USA > Maine > Maine; a history, Volume IV > Part 27
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).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67
Dr. Erastus Eugene Holt was born in Peru, Oxford county, Maine, June 1, 1849. We find that his childhood was spent among rural scenes. When he was four years old his parents moved to East Stoughton, Massachusetts, where his father had charge of the town farm and house of correction for four years, when they moved back to Peru. When his father went to Cali- fornia in 1859, he and his oldest brother Artemas carried on the farming, while his brother Otis worked out. On the breaking out of the Civil War in 1861, both of his brothers went into the army, and he with his mother moved to Canton, -a village town adjoining Peru. His mother,
while nursing typhoid fever patients, contracted the disease and died this year, just after his father's return from California.
It will be seen that Dr. Holt lost his mother just at the close of his childhood and at the beginning of the important period of youth. They had never been separated. His precocity had enabled him to be much of a companion to her in the absence of his father in California and in the stress incident to the brothers going to the war. She was an ideal Christian mother, well versed in the literature at her disposal, and knew how to do all kinds of work incident to pioneer life, such as weaving cloth from the raw materials and making garments of all kinds, thus practically supplying all the necessities of her household. The precepts inculcated during the important developments of childhood should have a far-reaching importance in the subsequent career of any person. With Dr. Holt they did have this effect for he kept constantly before him the teachings of his mother as a most prec- ions heritage to guide him through all the vicis- situdes of his life.
During youth, Dr. Holt was active in doing a variety of work on the farm, in the mill, and in the store,-all the time devoting his spare time to studying and going to school when he could. He taught his first district school in the Canton Mountain District when he was eighteen years of age. It was in this district that the winter before, the older boys made a brutal assault upon the teacher, injurying him so se- verely that he was taken to the village, where the doctor attended him. Notwithstanding, Dr. Holt knew all about this and knew that the teacher never fully recovered but died later, it did not deter him in the least from taking this school, and he taught it through the winter successfully.
It was during this period that he organized an amateur minstrel show, using the school house for a place for giving the exhibitions. There was seldom any local play staged without his active cooperation and participation in it. He secured the services of Dr. Major, a lecturer of repute, to give a course of lectures on psychol- ogy, illustrating all the features of what is now known as hypnotism. He served as secretary to many organizations, and his efficiency and adaptability to these duties were such that he was impressed into that service in a Grant Club in 1868, which cansed his name to be put on the voting list two years before he was twenty- one. He served as local correspondent to the
132
HISTORY OF MAINE
Oxford Democrat, a Republican paper published at Paris, giving the happenings in the eastern part of Oxford county, many of which he was the means of bringing about, such as ball games, wrestling matches, and horse races, of which he wrote up before and after they came off. By his diligence he had mastered the Spencerian system of penmanship, and in actual practice had become proficient in bookkeeping, so that he taught these subjects to private classes while teaching district schools and when attending school at Hebron Academy, Westbrook Seminary and Gorham Seminary. Thus in all his activities he was acquiring one of the greatest lessons of life, of knowing the value of money and to be self-dependent in all his plans, so that when he actually began his manhood career he had saved money to carry him through a college course. He, however, decided to begin the study of medicine, and devoted much more time to it than was required at that time.
Dr. Holt attended his first course of lectures in medicine at the Medical School of Maine, at Brunswick, going directly from there to Deer Island, Boston, as teacher in the City Reform School of Boston, composed of about three hun- dred boys and eleven officers and teachers. It was here that he had typhoid fever which caused him to be delirious for an unusually long time, so that when he came to write out all the details of the aberrations of his mind during this period, he found it took more than twenty thousand words to record them. Upon his recovery, his management of the boys in the school was so efficient that he was appointed principal of the school, the duties of which he performed to the satisfaction of the superintendent of Deer Isl- and and the school authorities of the city of Boston. He continued the study of medicine while at Deer Island, and took a short course of instruction at Dartmouth Medical College, Han- over, New Hampshire, before taking a second course of lectures at the Medical School of Maine, where, he graduated in June, 1874. The class consisted of twenty-eight members, but only twenty-one were able to pass the examination. After grad- uating, Dr. Holt continued the study of medicine in the Portland School for Medical Instruction until he left for New York City, where he entered the Medical School of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, now the Medical Department of Columbia University. Upon the completion of this course he received his ad eundem degree of M. D. in June, 1875.
