History of Cass County, Indiana, from its earliest settlement to the present time; with Biographical Sketches and Reference to Biographies, Volume I, Part 52

Author: Powell, Jehu Z., 1848- [from old catalog] ed
Publication date: 1913
Publisher: Chicago and New York. The Lewis publishing company
Number of Pages: 763


USA > Indiana > Cass County > History of Cass County, Indiana, from its earliest settlement to the present time; with Biographical Sketches and Reference to Biographies, Volume I > Part 52


Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).


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OTHER PIONEER PHYSICIANS


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Dr. G. N. Fitch came to Logansport in 1834; Dr. Uriah Farquhar, in 1835; and soon after John Lytle, A. B. Buchanan, J. M. Jeroleman, Ruel Faber, Drs. Merrill, Howes, Culbertson and Miller located in Logansport. These were the first and most prominent of the early physicians of Cass county.


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TRIALS OF THE PIONEER DOCTORS


The physicians of today cannot fully realize the trials, hardships and difficulties of the pioneer doctors of 1828. Cass county was then a


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dense forest roamed over by Indians and infested with wild beasts, in- sects and rattle snakes galore. There were no roads or bridges, and physicians had to wend their way through the wilderness on horseback and ford or swim the rivers. Doctors could not find their way after night to many parts of Cass county and many instances of fatalities are related in the early settlement, because the surgeon could not find his way to the lonely cabin after nightfall. One case was that of Wil- liam Dale near Galveston, who cut his foot while clearing in the woods, and had to send to Logansport, eighteen miles distant, for a surgeon; night overtook the messenger and neither doctor nor messenger could follow the trail in the dark and had to wait till morning, and next day when the surgeon arrived at the cabin he found Mr. Dale had bled to death during the night. In those days physicians went on horseback with saddle bags filled with crude drugs, and often it was impossible to purchase the medicines desired because everything had to be brought to Logansport on horseback or cart from Toledo or Cincinnati.


CRUDE DRUGS


The form in which medicines are now prescribed has radically changed in the past forty years. Then crude drugs in the form of powders, infusions or decoctions were employed, but now we use alka- loids and extracts in the form of tablets, or capsules, or concentrated tinctures, so that the doctor of today can carry in his pocketcase a greater variety of drugs than he could in his large saddle bags of pio- neer days and certainly in a more palatable form. What would a pa- tient today say if the physician would give him a teaspoonful of pow- dered aloes, rheubarb or bark, instead of a small coated tablet, pill or capsule of the extracts or alkaloids of those drugs, as equally effective?


INSTRUMENTS


Many surgical instruments and appliances, also instruments of pre- cision were not known or could not be procured by the early doctors of Cass county. The fever thermometer, hypodermic syringe, and stethe- scope were not used by the older physicians when the writer began practice in Logansport in 1874, Dr. Cady, and the writer were the first physicians in Cass county to possess and use a compound micro- scope. The X-ray and various electrical appliances were wholly un- known. Aseptic surgery was not even dreamed of and the pioneer sur- geon would groom his horse, and without changing his clothing, or wash- ing his hands, would start off on horseback, over mud roads, to ampu- tate a leg or attend an obstetric case; the log cabin for an operating room, an old kitchen table for an operating table, his only light a tallow dip in the hands of a nervous inexperienced woman; instead of chloro- form he utilized the strong pioneer hands to keep his patient from struggling; an old wooden keeler his only wash basin into which the hard unsterilized water was poured with an old gourd which Jonah had sent over from Palestine; an old sheet from the bed furnished gauze, lint and bandages; with the crudest of instruments, the pioneer doctor acting as operator, assistant, interne and nurse, thus performed his surgical operations-and always considered himself fortunate if he had only healthy laudable pus in his surgical wounds instead of saneous and unhealthy.


