Close-up of metal rake + glass tumbler. Leyden jar is to the right.
Corbett was a medical physician for the Shakers, a religious group of colonial America. He was a botanist and preferred herbal medicines to bloodletting.[2] His machine was hand-operated. Rotating a glass cylinder in contact with a silk pad caused a static charge to accumulate on the cylinder. A metal comb collected this charge, which was then stored in a Leyden jar. From the jar, the electrical charge could then be released into the patient, producing a shock akin to "touching a doorknob after walking across carpet in dry weather".[3]