His mother having died of typhoid fever, and
he having had it, naturally he had studied this disease more extensively, and he chose it for the subject of a thesis which was required by all candidates for the degree of doctor of medicine. By special permission of the faculty of the Col- lege of Physicians and Surgeons, Dr. Holt was allowed to attend to his duties as Demonstrator of Anatomy at the Medical School of Maine, to which position he was elected upon his gradua- tion. Continuing the study of medicine, he at- tended clinics at the Massachusetts Charitable Eye and Ear Infirmary and studied the diseases of the ear under Dr. Clarence J. Blake, and then entered the Maine General Hospital as its first regularly appointed interne and served one year, making quarterly reports of medical and surgical cases treated there, which were published in the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal. He also wrote a history of the Hospital which was pub- lished in the Portland Transcript, a paper which held the rank as the first literary paper in Maine at that time.
While Demonstrator of Anatomy, Dr. Holt prosected for Dr. Thomas Dwight, Professor of Anatomy at the school, several of which dissections the professor exhibited to members of the faculty as equal to any he had ever seen and which he preserved for the museum. Dr. Holt also prepared the section of the head from which Professor Dwight wrote a book entitled "The Anatomy of the Head."
Upon opening an office in Portland, Dr. Holt was elected one of the attending physicians and surgeons to the Portland Dispensary. He was elected member of the Cumberland County Medi- cal Society, and he founded the Portland Medical Club, which is now the largest and oldest medi- cal club in the State. Although he did general practice, he began to give attention to special subjects, and we find his first paper read before the Maine Medical Association, to which he had been elected upon his first graduation in 1874, was upon a "Report on Otology." We find him attending clinics at the Manhattan Eye and Ear Hospital, where he studied under its founder, Dr. C. R. Agnew and such men as Drs. Webster, Pomroy and St. John Roosa. He continued this course every year, writing papers on medical sub- jects until he went to Europe in the spring of 1881 with Drs. Hersom, Webster and Gibney, the first of whom died in Dublin under distress- ing circumstances.
This was an extraordinary year in Europe, in that the Seventh International Medical Congress met in London, and many of the distinguished
133
BIOGRAPHICAL
men of the world went there to attend it and discuss the causes which were revolutionizing the practice of medicine. Dr. Holt became a member of this Congress and made a report of its proceedings.
Upon Dr. Holt's return from Europe he con- fined his practice exclusively to diseases of the eye and ear. Thus it will be seen that it took Dr. Holt ten years from the time he began to study medicine before he confined his practice exclusively to these diseases, from the latter of which he had suffered himself, and which in- duced him to take up the study and practice of medicine as a life work.
In 1885 two quite important things happened in connection with the life of Dr. Holt-namely, a son was born who was to bear his name and follow in his footsteps in the study and practice of medicine; and the necessary steps were taken by him for the incorporation of the Maine Eye and Ear Infirmary. In his address at the dedi- cation of the new building in 1892, Dr. Holt says :
Well do I remember in December, 1885, just before Christmas, of starting ont with a paper to obtain names to a petition for incorporation. It was the first step to the consummation of a purpose, long before that time formed, of establishing an institution of this character. The petition was willingly signed by all to whom it was presented, and encouraging words were given to the enterprise, but it was as evident as bad been anticipated, that a vast amount of work lay before me, the magnitude of which, had I fully real- ized as I do now, might have caused me to delay my purpose longer.
