USA > New York > Cayuga County > History of Cayuga County, New York > Part 24
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
The first school-houses in the county were rude buildings. The windows were small and far between, extra light being supplied by the capacious chimneys and crevices in the walls and ceiling. The floor and ceiling were of rough, loose boards through which the wind circulated freely, providing a ventilation much too good in cold weather. The cold, draughty room made the broad, open fireplace so distinctly a center of interest as to suggest the origin of fire worship among suffering heathen tribes. Around the blazing pile, the pupils upon their entrance would range themselves, and by repeated turnings would at length warm themselves and their coarse home-made clothing sufficiently to enable them to endure their chilly benches for a time, but for a short time only. This, of course, refers to the winter season.
When the county was first settled and for many years after- wards, books of any kind were a luxury. The library at home was made up of the Bible, a hymn book and an almanac. The school books were the reader and arithmetic with a "copy book" to - write in.
289
PUBLIC SCHOOLS
The teachers of those days were an incompetent class. Poorly educated themselves they could not teach others what they did not know, and having had no training in the art of teaching they were poor instructors.
From 1789 to 1838 the State, from time to time, from the avails of lotteries, appropriations of public lands and from revenues derived from United States deposit funds and other sources, had been accumulating a fund, the income from which was annually applied to the support of common schools. In 1838 this fund had reached to nearly $800,000.
From George Clinton down, every governor and secretary of state has advocated and encouraged the highest possible standard in our common schools. Laws for their betterment have been enacted and changed from time to time to make them more effective. The first general law was passed in 1795. It appropriated $50,000 annually for five years to support the public schools. Previous to this monetary aid the State had, in 1789, devoted two lots of six hundred acres each, in each township of ten miles square, to the support of literature; this was the first step toward the grand system of schools which the State can boast to-day.
In 1835, eight academies, one in each senatorial district, were designated, and in 1838 district school libraries were established. In 1841 the supervision of schools was confided to county super- intendents. In 1843, this was changed to a separate superintendent in each town. In 1856, the office of school commissioner was created and is still retained.
Free schools were established in 1849, to be abolished in 1851. In 1853 the establishment of free union or high schools was author- ized by law. The real foundations of successful schools were laid between the years 1830 and 1850. Improved school books were introduced and the range of studies greatly enlarged.
The county supervision of public schools, established in 1841, and the organization of teachers' institutes were most efficacious
19
290
HISTORY OF CAYUGA COUNTY
agencies for the betterment of schools. The first of these institutes was held in Cayuga County in 1842, and there was an attendance of more than five hundred teachers at the first three sessions.
By an act of Legislature, passed in 1843, the boards of super- visors of the several counties were directed to appoint county superintendents of common schools, and Elliot G. Storke was selected for that office in Cayuga County. Then real improvement in the character and conditions of the public schools of the county vas effected. The investigations of the superintendent disclosed the fact that there were at that time two hundred and twenty-two district schools in the county, besides four in Auburn, but that only one out of the whole number contained more than one room. He also found that the school buildings were rudely constructed and greatly out of repair. The further fact was also revealed that the better classes refused to allow their children to be taught in such uncomfortable and unhealthy buildings, and in many instances the children of poor people did not attend school because the parents were unable to incur the expense of tuition, yet were too proud to endure the reproach of being exempted from that expense by the district trustees.
This condition was not peculiar to Cayuga County, but extended all over the state, and appearing in the reports of many superin- tendents, led the Legislature to take positive, remedial action. The office of county superintendent was abolished March 13, 1847, and thereby this county lost the valuable services of Elliot G. Storke. The office of school commissioner was substituted for that of superintendent.
With the establishment of normal schools to supply trained teachers; with a free school system; with buildings suitable for their purposes, and with valuable text books, the schools of Cayuga County compare favorably with those of any other part of the state. The City of Auburn is especially noted for the high efficiency of its schools, which are treated fully in another chapter.
291
MEDICAL PROFESSION
CHAPTER XIX.
HISTORY OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSION OF CAYUGA COUNTY.
BY BENJAMIN I. C. BUCKLAND, M. D .- REVISED BY WILLIAM S. CHEESMAN, M. D.
