LESIONS of the colon have always offered difficulties in diagnosis and treatment. Until the evolution of the electric light and the x-ray, diagnosis was seldom made except by palpation and by inference from the presence of intestinal obstruction. Surgical treatment was complicated by many factors. The contents of the bowel contained many pathogenic organisms that gave rise to peritonitis; interference with function by the lesions resulted in malnutrition and anemia, and intestinal obstruction caused alterations in body chemistry and physiology that were frequently fatal. The historical development of the operative treatment is interesting, and a knowledge of it is helpful to the present-day surgeon in his efforts to further improve upon it. The names of many surgeons have been associated with the increase in our knowledge of and the advances in our treatment of lesions of the colon. To mention a few, Bloch, Mikulicz, and Paul, pioneers in the field,