"In the night time or the day time, he would rally brave and well, Though the summer lark was fifing or the frozen lances fell,


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Knowing if he won the battle, they would praise their Maker's name, Knowing if he lost the battle, then the doctor was to blame. 'Twas the brave, old virtuous doctor, 'Twas the good old family doctor, 'Twas the faithful country doctor,


Fighting stoutly all the same."-Carleton.


THE CONTRAST


What a contrast between pioneer days and the present. Now the surgeon is summoned from any part of Cass county by telephone. He grabs his aseptic surgical case, which is always kept in readiness, tele- phones a skilled assistant, and in a few minute is off on interurban, steam car or automobile, and if in the latter, travels over smooth grav- eled roads and soon reaches the bedside of his patient, or the latter is rushed, in an ambulance, to the hospital, fitted up with all modern steril- ized apparatus, where night is converted into day by electric lights, and with trained nurses he performs painless and aseptic surgery, and the surgeon is censured should purulent infection follow which is now the exception and not the rule as formerly.


Drs. Fitch, Farquhar, Faber and Buchanan, a quartet of pioneer physicians who spent their lives in Cass county, have told the writer that they have been called twenty, thirty or forty miles from Logans- port and would have to travel that distance on horseback, over mud roads, when the horse could not be urged out of a walk, owing to the bottomless conditions of the road.


DOMESTIC REMEDIES


Because of these conditions nearly every family in the county was provided with a number of family remedies, usually consisting of domes- tic herbs, roots and barks, and you would always find in the loft of the pioneer cabin a collection of dried boneset, elecampane, peppermint, sage, Jimson weed, smart weed, tansy, hops, red pepper, also burdock and pleurisy root, with wild cherry, elm and other barks.


Their taste, do I remember well, and never shall forget, And when I see those herbs today, me thinks I taste 'em yet.


The pioneer women who presided over those cabins in the clearings, had a remedy for every disease and they were not slow to use them, but when the herbs failed the country doctor was called, who would supplement the family remedies by calomel and jalap, aloes and rheu- barb, ipecac and tartar-emetic with cinchona bark always given in powder. If plethoric, bleeding, if depressed, sinapisms or fly blisters were employed. But the good old pioneer doctor with his few crude remedies, brought relief to about as many of his patients as the mod- ern automobile doctor, and certainly exhibited as much energy, tact and practical commonsense, and was more resourceful as necessity com- pelled him to be.


It may be a question whether or not our modern pharmacists have not gone too far in their endeavor to manufacture pleasant tasting medi- cines and have sacrificed efficiency for palatability, and yet we would hardly return to former methods.


If the pioneer doctor of seventy years ago could rise from his grave he would certainly be surprised at our speeding automobiles and trolley cars. He would imagine he was in fairy land, to take down a telephone


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and talk with a patient fifteen miles in the country, prescribe the neces- sary changes in the treatment, all done in a moment while sitting in his office chair; instead of riding a whole day through mud and rain to accomplish the same results, as was formerly done. If the early phy- sicians were to attend a meeting of the Cass County Medical Society today, they would think its members were using a strange language and certainly a large number of the medical words now in use would not be understood. Such terms as toxins, anti-toxin, opsonins, antiseptic, Lis- terism, serums, bacterial germs, etc., could not be comprehended.


In what a wondrous age we live, A kaleidoscopic show, The rapid changes taking place, Since eighty years ago.


MEDICINE AMONG THE INDIANS


The Indians had their medicine men, but little is known of the meth- ods and nature of the practice of those occupying this part of Indiana but it is authoritatively stated that it was largely incantation and sim- ilar to tribes in other localities.