The petitioners were incorporated under the name of the Maine Eye and Ear Infirmary, according to a law provided for such purposes which limited capitalization to one hundred thousand dollars. Nobody at that time dreamed that this limitation would cause the organization any trouble, but the Legislature was called upon to increase its capi- talization to one million dollars in order for it to be able to receive the munificent bequest of its president, the late Mr. Ira Putnam Farrington.
In 1891 Dr. Holt secured the passage of the law for the prevention of blindness by the Leg- islature, Maine being the first State to pass this law after the State of New York. Now, how- ever, all the States have this law on their statute books. It has done a great deal towards the prevention of blindness which has been achieved since that time by the concerted action of several organizations whose object has been to attain this end. The law directs attention to any redness, inflammation or discharge from the eyes of the new-born, and thereby ensures having them treated properly at a time when such treatment
will be effective and prevent disastrous results.
It was entirely through Dr. Holt's efforts that the Maine Academy of Medicine and Science and its official organ, the Journal of Medicine and Science, was founded in 1894, by means of which the Medical Registration Law was enacted by the Maine Legislature at its session of 1895. It may seem an unusual thing for those not conversant with the history to establish these organizations for the purpose of securing the Medical Registra- tion Law, but it was done to meet unusual condi- tions, because six years previous to this time a Medical Registration Law had been passed by the Legislature through the efforts of Dr. Sleeper, who was one of its members. It passed throughi all the subsequent stages necessary for it to be- come a law, but such pressure was brought to bear upon Governor Bodwell that he was induced to withdraw it. This led to litigation on the part of the Maine Medical Association to rein- state the law, and created a bitter feeling on the part of those who had induced the Governor to withdraw the law, and they made no secret in asserting that they would do everything they could to prevent the passage of any medical reg- istration law in the future. Dr. Holt conceived the idea of founding the Academy with sections to embrace subjects which would interest lay- meu generally, by which many of those who had opposed the Medical Registration Law saw the need of it and worked for its passage through the the Legislature of 1895. Thus the main object for which the Academy and Journal had been founded, was attained within a year. However, the experiment of bringing together professional men and laymen for a better understanding of the relationship of each to the other in the wel- fare work of the community had become of such mutual help that the meetings of the Academy and the issuance of the Journal were continued for another ten years, during which Dr. Holt devoted much of his time when he should have been diverting his mind to rest and recreation from the arduous duties of his private practice and as executive surgeon of the Maine Eye and Ear Infirmary.
Dr. Holt's achievements and interests in the welfare of humanity became widely known, and they were recognized by the faculty and trus- tees of Colby University by conferring upon him the honorary degree of A.M. in 1897. Seven years later the University of Maine conferred upon Dr. Holt "for distinguished services in the field of Medicine, profound scholarship, and for the most noteworthy services to the public in
134
HISTORY OF MAINE
relief of suffering, the degree of Doctor of Laws."
He was interested in many things aside from those pertaining strictly to his profession, as we find he was one of the incorporators of the Mercantile Trust Company in 1898. In 1916 this company purchased the Casco National Bank, one of the leading banks of the city, prefixing Casco to its name and thus becoming by this . transaction one of the largest financial institu- tions of the State.
We find him as an honorary member of the Lincoln Club, giving an address before that or. ganization in observance of the ninety-second anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln, in which he was the first to explain an "illusion" on rational grounds, which occurred to Lincoln just after his first election,-a ghostly counterpart of himself- dne to a separation of his eyes from the fatigue incident to the duties connected with the campaign which resulted in his election to the presidency of the United States. The esti- mate given by Dr. Holt of Lincoln's character was pronounced classical by the papers and by those who heard it, or have read it, as one of the best ever delivered before that organiza- tion which has had for its speakers some of the most distinguished men of the country.
