Occupational Stigmas

Dr. Watson often tried to deduce a man's occupation from his appearance, but Sherlock Holmes almost always had to set him right. Police medical examiners who lack Holmes's deductive powers but must often try to determine the occupation of a person brought in dead, unconscious, amnesic or deliberately lying can get some ideas from a guide published in the Journal of the American Medical Association last week by Dr. Francesco Ronchese of Providence, R. I. and Boston University.

Some of his tips:

P: A callus at the base of the left little finger indicates a stone cutter, who braces his chisel with his little finger. Other characteristic calluses: the house painter's on the front of both shins where he leans on his ladder ; the trumpet or tuba player's near the tip of the right little finger, where the finger presses against a small hook to steady the instrument; the writer's (or student's or bookkeeper's) on the side of the right middle finger; the French horn player's in the corresponding spot on the left; the floor sweeper's at the base of both thumbs ; the gardener's on the knuckles of his left hand which he uses to brace himself as he weeds with his right.

P: Some telltale sores: the violin player's on the left side of the jaw; the optical glass molder's burn sores and scars on knuckles and arms ; milkers' nodules which farmers sometimes get on their hands.

P: The cauliflower ear of the prize fighter is well known. Less familiar are the banged-up "dealer shins" of the junk dealer, garbage collector, truck driver, foundry worker.

P: Silversmiths may absorb so much silver that their skin becomes slate grey. "Canary" is the name for an explosive-powder worker whose hair and skin have become red-yellow from tetryl. A foundry worker often has red-streaked forearms.

P: A man whose bald head shows scars of crusted ringworm suffered during his youth Dr. Ronchese suspects of being a European, because that type of ringworm is prevalent among Europe's poorer classes but not in the U.S. A man with a wartlike scar of Aleppo or Jericho boil is probably an Armenian, because the disease rarely occurs outside of Asia Minor and is most common in Armenia. An old man scarred by bites of the body louse (vagabond's disease) is probably a tramp.

P: Fingerprints are sometimes temporarily obliterated, even without surgery: e.g., the fingertips of a bricklayer's left hand are usually smooth as glass.

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