In a history of the Cayuga County Medical Society, it is inter- esting to contrast this age of wonderful achievements with the environment of the stalwart medical pioneers who came into the woods of this beautiful lake region of Cayuga and Owasco a few years after John Hardenbergh from the east and Roswell Franklin from the south with flintlock on shoulder and axe in hand blazed a trail through the primeval forest. Substitute for our electric trolley and steam railroad system, the ox cart of the pioneer plod- ding slowly westward toward Cayuga bridge along the blazed Indian trial; for our automobile and bicycle, the ox team and saddle horse. For the telegraph, telephone, and daily paper, with its hourly report from the whole world, transmit all news and information by fire signals and smoke signals from hilltop to hilltop across the country, or by the swiftest messengers of those days, the Indian runners. Take away the stethescope, microscope, fluroscope, hypodermic syringe, anæsthetics, and the compact medicine case, containing all the luxuries of modern pharmaceutical preparations, and replace the bulky saddle bags containing calomel, opium, antimony, guiacum, Peruvian bark, roots and herbs for decoctions, and the lance for bleeding. Then turn out the electric light, and by the smoking gleam of the pine knot see the old-time doctor equal to us in natural ability and professional enthusiasm. Faith- fully he stands by the bedside of birth and death with willing hands and sympathizing heart, casting his bread upon the troubled
292
HISTORY OF CAYUGA COUNTY
waters or pouring the oil of human kindness upon the tempestuous waves of frontier life-such is the type of men who in the primitive surroundings of a wilderness elaborated the principles of our Society, which have been the backbone of medical practice in this county for the past century.
On the fourth day of April, eighteen hundred and six, the Legislature of the State of New York passed a law to incorporate county medical societies throughout the state, for the purpose of regulating the practice of ph-sic and surgery. It required nearly a decade to unify the opinions of medical men and politicians as to the essentials of this law and to secure its enactment.
They builded better than they knew, for they thus established the medical profession upon an honorable, educational, and legal foundation. Let us recognize and emphasize the fact, that this was the first law in the Empire State to establish a regular legal standard of physicians and surgeons.
Physicians recognized by the State were in popular parlance called "regulars," and in later years by other schools nicknamed "allopathists." This law marked the parting of the ways of the educated physician and the popular charlatan. Agreeably to this ordinance, twenty physicians of this county held a meeting August 7, 1806, at the tavern of Daniel Avery, in Aurora, and organized the Cayuga County Medical Society.
Cayuga County had been formed only seven years before from the great Montgomery tract of forest land of Central New York, out of which Onondaga County had been taken one year earlier. The southern part of Cayuga County, with its fertile fields and fruitful Indian orchards, its healthful uplands covered with valuable timber, between the lakes, had been favorably re- ported by the soldiers returning from the war of exterminating the Indians in Sullivan's campaign in this section. Early settlers, therefore, selected here their homes, and most physicians first
B. I. C. BUCKLAND, M. D.
293
MEDICAL PROFESSION
located in this part of the county. Aurora is historical, not only as being the birthplace of our medical society, but also for being the site of the first settlement made in Cayuga County (in 1789).
Hardenbergh's Corners had now been settled a dozen years- years of strife and bitter contention with Aurora for the advantage of becoming the county seat. When at last victorious, the inhabi- tants held a public meeting for the purpose of selecting a more euphonious and dignified name for the Corners. At this meeting Doctor Samuel Crossett, the first physician to settle in the county, proposed the name "Auburn," derived from Goldsmith's poem. Colonel Hardenbergh, the first resident and founder of this city, opposed the choice of this name on the ground that Auburn was synonymous with deserted village and the name would injure the · town; in place of it he suggested "Hardenbergh " or "Mount Moria," while Captain Edward Wheeler proposed to name the place "Cen- ter." After a stormy debate "Auburn" was selected.
Although a subsequent meeting was held to induce the people to reverse this decision, the doctor's diagnosis has never been changed. The significant point of this interesting clause of early his- tory is that this pioneer physician, Doctor Samuel Crossett, should have received the honor of namning this baby city, and thus scored for our profession a historic victory in civic affairs.
It is interesting to note from chronological data that our medical society is older by ten years than the village of Auburn, and forty- two years older than the corporate City of Auburn. Also it is the oldest medical society in Western New York.
But let us return to the first meeting of this venerable society, on the eastern shores of Cayuga's water, amid the murmuring pines and hemlocks of the primeval forest, and review in the light of a century's experience the work of these medical pioneers.