In observance of the twenty-sixth anniversary of the Portland Medical Club, which he founded, Dr. Holt performed a feat in the statistics of that Club never before attempted in such work. They give at a glance the name of each member, when membership began, when it ceased,-if it had, length of membership, the offices held, the num- ber of meetings each member had attended, the percentage of meetings attended, the number and title of papers read by each member of the club, the number that each member should have read as per average of the whole number of papers read during the existence of the club by its one hundred ten members, and finally, when another paper was or is due from each one who belongs to the club. This was published in the Journal of Medicine and Science, and assurances were given by many interested in such work in dif- ferent parts of the country that the plan was unique and would serve as a standard for giving statistics of other clubs.
Dr. Holt was the first in the country to devise a book for making systematic records of cases of affections of the eye and ear. The forms he used at the time he went to Europe he took with him, and there was such a demand for the one used for recording affections of the eyes that Pickard and Curry, of London, published it and
have continued its publication ever since. Dr. Holt has examined and made records of more than a hundred thousand patients suffering from diseases of the eye and ear. It was the careful records of cases that led Dr. Holt to study more closely physical economics, hence, when he was disabled from an accident received in 1903, he devoted his attention to physical economics, solved the problem of determining damages to the body from injury or disease for the first time, according to the natural science method, and prepared papers upon this subject which he read before different audiences, one of which was the Association of United States Pension Exam- ining Surgeons at Atlantic City, New Jersey, to which were invited members of the Bureau of Pen- sions of the United States. The inequalities and which were invited members of the Bureau of Pen- sions of the United States were pointed out, and it was shown how these defects could be remedied by the method proposed in physical economics. This led to the revision of the pensions which went into effect in 1905, giving an increase in ten of the principal pensions of $1,968, which, when multiplied by the number receiving these pensions, amounts to millions that is being paid to the soldiers and sailors in consequence of this work of Dr. Holt. In sending out reprints on physical economics, Dr. Holt asked for criticism and to be informed if any one had ever attempted to solve the problem in the manner there given. Professor Seaver, formerly director of the gym- nasium of Yale University, replied: "I wish to thank you for a reprint on 'Physical Economics,' . . . which strikes me as a very valuable contribu- tion on a subject to which I have given considerable thought without being able to arrive at definite conclusions, and so I have never published any- thing. You have hit on a practical method of rating a man's physical ability so far as the physical side of him is concerned, as mental rat- ing is given by intellectual tests so that we may have a fairly accurate mathematical statement of his probable worth to society." Professor Seaver was a graduate in medicine, and, as he wrote, had spent a large part of his active professional life in studying the body to develop it to its best proportions and highest efficiency. From this experience he was able to write one of the best works on anthropometry and physical examina- tions in the English language, and therefore his opinion on this subject bears the weight of au- thority. It is, of course, difficult to give in a limited space how the problem is solved in physi- cal economics, but a comprehensive view of it
135
BIOGRAPHICAL
may be obtained from an introduction to one of the articles written on the subject, as follows:
Physical Economics is based on an analysis of the human body which first. resolves the earning ability Into its component parts by selecting those parts which are so interdependent that each is needed to ensure the functions of the other, it being found neces- sary by this analysis to have three parts to satisfy all the conditions; the first and most important is the functional ability of the body, the second, the techni- cal ability, and the third, the competing ability of the body, which when used as factors in mathematical formulas, according to the natural science method, determine by scientific and economic standards of measurement and other data, the true status of either the efficiency, or the earning ability of that person. In order, however, to accomplish this according to the actual existing condition of the most important factor, naniely, the functional ability of the body, it must he resolved into its component parts, in the same manner as the earning ability was resolved into its component parts, by selecting those parts which are so interde- pendent that each is needed to ensure the functions of the other, it being found necessary by this analysis to divide the functional ability of the body first, into four units, according to the natural order of their development and associated functions, and each unit into three parts, making twelve indispensable parts to be used as factors, within which every disability of the body is included. Each of the three parts of a unit are to be used as a factor of the unit, the same as each of the four units are to be used as factors of the functional ability of the body, and thereby ascertain, by scientific and economie standards of measurement and other data, the actual existing condi- tion of each of the factors of a unit, and thus of the unit itself, and with the units as factors, the func- tional ability of the entire body upon which the tech- nical ability and the competing ability so largely de- pend, by which
First-From the status of the functional, and the technical ability, the efficiency of that person may be rated as to his technical standing at school or in any vocation.