John Lawson, in a book published in 1709, relates his observations among the Tuscaroras Indians as follows: "When the Indian doctor comes into a cabin, the patient is placed upon a mat or skin, stark naked. The chief of the nation comes with a rattle made of a gourd with peas in it, which he hands to the doctor. The doctor begins by uttering some words and shaking the gourd, then he smells the patients belly and scarifies the patient in different parts of the body with a comb-like instrument made of rattle snake teeth, and sucks the scarification and draws out blood and spits it into a bowl of water until he has drawn quite a quantity, then he dances around the patient, shaking the gourd rattle, and slapping his own body, making all manner of sounds and grimaces and assuming antic postures which are not matched this side of Bedlam. All this time the patient lies motionless although the lanc- ing with the rattle snake teeth draws blood and is a great punishment. At last when the doctor is all in a sweat and nearly exhausted, he makes an end and tells whether the patient will live or die, and the blood sucked out of the patient and spit in the bowl is buried in a place un- known to any one except the party making the interment."


BLACK POWDER


To show the unscientific and crude methods of ancient medicine even among the civilized nations, the following quotations are made from Dr. Edward Stafford, of London, who on May 6, 1643, wrote to Gov. W. Winthrop, of Massachusetts, giving him a number of standard rem- edies that could be used in various maladies, one of which was his ,"Black Powder," "against ye plague, smallpox, purple and all sorts of fevers, etc. : '


"Take toads, in the month of March, as many as you will alive, putt them in an earthen pott, so it will be half full; cover it with a tile or iron plate; then overwhelme the pott soyt ye bottom may be uppermost, put charcoal around about it, in the open ayre, and not in ye house; sett it on fire and let it burn and extinguish itself; when it is cold, take out the toads, and in an iron mortar pound them very well and scarce them, then in a crucible, calcine them again; pound and scarce them again; the first time they will be brown powder, the next time black.


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Of this you may give a dragme in a vehiculum (or drink) internally in any infection taken, and let them sweet upon it in their beddes. For prevention half a dragme will suffice-moderate the dose according to the strength of 'ye partie' for I have set down ye greatest that is need- ful. There is no danger in it. The same powder is used plasterwise with vinegar for gangrene or bites of venomous beasts, taking it like- wise internally. It is likewise used in cankers, fistules, old ulcers, King's evil, strewing it upon the sore."


SPECIALIZATION


Among the pioneer physicians of Cass county there were no spe- cialists, they were simply doctors. Each covered the whole field of medicine, but in that day, the field of medicine was only a "truck patch" as compared to the vast field of medical science of the present age. Now-a-days we go to a certain doctor if something affects our ears, nose or throat; to another if our eyes trouble us, and so on through the whole list of anatomical organs. Each organ or part of the human body having a specialist who devotes his time and talents to the diseases of that particular organ. But in pioneer times, they "called the doc- tor" and that was all there was to it; and to his credit be it said that he was ready for anything. He may not have been shaved that day, or changed his collar or cuffs, but the chances are that it was because he had ridden all night through the mud and rain. There was no luster on the stout boots he wore, but there was luster in his eye, and his fin- gers were none the less steady when he came to perform some delicate operation to save a precious life. But since those good old pioneer days the field of medicine has become so broad and extensive that it is im- possible for one man, in this short life, to completely master all the details in all branches, hence it is necessary to specialize to some extent, and by so doing the profession can give better service to their patients, and specialization is a distinctive feature of modern medicine, especially in our larger cities where there is sufficient patronage to justify phy- sicians in giving their entire time to a particular class of diseases.


PROGRESS OF MEDICAL EDUCATION AND MEDICAL LAWS


When we come to study the educational facilities of the early days we find the same primitive situation that obtained in other conditions of that period.


A medical student of the pioneer days was not expected to go to college, for there were no colleges "west of the Alleghenies" and it would require a month's time to reach the seaboard, from the wilds of Indiana. When the young man of that day felt the bud of medical genius sprouting in his brain, he entered some old doctor's office as an apprentice. His first duties were to act as office boy, wash bottles, keep the office clean, groom the doctor's horse, and his spare time was spent in reading the few text books that composed the doctor's library. As time went on he would make pills, spread plasters, and ride out with his preceptor when making calls and assist him in surgical operations, and thus imbibe, so to speak, a knowledge of disease and its treatment. After a two years' apprenticeship the youthful doctor was supposed to be capable. of starting out in his own behalf. There was but little theoretical knowledge acquired, everything was pre-eminently practical, gained from observation by practical bedside experience. There was no hospital where difficult cases could be taken, and eminent specialists consulted, but every doctor, be he old or young, had to rely upon his own


