The American Ambulance 1900-2002: An Illustrated History

Rating:
Summary: Yet another `professional car' ambulance book
Review: An ambulance book written by a car collector.
The `professional cars'/`limousine ambulances' from the 50s to the 70s form the main part of the book. More modern vehicles are relegated to a rather short annex, reinforcing the European belief that US prehospital emergency care failed to progress in the last decades.
Some interior views are available, but the main focus is on the car in the ambulance, not on patient care.
Many photos have been taken at Professional Car Society meetings and show restored collector's items instead of original pictures.
The quality of the photos is excellent, most important in a picture book.
The book contains lots of the weird and wonderful, giving the reader endless pleasure discovering the oddities our colleagues of ages past had worked in. I did not realize that even in the late 1970s there still existed combination vehicles between hearse and ambulance.
For anybody interested in ambulances based on station wagons this book is recommended reading, those more interested in `modern emergency vehicles' (= from 1970 onwards) may feel rather disappointed.

Rating:
Summary: For Professional Car Lovers
Review: I operate a web site dealing with EMS history and TV's "Emergency!" So this book tickled my fancy when I saw it on Ebay.

I did whirr whirr noises when first looking at the book. Fascinating vehicles. Many of the machines were pro cars that were restored but a few were original pictures. I found it very interesting and the author did try to mention the modular/van rigs of the Seventies onwards. I wish he had focused more on these truck-type rigs, especially pre-Seventies rigs of Los Angeles and New York.

He credited Horton with the first modular ambulance; however Swab preceded them in 1962. Also Jim Page's rescue truck did no transporting. Otherwise he did a good job.

Meanwhile, would someone please write a book on the history of EMS including ambulances, emergency rooms and patient care (and WITH pictures)? Jim Page tried this with "The Paramedics" but its focus is too narrow. So much has happened in America's EMS and due to so many good, wonderful people eg. Julian Wise, Deke Farrington MD, Jim Page, Bob Cinader, Michael Criley MD, and Eugene Nagel MD. They deserve to be mentioned and their story told.