Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/454

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.
NAME
432
NAME

GENTSCH 432 GERHARD tion with Victoria University and a year later suggested the establishment of a medical faculty in Trinity University, Toronto, which, in 1877, was incorporated under an independ- ent charter as the Trinity Medical College. Under his able direction, the work of the College rapidly developed and its amalgamation in 1903 with the University of Toronto was a great blow to him, and was the cause of his retiring from educational work. He was for many years on the active staflf, and later on the consulting staff of Toronto General Hospital. He represented Trinity Medical College on the Council of the College of Physicians and Surgeons from 1877 to 1902. He married Frances M. Woodhouse, daugh- ter of James Woodhouse, in 18S4, and one daughter and two sons, both doctors, survived him. His association with the Upper Canada Bible Society was especially notablei, having ex- tended over a period of sixty-five years. He was a member of the Presbyterian church. He retained to the last of his life an unim- paired interest in medical training in its higher and more humanitarian aspects, and was still able, at the beginning of the World War, to regard as one of its compensating advantages to humanity the improvements it was sure to bring in discoveries and inventions. Dr. Geikie died at his home in Toronto, January 12, 1917, at the good age of nearly eighty-seven years. Canadian Med. Assn. Jour., March, 1917, vol. vii, 264, 265. Canada Lancet, Feb., 1917, vol. i, 279-281. Jour. Amer. Med. Assc, 1917, vol. Ixviii, 1137. Gentsch, George Theodore (1850-1880) This brilliant, legal physician— "whose bud- ding manhood was untimely Wighted by the frost of death" — was born in New Philadel- phia, Ohio, August 22, 1850. He was dis- tinguislicd, even in early boyhood, for his love of learning and his generous and affectionate disposition. At seventeen he graduated from the New Philadelphia High School and for a number of years acted as clerk in the drug store of William Rickert, at Canal Dover, Ohio. In the intervals of work, and by self- training merely, he acquired, under the cir- cumstances, an extraordinary knowledge of analytical chemistry, and was often called upon to make analyses of ores and other chemical tests. In this way he earned suffi- cient money to defray his expenses when later he studied at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor where he graduated in 1871 with the degree of pharmaceutical chemist. In 1876 he became professor of chemistry at Wooster University, Cleveland, Ohio, where in 1878 he received his M. D. The following year, 1879, was spent in study at Vienna and London, and on his re- turn he was engaged as expert in a number of poisoning cases, notably that of the Charles family, which was tried at Findlay, Ohio, exciting national comment. He wrote very little but his articles were full of promise of great achievement; his lectures were simple, clear, and interesting. Dr. Gentsch died unmarried when only thirty years old. He passed away on the night of March 3-4, 1880. Upon going to bed he had complained of headache to the family with whom he was living, and had bade them a cordial good night. In the morning he was found dead and cold, evidently having died early in the night, probably of apoplexy. Thomas Hall Shastid. Phys. & Surgs. of U. S., W. B. Atkinson, 1878. Private sources. Gerhard, William Wood (1809-1872) Born in Philadelphia July 23, 1809, of Ger- man and Moravian descent, he was educated at Dickinson College (A. B., 1826), and gradu- ated from the University of Pennsylvania hi 1830 and studied medicine under Dr. Joseph Parrish, going that same year to Paris, then the medical center of the world, to study under Chomel, Andral and Louis. How willing to study can be seen from this little bit from a letter to his brother : "Jackson, Pennock and I were all desirous of studying auscultation, of studying it in such a manner as to be sure of our ground on our return and to be capable of appreciating 'the advantages of the art. Louis' public in- structions were valuable but 'his private lessons upon a subject demanding minute and patient inquiry we knew would be infinitely more so. I therefore, in the name of my friends, ad- dressed hira a polite note accompanied by a handsome pecuniary offer; we did this with little hope of success but happily for us he accepted our proposition and next week we are his private pupils at La Pitie." "He appears," says Osier, "to have been an indefatigable worker, and the papers which he published based upon material gathered in Paris are among the most important we have from his pen. With Pennock he described Asiatic cholera in 1832. Devoting himself par- ticularly to studying diseases of children he issued a very interesting paper on small-pox and two of very special value — one on tuber- culous meningitis and one on pneumonia in cliildren. Both of these mark a distinct point in our knowledge of the two diseases. He is