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resources which necessarily made them self-reliant and resourceful. In the evolution of medical science all this has changed. The causes of diseases and a world of bacteria, cell action, minute anatomy, various tissues, physiological and pathological, with the glandular secretions, all have to be studied in the laboratory with microscope and other instru- ments of precision, requiring months and years of study that was unknown in the olden times, but necessary for the up-to-date physician.


The colonies of North America very early took measures to protect the health and life of the people, and probably the first laws relating to the practice of medicine were passed by the colonial legislature of Vir- ginia in 1636 to regulate the fees and protect the people from excessive charges.


Nearly all the colonies enacted various medical laws and many of them required an examination of all physicians to test. their qualifica- tions, before they were permitted to practice, but after the Revolution- ary war and new states were formed, the laws pertaining to the prac- tice of medicine were sadly neglected until within the past few years.


MEDICAL LAWS IN INDIANA


Prior to 1881, Indiana had no laws regulating the practice of medi- cine, and any one, however ignorant, could engage in medical practice. In 1881 the legislature enacted a registration law, requiring all phy- sicians to register their names in the county clerk's office, but per- mitting every doctor who had been in practice for ten years, to register, but thereafter, all applicants for registration must be graduates of a medical college. In 1897 a more stringent law was passed, and a board of medical registration and examination, established, whose duty it was, not only to require a diploma from a recognized medical school, but all applicants must, in addition to the diploma, pass an examina- tion before the board and certificates issued to only those passing a suc- cessful examination. The leading schools or systems of medicine, regu- lar, eclectic and homeopathic schools are represented on this board. According to a more recent law, the so-called osteopathic doctors may be licensed to practice their peculiar methods of massage and hygiene but they cannot prescribe drugs. The nondescript school of chiropractic, would-be doctors, have recently knocked at the door for admission but for the honor of the state and the health of its citizens it is to be hoped all such unscientific and impractical isms will be relegated to the rear in the great onward progress of regular scientific medicine. The stan- dard of medical education in our colleges has steadily advanced during the past third of a century, from a two-year's course of four months each, to a four-year's course of nine months each, with increased re- quirements for admission to the medical colleges, and people are just beginning to realize that medical legislation is for the protection of the health and lives of the public, and to prevent ignorant, incompetent and unscrupulous men, calling themselves doctors, from imposing upon a long suffering and credulous people; that medical and pure food laws are not enacted in the interests of the medical profession, but for the benefit of the masses. The high standards of medical education set by legal requirements for admission to practice has driven out many small, irregular, and low grade medical colleges and diploma mills all over the country and Indiana now has only one regular medical college in con- nection with its state university, but it stands along side the best medi- cal schools of our country and is a credit to the state.


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The first eclectic physician, sometimes called botanic or herb doctors, to locate in Logansport was Dr. James A. Taylor, in 1845.


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The first homeopathic practitioner or the follower of Hahnemann's peculiar dogma of "Similia Similibus Curanter," was J. F. Gruber, in 1857, and since that date representatives of both these schools of medicine have been practicing in Logansport. In recent years with the development of science and the positive demonstration of the germ origin of disease, all these specialisms and dogmas of eclecticisms, home- opathy, Thompsonianism, etc., are gradually fading away, and all schools of medicine are approaching a unity of therapeutics on the broad prin- ciples of regular, scientific medicine.