The minutes of the first meeting show that the following officers were duly elected from the twenty members present: Frederick Delano of Aurora, president; James McClung, vice-president;
294
HISTORY OF CAYUGA COUNTY
Jacob Bogart of Fleming, secretary; Consider King of Ledyard, treasurer. Doctors Delano, Smith and King were appointed to draw up suitable by-laws for the society. The next meeting was voted to be held at the public house of Levi Stevens, in Scipio, November 6, 1806. The proceedings of the meeting were ordered to be filed according to law in the county clerk's office.
In the archives of our society as well as on the county records are found the following names of twenty physicians and surgeons who one hundred years ago founded our medical society :
Silas Holbrook, Moravia; Barnabas Smith, Poplar Ridge; Frederick Delano, Aurora; Parley Kinney, Sherwood; Jacob Bogart, Fleming; Ezra Strong, Scipio; James McClung, Genoa; Consider King, Ledyard; John Post, Milton; Josiah Bevier, Owasco; Isaac Dunning, Kellogsville; Asael Cooley, Fleming; Ebenezer Hewitt, Genoa; David Annaball, Moravia; Mathew Tallman, Scipioville; Luther Hanchet, Scipio; William C. Bennet, Aurelius; Joseph Cole. Hardenbergh's Corners; Nathan Branch, Cayuga; Nathaniel Asper- wall, Genoa.
The hardships of our profession, its nerve strain and overwork, inevitably make the life of a doctor of few days and full of trouble. It is history repeating itself therefore, to state that in a few years we find new members, with new theories in the chairs and new dis- cussions on the records.
For this pioneer band had gone the way of all the earth. But the work they aspired to accomplish as a medical society and not the achievements of the individual is the theme of this historical sketch.
At the next meeting of the society, November, 1806, there were thirteen present, who adopted the by-laws, elected Doctor Barnabas Smith, of Poplar Ridge, delegate to the first meeting of the New York State Medical Society. Doctors King and Smith were author- ized to fix and obtain at an expense of eight dollars the present seal of the society. A tax was also levied of four dollars pet capita
295
MEDICAL PROFESSION
to establish a medical library for the use of the society. Doctor Iddo Ellis, Joseph Cole, Ebenezer Hewitt, Nathaniel Asperwall, and Consider King were elected as a Board of Censors, to examine and judge of the qualifications of all persons desiring to practice medicine in the county. Medical societies were legally authorized to grant licenses and diplomas, through their board of censors and to recognize those legally granted in other states; to see that they were properly registered with the county clerk; to enforce all medical legislation, to prosecute irregular and illegal practitioners, and protect the people of the state from quackery.
The first candidate granted a license to practice medicine by this society was L. Q. C. Fuller, who presented himself at the first quarterly meeting, was examined by the censors in open session of the society, and was declared by them qualified to practice physic and surgery agreeably to the laws of the state.
He was required to take the following oath: "I, Doctor L. Q. C. Fuller, do solemnly declare that I will honestly, virtuously and chastely conduct myself in practice of Physic and Surgery, with the privileges of exercising which profession I am now to be invested, and that I will with fidelity and honor do everything in my power for the benefit of the sick committed to my charge." He then delivered a dissertation on typhus fever and was admitted to the society on payment of a membership fee of five dollars and two dollars for his diploma.
Medical meetings were to be held quarterly, on the first Thursday in February, May, August and November and provided for dis- cussion of papers on current medical topics and dissertations by professional men of ability.
For the first decade meetings were to be held, and the library to be located at Scipio, this place being a compromise in the rivalry between Auburn and Aurora for the possession of the medical library, the medical meetings, and the establishment of a medical college. The first meeting of the society held in the village
296
HISTORY OF CAYUGA COUNTY
of Auburn occurred on the sixth of February, 1817, at the inn of Canfield Coe. There were ten members present. The library had been transported there, and all books in cloth and board had been re-covered in calf and sheep. The expenses for same were audited and paid at this meeting. At the next quarterly meeting in May at this place the following amendment was added to the by-laws: "Any member of this society who becomes disorderly from the intemperate or excessive use of spirituous liquors, shall be suspended six months, and for the second offense shall be expelled from the Society. The members of this Society shall be the judge of the conduct of their officers and members and shall punish by fine, suspension, removal from office, or expulsion."
