Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/370

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DYER
348
EARLE

cimens so as to show the normal variations of all parts of the body.

He was president of the Association of American Anatomists in 1894 and was also one of the original members of the editorial board of the American Journal of Anatomy, and held this position until his death. From 1873 to 1878 he was an editor of the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal. Besides the Association of American Anatomists, he was a member of the American Society of Naturalists, Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a member of the St. Thomas Aquinas Academy of Philosophy and Medicine of Rome, an Honorary member of the Anatomical Society of Great Britain and Ireland, a member of the American Medical Association of the Massachusetts Medical Society and several other Medical Societies in Boston. In 1889 he received the degree of LL. D. from Georgetown University.

He was especially interested in the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, and became its vice-president in 1884 and president in 1887. This position he resigned in 1892, but continued to remain a member. He was chosen president of the Central and Particular Councils of Boston in 1899, and held the former office until his death. He completed a book entitled "Thoughts of a Catholic Anatomist" in the winter of 1911 and had the satisfaction of seeing it published before his death. This book contained his theories on evolution and his opinions on the relations between Catholic thought and science. His devotion and loyalty to his faith were his strongest characteristics, they influenced to a great degree his opinions and his scientific point of view, and enabled him to continue his work with courage and cheerfulness until the very end. His death occurred at his summer home, Nahant, Massachusetts, on September 9, 1911.

Anatom. Record, Nov., 1911, vol. v., No. 11.

Dyer, Erza (1836–1887).

Ezra Dyer was born in Boston, October 17, 1836, graduated at Harvard in 1857, and after studying under Jeffries Wyman (q. v.), Morril Wyman (q. v.) and John Ware (q. v), entered the Medical School and graduated in 1859. He then studied in Dublin, Bonn, and Vienna, where, under Arlt, his interest in ophthalmic surgery was awakened, and he determined to devote himself to this specialty. With a letter from Arlt to Von Graefe he went on to Berlin in the fall of 1860. Having spent a most profitable winter semester with Von Graefe, Dyer went to London, spent several months at the Moorfields Hospital, then to Paris to study under Desmarres and Sichel, and finally to Utrecht to visit Donders and Snellen. He returned to Philadelphia in the winter of 1861. During the war he was given charge of all eye and ear cases in the Philadelphia army hospitals.

In 1864 he was one of the founders of the American Ophthalmological Society, and later was appointed surgeon at Wills Eye Hospital, holding the position as long as he remained in the city. Dyer perfected a plan of using the eyes for near work in daily progressive periods of time to overcome asthenopia after long illness, the method being known as "Dyerizing." This was first described in a paper entitled "Asthenopia not connected with Hypermetropia," read before the American Ophthalmological Society in 1865. Again he wrote on this subject in 1876, in a paper read before the International Congress. In 1884 he invented an ingenious and beautiful perimeter. In 1873 he left Philadelphia on account of the health of a member of his family, gave up a large practice, and took up his abode in Pittsburg, where he soon acquired an enviable reputation. In 1879 and again in 1880 he fell and suffered serious fractures from which he never wholly recovered. He removed in 1883 to Newport, Rhode Island, and died February 9, 1887.

Unswerving integrity, unselfish and enduring loyalty, a child-like faith in those he loved, these were among the characteristics of Ezra Dyer.

Trans. Amer. Ophth. Soc., 1885–7, vol. iv. Hasket Derby. Portrait.
New York Med. Jour., 1887, vol. xlv.

Earle, Charles Warrington (1845–1893).

Charles Warrington Earle was born in Westford, Vermont, April 2, 1845, and died in Chicago, November 19, 1893, of cerebrospinal-meningitis. He was of English ancestry and a lineal descendent of Ralph Earle of Exeter, England, who came to Rhode Island about 1634. Moses L. Earle, the father of Dr. Earle, moved to Lake County, Illinois, in 1854, when the son was nine years of age. His early years were passed in the country, only such time as could be spared from the labors of the farm being allowed for the studies of the country school. When the civil war began he was 16 years old, but large and mature for his age, and early in 1861 he enlisted in the 15th Regiment, Illinois Volunteers. In the fall of the same year he was discharged on account of disability, incurred while assisting in unloading a transport of army supplies on