LIST OF DECEASED AND TRANSIENT DOCTORS


After exhausing every known source of information, about four hun- dred and fifty-three different physicians have been found, to have re- sided and practiced for a time, at least, in Cass county, two hundred and eighty-six of whom were located in Logansport, and one hundred and sixty-seven in the townships. It will be impossible to give a biographi- cal sketch of each, in this work, but a short biography of each physician, so far as could be procured, has been written and preserved in manu- script book. The physicians in the country will be named under their respective townships. The following list includes all physicians who have lived and practiced in Logansport from 1827 to 1913, with about the date of their residence in the city, and where known will give date of birth and death, designating the birth with "b" and death with "d." Allison, J. L., 1899; transient.


Armstrong, Dr., 1872; transient.


Abbott, Abner, 1886-92; b. Indiana, 1835; d. 1892.


Allen, Ethan, 1907; transient.


Adrian, J. A., 1854-1886; b. in New York, 1824; d. 1886.


Allen, J. H., 1888; homeopath; now in Chicago.


Allen, Walter H., 1871-2; moved to greener pastures.


Amy, Mrs. Jennie, 1900; gone to greener pastures.


Adolphus, Joseph, 1870-3; homeopath.


Alford, L. A., 1864-1883; b. in Vermont, 1814; d. 1883.


Andrews, James, 1897; homeopath; moved.


Alexander, Wilbur, 1900; moved.


Browne, John T., 1865-72; d. 1872.


Bois, Benjamin R., 1873; b. 1834; d. 1899.


Bueller, Dr., 1856-7; destiny unknown.


Banta, H. J., 1881-1902; b. 1849; d. 1902.


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Bowser, Perry B., 1876-1890; now in Soldiers' Home.


Brackett, James Wolf, 1838; b. 1816; d. 1886.


Brackett, Albert Gallion, 1854; b. 1829; d. 1896.


Bowers, Mrs. Jane, 1875-1896; b. 1840; d. 1896.


Blair, John M., 1885-6; probably a Weary Willie.


Budd, J. W., 1868-81; fell down stairs and killed, 1881.


Besser, Emil, 1898; homeopath-gone.


Bell, William H., 1868-1911; b. 1839; d. 1911, in Logansport.


Beardsley, E. J., 1901; homeopath ; moved away.


Baker, John, 1871-2; moved away.


Burgman, Edward G., 1899; left town. .


Bush, Charles R., 1899; homeopath ; moved away.


Ballard, John W., 1882; b. 1855; d. 1911, in Logansport.


Bartholomew, A. C., 1903; now in South Bend.


Bruggaman, Otto, 1903; now in Fort Wayne.


Brown, Francis W., 1900; now in Grand Rapids.


Bostwick, George T., 1834-44; moved away; d. since.


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Buchanan, Andrew B., 1837-1885; b. 1810; d. 1885. Berkley, Howard W., 1908; in Pennsylvania Railroad service. Conant, -, 1840-50; went West.


Crockett, Horace E., 1906; moved away. Carpenter, A. J., 1889; homeopath ; moved.


Cowdry, James S., 1845-55; went to Lafayette.


Carpenter, L. W., 1877-88; homeopath; b. 1814; d. in Washington, 1908.


Culbertson, William, 1842-56; d. in Illinois.


Chord, A. M., 1893-1892; b. 1833; d. 1892, in Logansport. Coleman, Asa, 1854-1905; b. 1831; d. 1905, in Logansport.


Coleman, Horace, 1854-1866; b. 1824; d. in Washington, 1911.


Coleman, Warren H., 1888; now in Ohio.


Clevinger, B. S., 1872-1896; b. 1819; d. 1896, in Logansport.


Cowgill, N. C., 1889-1898; b. 1827; d. 1898, in Logansport.


Cornell, Mrs. M. E., 1879-80; moved away. Crismond, J. W., 1894-99; b. 1847; d. in Anderson, Indiana, 1912.


Christopher, W. H., 1892; "Surgical Institute;" gone.


Conner, W. J., 1859; moved away.


Campbell, Joseph G., 1853-1890; b. 1832; d. 1890, in city.


Canfield, Sarah A., 1897; b. 1837; left city.


