The first successful ARTIFICIAL INSEMINATION on an animal was conducted by the Italian Abbe Lazare Spallanzani in 1779, when he injected the semen of a spaniel into the genital tract of a female hunting-dog. A littler of three cross-bred puppies was born 62 days later.
The first HUMAN ARTIFICIAL INSEMINATION was conducted by M. Thouret, Doyen of the Medical Faculty at Paris University, who made in intravaginal injection of sperm on his sterile wife in 1785 with a tin syringe. This resulted in the birth of a healthy baby, the achievement being described by Thouret in an anonymous pamphlet.
The first doctor in England to practise artificial insemination was Dr John Hunter, who used it on a wealthy and aristocratic female patient whose husband suffered from hypospadias. The case was initially reported by Everard Home in 1799, but the actual date it was carried out is not known. Dr Hunter died in 1793.
The first artificial insemination with semen other than that of the husband (AID, or Artificial Insemination with Donor) was conducted by Prof. Pancoast of Philadelphia on a chloroformed woman without her knowledge in 1884. This was done at the request of the husband, who was himself sterile.
