, lectures by masters of the
practice, and publications relating the latest scientific advances.
Both McCurdy and Gannal divulge a desire to undercut their competitors.
McCurdy returns to manifesto-like language in separating the modern professional
from the recent past, which he terms the ‘‘era of the ice-box.’’ He delineates two
elements justifying the profession. The era of the intelligent use of chemicals is upon
us and beckons us to move forward. What is the alternative? We have the physicality
of the corpse in its most negative form, ‘‘the slow putrefaction, the obnoxious stench,
the miasmic effluvia, the poisonous gases of contagious diseases and plagues.’’57
McCurdy promotes ease of use and the affordability of the technology not in
relation to individuals from the lower classes accessing the services but to allow the

under-privileged to become practitioners and earn a decent living. Although he lacks
the passion and emotive appeal of Barnes’ rhetoric, his confidence and extreme break
with the past reveal a flourishing industry which welcomes interdisciplinarity and
self-discipline as the norm and reduces the importance of certification by an
institutionalized board. McCurdy stands as a perfect example of the hybridity of
methods possible at this time.
Auguste Renouard: lessons in necro-etiquette
Auguste Renouard figures as an ideal necrospecialist because of his professional
development, attitude towards his services and role in the community and social
body, utilization of language and appeal to audience, and finally, success and
popularity as one of the fathers of the modern funeral industry. The most remarkable
aspect of this individual was his complete lack of affiliation to any field of science
and his education as a jack-of-all-trades. This separates him from all individuals
considered up to this point because of the possibility of the complete absence of any
connection to science or medicine. Renouard was born on a plantation in Point
Coupee Parish, Louisiana. His formal training has remained murky. Some accounts
have him attending medical school in St. Louis. But, like many other American
necrospecialists, the bulk of his experience began with odd jobs taken during the Civil
War and after. Renouard briefly worked as a pharmacist before obtaining permanent
employment as a bookkeeper for a furniture store that also specialized in
undertaking. A large part of this business’ clients required long-distance preparation
of corpses for shipment back to the family after treatment. From the onset,
Renouard developed an interest in the preparation of corpses as a type of hobby. Not
satisfied with the more imperfect work of other specialists at the company, he was
allowed to experiment with arterial embalming and reconstructive services. His
represents a traditional rags-to-riches story. Renouard’s techniques soon earned him
a reputation for creating beautiful corpses. This led to the establishment of a
correspondence course, the status of expert contributor to the industry journal The
Casket, and the 1878 publication of The Undertaker’s Manual, the first embalming
textbook written and published in the USA after Harlan’s translation of Gannal’s
text.58
Renouard, like Barnes, would go on to open his own embalming school. He
also became one of the founders of the National Funeral Directors Association in
1882, which was to determine the progression of the industry not only in the late
nineteenth century, but throughout the twentieth century.
The introduction to the book, written by fellow specialist Thomas Gliddon,
outlines the positioning of the American necrospecialist in contrast not only to the
past, but also similar professions in Europe. He presents Renouard’s text as occupying
‘‘an original and unique field in American literature.’’59
This is especially true in the
treatment of the subject matter. Unlike more abstract and grandiose manuscripts on
death-care services like those of Gannal and McCurdy, Renouard compiles a practical
manual delineating ‘‘the duties and amenities of the undertaker.’’60
The book is
directed at the student, foregrounding readability and unburdened with unnecessary
technical terms.61
Above all, it de-emphasizes the need for a scientific background
and privileges day-to-day experience. Gliddon summarizes Renouard’s ‘‘fascinating’’
contribution as a guide that ‘‘will materially assist [undertakers and their assistants]
in becoming more proficient in their profession.’’62
376 I. Fernandez

Renouard’s own introduction, titled ‘‘To the Profession,’’ gives us a palpable
sense of his intended audience. Rather than attempting to find a place in history for
his craft, he presents his compilation to ‘‘the American undertaker’’ with ‘‘the object
[. . .] to instruct, [. . .] create interest in the profession,’’ and ‘‘to promote the avocation
of an undertaker to the rank which it deservedly ought to occupy.’’63
He highlights
the relation of necrospecialist to corpse. The first thing a necrospecialist requires in
his education is an understanding of ‘‘the conditions of the body after death, as
governed by circumstances which may affect it, and thereby modify the treatment
thereof Á admitting that different modes of treatment are required by different
cases.’’64
Like Barnes, Renouard proposes practices based on the capacity to observe
natural bodily processes and deal with the limitations these impose upon
the professional. The necrospecialist develops a relation to the corpse based on the
exchange of activity from specialist to corpse and vice-versa. The body under
consideration is anything but inert, or the passive subject we find in Gannal’s text.
Renouard highlights the need for insight into the properties and composition of the
constituents of the human body as key for any attempt to preserve it. The
necrospecialist does not so much impose his will upon the corpse, but must rather
have a thorough knowledge of the formation of elements affecting the rate of
putrefaction, a battle he needs to prepare for.
Renouard writes entirely in the third-person, also positioning himself as an
observer rather than the main character. He does not present himself as the greatest
inventor on earth like Gannal or the cutting-edge progressive like McCurdy. Unlike
Barnes, who was writing when the profession had become more solidified, or Gannal
and McCurdy, who focused on a move toward modernity, Renouard creates a
cultural mandate by addressing the public’s early misrepresentation of the social role
of the necrospecialist. Renouard delicately treads upon this path by countering a
pervasive and ill-placed negative association with the caretakers of the dead:
To great many the business of the undertaker has something dreadful and appalling
about it; and without very well understanding themselves the nature of the feeling, it is
always associated with the horrible. [. . .] Undertakers, as a class, are men useful to
society; their calling, far from being horrible and loathsome, as the ignorant and shallow
minded are pleased to call it, is one which requires a great deal of self-denial, and which
often brings to the surface the finest traits of human nature.65
Renouard foregrounds the inevitable human hostility towards death, a subject which
is not fully understood in the cosmic sense. The necrospecialist becomes relevant
precisely because he can move beyond the instinct of apprehension and fear of death.
Part of his ‘‘calling’’ involves a moral duty in which he surpasses his own limitations
and embraces this stage of the life-cycle with utmost soberness and etiquette. The
value of the necrospecialist is quite material and grounded in practice. According to
Renouard, his text does not simply list mere speculations or recipes picked at
random, but the fruits of his own prolonged exposure to dying and death.
For Renouard, the embodied character traits of the necrospecialist define the
success he achieves in the profession. Professional experience and scientific knowl-
edge do not count for much if not paired with etiquette. Etiquette starts with the self.
The ideal necrospecialist guards against a slovenly appearance because ‘‘a man who
does not care for his personal appearance seldom possesses much regard for anything

American Necrospecialists--the modern artisans of death

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