Cunningham, S. R., 1900-02; at Longcliff; moved. Dill, John W., 1901; left city. Downey, S. L., 1875-1879; b. 1837; d. 1893, in Illinois.


Dale, F. C., 1874-6; United States Navy ; b. 1848; d. in California, 1885.


Darnell, R. F., 1899; at Longcliff; now in Colorado.


Dickerson, George L., b. 1870; 1906; advertised and soon left. Ellis, James D., 1899; left city.


Elston, William T., 1847-1856; b. 1820; d. 1873, in Pulaski county.


Eckles, John, 1868-1870; Indian doctor; d. in city, 1871 ..


Elder, Edward F., 1902-3; at Longcliff.


Emerson, A. R., 1902; at Longcliff ; now in Boston. French, George W., 1879-85; left city.


Fossion, M. S., 1865-1871; b. in France, 1837; lives there.


Flynn, Warren R., 1897-9; b. 1869; now in California. Fansler, D. N., 1877-1888; b. 1836; d. Marian, Indiana, 1910.


Fording, S. L., 1878-1880; left city.


Fewit, W. H., 1899; left city.


Forrest, John H .; b. in Logansport, 1858; now in Marian, Indiana. Farr, -, 1869-73; homeopath; left for greener pastures.


Fitch, Frederick, 1834-1850; b. in New York, 1784; d. in city, 1850. Fitch, G. N., 1834-1892; b. in New York, 1809; d. in city, 1892. Farquhar, Uriah, 1836-1872; b. 1795; d. in city, 1872.


Faber, Ruel, 1842-1894; b. 1816; d. in city, 1894.


Fowler, Walter N., 1911; left city.


Gassoway, Thomas O., 1899; advertised and soon left. Graham, M., 1885; left city.


Gemmill, H. C., 1873-1876; b. in city, 1845; d. 1903.


Gemmill, H. C., Jr., 1899; now in Indianapolis.


Griffith, Mrs. Anna M. L., 1910; left city. Graber, J. F., 1857; first homeopath in city. Gates, William N., 1884-1891; b. 1831; d. in city, 1891. Gapen, C. W., 1869 ; left city. Hoss, J. V., 1873; left city.


Hillis, E. E., 1879-80; left city.


Hubbard, H., 1859; left city.


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Hermann, John, 1868-1899; b. in Germany, 1835; d. in city, 1899.


Hermann, A. J., 1888-1907; now in California.


Hancock, James M., 1910; left city ; b. 1878.


Hall, Richard R., 1855-1870; left city.


Hall, Amos C., 1863-1873; moved to Laporte.


Hall, Amos, 1880; left city.


Hall, Joseph, 1903; quit practice; now agent in city.


Hattery, H. D., 1876-1912; b. 1845; d. in city, 1912.


Hopper, George H., 1899-1904; homeopath; moved to Chicago.


Hill, C. C., 1880-1; moved to Ohio.


Hill, Frank, 1880; moved to Ohio.


Hewitt, J. N., 1872; moved to Kansas.


Hawley, Max C., 1905; at Longcliff; since left.


Hoffman, Max F., 1865-1868; secretary of state, Indianapolis; d. about 1875.


Hoffman, George E., 1905; Longcliff; now at Rochester, Indiana.


Haugh, Charles F., 1907; left city.


Hallinan, Joseph, 1871-1909; b. 1850; d. in city, 1909.


Howes, Thomas H., 1838-1848; b. 1808; d. at Rochester, Indiana, 1864.


Hollingworth, I. M., 1889; advertised and soon left.


Irons, John W., 1869-1890; homeopath; d. in Tennessee, 1897.


Ivins, Daniel, 1847; left city.


Ingram, Frank; b. in Logansport, 1860; alienist; d. New York, 1893. Justice, James M., 1860-1894; b. Indiana, 1817; d. 1894, in Logans- port.


Jerolaman, George M., 1835-1883; b. New Jersey, 1811; d. in city, 1883.


Jarvis, -, 1851; moved to Canada.




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