The membership fee was fixed at five dollars and a fine of one hundred cents was imposed on every member who failed to attend the annual meeting. The following unique regulations relating to the library, I also quote from the by-laws: "Every book shall be returned at the end of six months, and all books shall be returned at the annual meeting. The fine for detaining a book longer than this stipulated time shall be twelve cents for the first day and one cent daily until returned. The fine for damaging books shall be as follows: For every grease spot, blot or stain, the sum of twelve cents; every leaf torn one inch, twelve cents, and for every addi- tional inch, twelve cents. All other damages to the books shall be appraised by the Society."
At an enthusiastic meeting held at Aurora in 1811, five years after the society was organized, a committee empowered with all the authority and influence of the society was appointed to act with the trustees of the Cayuga Lake Academy at Aurora to secure an appropriation from the Legislature for the purpose of establishing a medical college at said academy. This project failed, but was not abandoned, for five years later, at an annual meeting in Auburn, another committee, with similar power was appointed to apply to the Legislature for a grant for a medical school at Auburn. The
297
MEDICAL PROFESSION
State Prison having just been located here, this committee suc- ceeded in securing from the Legislature an appropriation of all the unclaimed bodies of deceased convicts, at the prison, for anatomical study, and the use of the prison hospital for clinical study; but no money was appropriated for building a medical school. A special meeting was held in January, 1820, at which the prison physician, Dr. Erastus D. Tuttle, was appointed to go to Albany at an expense of fifty dollars to the society, to persuade the Legislature to favor and assist this project. A petition and resolutions were also adopted at this meeting explaining in detail the feasibility of this medical college and the many medical educational advantages possessed by the City of Auburn. Two hundred copies of the same were ordered printed at the society's expense to promote this object.
So sanguine of the ultimate success of securing the necessary money and the charter from the State was Dr. E. D. Tuttle, that he erected a building on Genesee street in the City of Auburn, and with the abundance of anatomical and clinical material at the State Prison, and with the assistance of the members of this society as lecturers and teachers, conducted a creditable medical school in Auburn from 1825 to the year of his death in 1829. This Auburn Medical School, is still registered in the Medical and Surgical Register of the United States by R. L. Polk & Co., as "Number 228, Auburn Medical School, Auburn, N. Y."
Dr. John S. Morgan succeeded Doctor Tuttle as prison physician and continued the medical school on North street for a number of years, while the Legislature was annually besieged by the society for a charter. Hobart College was established about this time at Geneva, and through political sagacity obtained from the State in 1836, the money appropriation and charter for the medical school our society had started, and for which they had again and again attempted for twenty years to get the State's charter and support.
The medical school took with it to Geneva, Dr. Frank H. Hamil-
298
HISTORY OF CAYUGA COUNTY
ton and Thomas Spencer, prominent members of this society --- men who in after years became distinguished.
Geneva was a small town for such an institution, but still suc- cessfully retained the medical school for thirty-six years, when in 1872 it was again moved and located in the city of Syra- cuse, where for a number of years it was maintained by the mem- bers of the Onondaga County Medical Society, who furnished it gratuitous service as instructors and lecturers, until it was adopted as a medical department by the university of that city. It is favor- ably known to-day at home and abroad, for its high standard of requirements, as the College of Medicine of Syracuse University.
In 1830, the society instituted a plan of making a medical topographical survey of the county. The object was to ascertain the influence of climate, soil, different occupations, the moral and physical causes in the production of disease. Elaborate reports were made during the next five years, on lakes, rivers and marshes, and inhabitants; the quantity and quality of the diet of the labor- ing classes; the diet and mode of rearing children; moral and edu- cational influence, the effect of religious enthusiasm, and intem- perance in the use of ardent spirits; on the welfare and health of the people. The interest of the medical profession in this survey centered in the inquiry into the diseases of each locality, popular opinion respecting them, and the modes of home treatment, with popular ideas and superstitions regarding age, sex, and diet, as causes of disease. The prevailing opinion of professional men was also to be recorded in these reports and the most approved methods of treatment then known to medical science.
For the purpose of pursuing this scientific investigation two physicians were appointed from the members of this society residing in each of the towns of the county.
An historic landmark at the close of the first quarter of the century is here found recorded in the following list of physicians.
299
MEDICAL PROFESSION
Only three of those elected on this Medical Survey Committee were charter members of the society.
John G. Morgan and Ches. Bradford were appointed for Auburn. Wm. C. Bennet Noyes Palmer 66
Aurelius.
Henry Follett W. H. Williams .. Brutus.
Nathan Boyd
Thos. B. Hoxsie
Cato.
