Blastomycosis was first described by Thomas Casper Gilchrist in 1894; because of this, it is sometimes called "Gilchrist's disease". It is also sometimes referred to as Chicago Disease. Other names for blastomycosis include "North American blastomycosis", and "blastomycetic dermatitis". Among a skeletal series of Late Woodland Native Americans and later burial populations (the Mississippians, AD 900-1673) Dr. Jane Buikstra found evidence for what may have been an epidemic of a serious spinal disease in adolescents and young adults. Several of the skeletons showed lesions in the spinal vertebrae in the lower back. There are two modern diseases that produce lesions in the bone similar to the ones Dr. Buikstra found in these prehistoric specimens - spinal TB and blastomycosis. The bony lesions in these two diseases are practically identical. Blastomycosis seems more probable as these young people in Late Woodland and Mississippian times may have been afflicted because they were spending more time cultivating plants than their Middle Woodland predecessors had done. If true, it would be another severe penalty Late Woodland people had to pay as they shifted to agriculture as a way of life, and it would be a contributing factor to shortening their lifespans compared to those of the Middle Woodland people. Blastomycosis also affects an indefinitely broad range of mammalian hosts, and dogs in particular are a highly vulnerable sentinel species. The disease generally begins with acute respiratory symptoms and rapidly progresses to death. Cats are the animals next most frequently detected as infected.