Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/252

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.
NAME
230
NAME

CLYMER 230 COAXES lege, from which he received his M. D. in 1847. He at once began to practise in Cleveland, and soon made himself known as a physician of ability and promise. In 1854 he married Miss Harriet A. Wiley, of Watertown, New York, by whom he had nine children. On the outbreak of the Civil War he was appointed assistant surgeon to a regiment of "three months' men," and subsequently became surgeon to the one hundred and forty-first regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry, under Col. Hazen. In spite of failing health. Dr. Cleve- land persisted, almost to the day of his death, in performing his duties, and it was lack of physical strength only which compelled him, though too late, to claim a few days of rest. He died of cardiac disease, December 3, 1873, greatly mourned. Dr. Cleveland was city physician of Cleve- land in 1855-6, and served also upon the city board of health for a considerable period. From the latter position he is said to have been removed in consequence of his firm and persistent advocacy of the pollution of the water of the city wells as the cause of an epidemic of typhoid fever. He was a mem- ber of the Ohio State Medical Society, and was professor of materia medica in the Uni- versity of Wooster at the time of his death. No writings are known. Henry E. Handerson. Transactions of the Ohio State Medical Society, 1874. Clymer, Meredith (1817-1902) Meredith Clymer, pioneer neurologist, was born June 6, 1817, in London, England, while his parents, George Clymer and Maria Gratiot O'Brien, of Philadelphia, were traveling abroad. He came of distinguished ancestry. His grandfather, George Clymer (1739-1813), born in Philadelphia, was an alderman in 1774, member of the Committee of Safety in 1775, of the Continental Congress in 1776 and a signer of the Declaration of Independ- ence. He held important public positions, until his retirement; was a trustee of the University of Pennsylvania from 1791 until his death, and president of the Academy of the Fine Arts. Meredith Clymer entered the sophomore class of the University of Pennsylvania in 1832 and in his junior year was transferred to the medical department, and graduated in 1837 with a thesis on "Lateral Curvature in the Female." From 1839 to 1841 he studied under physicians of London, Paris, and Dub- lin ; returning he practised in Philadelphia, and in 1843 became lecturer on physiology in the Philadelphia Medical Institute, and in 1845 professor of practice of medicine in Franklin Medical College (organized, 1847; extinct, 1852) ; he held the same chair in Hampton-Sidney College, Virginia, 1848-1849. In 1851 he was professor of practice of medicine in the University of the City of New York, and 1871-1874 was professor of nervous and mental diseases in Albany Medi- cal College. He was physician to the Philadelphia Hos- pital 1843-1846, when he became consulting physician until 1851. He served as surgeon in the Civil War, 1861-1865, as major and lieutenant-colonel. He was president of the Army Medical Board, 1862-1863, and was a member of the Neurological Society of New York (president, 1874-1876), and of other medical societies. He edited Aitken's "Science and Practice of Medicine," (Philadelphia, 1866 and 1872) ; Williams' "Principles of Medicine" (Phila- delphia, 1844), and Carpenter's "Principles of Human Physiology" (Philadelphia, 1843-1845 and 1847). He was editor of the Medical Examiner, 1838-1839, and in 1843; and asso- ciate editor of the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 1878-1880. Clymer was twice married, first in 1842 to Virginia M., daughter of J. P. Garesche, of Wilmington, Delaware, who died in 1849, and, second, in 1856, to Eliza L., daughter of Andrew Snelling, of New York. He died in New York, April 20, 1902. Information from Dr. Ewing Jordan. University of Pennsylvania, 1740-1900. J. L. Chamberlain. Phys. and Surgs. of the U. S. W. B. Atkinson, 1878. Coates, Benjamin Hornor (1797-1881) Benjamin Hornor Coates was born Novem- ber 14, 1797, at the northwest corner of Front and Walnut Streets, Philadelphia, the son of Samuel Coates, the close friend of Stephen Girard, and for over forty years on the board of managers of the Pennsylvania Hospital; for thirteen years its president. His mother was great-granddaughter of John Horner, who aided in establishing Princeton College, and great-great-granddaughter of Isaac Hor- nor, the first person in New Jersey to eman- cipate slaves. Coates was a man of broad culture, an eminent practitioner and teacher, writer and philosopher, closely connected with the devel- opment of Philadelphia medicine in the first half of the 19th century. Benjamin attended Friends' Grammar School, later entering the University of Penn- sylvania as a medical student, and graduat-