Alvah Randall
David B. Wait ٠٠
" Conquest .
Isaac Brown Hiram Bennet
،،
Fleming.
D. R. Pearl
יי
David D. Jessup Jno. Thompson
Ira.
Alex. Thompson
Thos. Siveter
66 Ledyard.
David G. Perry
Edward Finn ..
4 4
.. Locke.
Ira Doty Hiram Eldridge
6 4
" Mentz.
Josiah Bevier
Abel Baker
Owasco.
Chas. G. Toan
Stephen Mosher
" Springport.
Andrew Groom
Phineas Hurd
" Scipio
Uriah Veeder Dr. Proudfoot
" Sterling.
Sylv. Willard
Curtis C. Cady
1 1
Sennett.
Silas N. Hall
David E. Lord
Sempronious.
Consider King
Jared Foot, Jr.
" Venice.
Dr. Frederick Delano, the first president of this society, was a prominent surgeon for the first quarter of a century in south- ern Cayuga County. He came to Aurora from Orange County in 1792, one year before John Hardenbergh came to his Corners. He was one of the founders in 1801 of Aurora Academy, the oldest in the county. In 1804 he, with other physicians, per- formed the autopsy on the body of Delaware John, an Indian who had murdered Mr. Ezekiel Crane, an early settler, near Seneca Falls, the previous year.
This first murder trial was held at Aurora, which was the first county seat of Onondaga County, and when Cayuga County was organized, its first court house was also erected at Aurora. It
" Genoa.
Allen Benton
300
HISTORY OF CAYUGA COUNTY
was made of posts set in the ground with poles covered with brush resting on them.
The Indian was convicted of murder and sentenced to be hung in the glen in the rear of the present site of Wells College. He wished to be shot like a warrior, with his rifle in his hand, but the Court denied him these honors of war and he submitted to his fate with the stoicism of his race. This was the first case of capital punishment with an autopsy in Cayuga County. Tradition says that the doctors secured the autopsy by purchasing the body from the Indian himself with a jug of rum, which he received and enjoyed before the day of execution.
Doctor Delano preserved the skeleton for anatomical study, and on his death it passed into the possession of his successors, Dr. Elisha Morgan, Dr. John Gridely, Dr. Alexander Thompson, and subsequently to Dr. Elijah P. Baker, who had it appropriately buried in the glen some seventy years after the autopsy.
Doctor Delano was a skillful surgeon. He performed success- fully the operation of lithotomy on two young girls in Scipio as early as August 3, 1816. He was again elected president of the County Society in 1819 and 1820, 1822, 1823, 1824. He died at Aurora, July 26, 1825, at the age of sixty, having practised medicine thirty-three years at this place.
Doctor Joseph T. Pitney was the next surgeon of prominence in the County Society, which he joined in 1812, serving as secretary, censor and president, several different terms during an active membership of thirty-five years until at the January meeting in 1847, we find the following record; "Resolved, that Joseph T. Pitney be exhonorated from any further tax in support of this Society and that he remain an honorary member."
At the time young Doctor Pitney began his practice in Auburn there was an epidemic which tested the combined skill of the earliest resident physicians, Dr. Samuel Crossett, Dr. Hackaliah Burt, Dr.
301
MEDICAL PROFESSION
Joseph Cole and Dr. Erastus E. Tuttle. Among those who died was Robert Dill, one of the distinguished early settlers.
The crude methods of treatment of those pioneer days are interestingly illustrated by the following case. The mother-in- law of Robert Dill, while on a visit at Hardenbergh's Corners in 1814 had an acute attack of rheumatism. The following popular mode of treatment was adopted. A hole was dug in the garden five feet in diameter and four feet deep and into this pit the old lady was seated in a chair, covered with blankets and steamed with hemlock and medical herbs. The result of this treatment on this patient is not recorded. Research does not reveal that this was Doctor Pitney's case, but it does reveal that this patient was his own prospective mother-in-law. For we find recorded that on a beautiful Sunday afternoon on the ninth day of the following June, Doctor Joseph T. Pitney was married to the charming widow of the late Robert Dill. One of the many major operations per- formed by Dr. Pitney, was successfully tying the subclavian artery on the left side above the clavicle, for aneurism, in the case of a Scipio woman in 1841. Doctor Joseph T. Pitney died in Auburn, April 20, 1853, after practising surgery over forty years.
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.