Second-From the status of the functional and the competing ability, represented in the earning ability, the economic value of man may be obtained giving his bodily financial standing as a part of the wealth of the state and nation.
Third-From the status of the functional, and the competing ability, represented in the loss to the earn- ing ability, an indemnity for any disability from damages to the functions of the body from injury or disease may be adjusted in a manner equitable to all concerned; in the courts of law, by insurance compa- nies, in the Bureau of Pensions, in the Burean of War Risk Insurance of the United States, and in the Workmen's Compensation Service Bureaus of the States and of the Nation.
It will be seen from this introduction that Physical Economics, provides first, a method for ranking a pupil at school and for rating a person for any vocation; second, one for obtaining the economic value of man; and third, one for the measurement of damages to the body from injury or disease in a manner equitable to all concerned. A chart showing the factors of F, the functional ability of the body, is herewith produced as follows:
[ Osseous, articular [h, the bones. a={ and musenlar sys- { i, the ligaments.
[ tenis, consisting of [k, the muscles.
[ Circulatory and res- [ m, the vascular system. b= { piratory systems, Jn, the blood. | p, the lungs and their ( consisting of ... (accessory organs.
F=
[q, the alimentary canal [ Digestive and geni- | and its accessory organs. d= { to-urinary systems, {r, the kidneys, with the [ consisting of.
| genital organs. ls, the skin.
[ Cerebro-spinal sys-
[ tem, nerves and
fu, the brain, its mem- branes and its nerves. v. the spinal cord, its
g={organs of special Isense, consisting Į of
membrane and its nerves. | w, nerves and organs of ( special sense.
As C, the competing ability, depends upon the same functions of the body for its existence and efficiency, it must have primarily the same values for its co-efficient. It may readily be seen that this analysis is correct and that F, the functional ability, and C, the competing ability, of the body, are the two indispensable factors of the earning ability of a person. They are, as it were, an equation: Fx C = E, in which F is the multi- plicand, C, the multiplier, and E, the product. The first difficult problem in physical economics was to analyze the body by resolving it into its component parts as factors which would include the function of every structure of the body so they could be handled in the multiplicand as though there were but one organ with which to deal. The chart shows how this was done. The second difficult problem was to grade C, thie com- peting ability after damage to F, the functional ability of the body, so that E, the carning abil- ity would correspond to its actual condition in the vocation the person followed. This was done in Computation Tables No. 1 and 2. The third difficult problem was to devise standards of measurement for the different systems and organs of the body in their relationship to the whole functional ability of the body. This has been done and formulated in a large number of tables by weighing, measuring and testing all the values ever given to a function of an organ, and then striking an average for the number con- sidered for a scientific standard of measurement. This makes physical economics complete in itself so it can be used by any one competent to solve a problem involving damages to the body from injury or disease.
The truth has been sought for in every subject that Dr. Holt has had to consider. He is con- stantly collecting and compiling material upon different subjects, examining them critically and writing out his own views from time to time.
136
HISTORY OF MAINE
It is in this way that his views upon subjects develop and grow, so that he has been able to assemble in due course of time and write more than a hundred papers and addresses upon dif- ferent subjects during the past forty-five years. These papers have been read before State or National organizations. Some of them have been read before lay audiences and some of them have been contributed to cyclopedias,-while others have been translated into foreign lang- uages, and his name appears in some of the lead- ing text books of Europe in connection with the methods he has devised and practiced and made known to the world.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.