Page:A cyclopedia of American medical biography vol. 2.djvu/131

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LOOMIS


attractions for him. In 1864 want of money, war, fire had brought the Univer- sity of the City of New York to a very low ebb. Loomis brought all his energy as teacher and organizer to diagnose and heal its condition, with the result that the Loomis Laboratory was built and endowed and the property freed of debt. He joined with Dr. Trudeau in making provision for impecunious consumptives and took keen interest in the Hospital in the Adirondacks. His great talent lay in discriminating between the patient and the disease, seeing beyond the morbid process to the man fighting with it for his life. During the three days he him- self lay dying, all classes came to beg to do something for him, for few men had exerted so powerful an influence in so many directions.

Among his appointments were: pro- fessor of pathology and practice of medi- cine, University of the City of New York; physician, Bellevue Hospital; lecturer on physical diagnosis, College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York.

His chief written work was "Physical Diagnosis," 1873, and also a volume on "The Diseases of the Respiratory Organs, Heart and Kidneys," 1876, besides papers to leading medical journals.

Med. Rec, N. Y., 1895, vol. xlvii.

N. York Med. Jour., 189.5.

Tr. Med. Soc, N. York, Phila., 1895.

Loomis, Henry Patterson (1859-1907). Henry Patterson Loomis, fellow of the American Chmatological Association since 1896, died at his home in New York City on December 22, 1907, of pneumonia, after a short illness, in the forty-ninth year of his age and at the height of his intellectual powers and his professional work. The son of Dr. Alfred L. Loomis, first president of the association, he in- herited a name distinguished in the annals of medical science, and an ample fortune which might have robbed a mind less de- voted to the pursuit of truth in our call- ing, of two of the strongest incentives to work. Graduating from Princeton Uni- versity in 1880, he took his degree in


111 LOOMIS

medicine from the New York Medical School in 1883; in 1887 was appointed visiting physician to Bellevue Hospital, and for a number of years was pro- fessor of pathology in the University of New York. His demonstrations, supple- menting the clinical teaching of his re- nowned father, were always of great inter- est to the students. He was one of the first to attempt to clear up the confusion resulting from the application of the term " Bright's disease" to kidney affec- tions, and to insist upon a proper classi- fication based upon anatomical study. His article upon " Diseases of the Kid- neys, " written in 1896 for the " American System of Practical Medicine," leaves little to be added at this day. But it was in the field of tuberculosis that he sought and gained his highest honors, continu- ing the work that had been dearest to his father's heart. The Loomis Sanator- ium at Liberty, New York, was one of the first institutions to treat tuberculosis " at the right time, and in the right place, and in the right way, until the patient was well " instead of in the old way — until the patient was dead.

In 1896 Loomis was made visiting phy- sician to the New York Hospital, and in 1897 consulting pathologist to the New York Board of Health. Upon the organ- ization of the Cornell University Medical College in New York City in 1898, he was chosen to fill the chair of materia medica and therapeutics. He was an active and talented contributor to medical literature, and especially to the "Transactions of the Chmatological Association," his last paper being a very timely " Plea for the Systematic Study of Climatology in the Medical Schools" (1906), which deserves the careful study of every physician.

C. E. N.

Loomis, Silas Lawrence (1822-1896).

Silas Lawrence Loomis was the son of Silas and Esther Case Loomis and born May 22, 1822. When five years old his father died. He taught school in Massa- chusetts and Rhode Island, 1837-43, in this way being able to work his way