Curing the peasant's disease : Frank Oldt’s work and research on hookworm disease in South China, 1905-1926

While current scholarship on “hygienic modernity” in China focuses on the construction of urban health systems and institutional infrastructures, this study proposes an alternative analytical lens by foregrounding the domain of agricultural health. It aims to investigate how early twentieth-century medical researchers uncovered public health models grounded in China’s agrarian conditions. Taking the case of Frank Oldt (1879–1976), a medical missionary living in Guangdong between 1905 and 1926, this research examines how he identified, interpreted, and sought to mitigate the problem of hookworm disease—a parasitic condition intricately linked to China’s farming practices and rural environmental conditions. Specifically, this thesis aims to address the following questions: How did an American missionary initially promoting on evangelism transform himself into a scientist in the urban context? In what ways did this transformation influence his research agenda, setting him apart from other Western scientists in China? And how did he draw upon China’s agricultural traditions to conceptualize an innovative public health model for the treatment and prevention of hookworm disease? This thesis argues that Frank Oldt’s contributions to local public health in China can be understood on three interrelated levels. First, as a missionary with limited formal medical training, Oldt diverged from the prevailing surgical orientation of early twentieth-century medicine and instead concentrated on public health problems endemic to rural China. Second, informed by his field experience and familiarity with farming practices in Guangdong, he took part in the global discourse on hookworm disease by investigating its transmission pathways within the specific environmental and labor conditions of South China. Third, by aligning his research with the practical exigencies of the local context, he formulated a systematic and empirically grounded methodology for developing a agricultural health model tailored to the conditions of rural southern China. Oldt’s career exemplifies a unique model of local hygienic modernity: rather than transplanting global health paradigms, he imagined China’s agricultural health from local knowledge and scientific networks, proposed a concept that balanced economic efficiency with peasants’ well-being. This study highlights that not only Chinese, but also Western scientists can contribute to the localization of China’s hygienic modernization. Furthermore, Oldt’s public health model not only impacted on later Chinese scientists’ research in agricultural health but also predicted the principles of the Patriotic Health Campaign launched in the People’s Republic of China after 1950s.