Page:A cyclopedia of American medical biography vol. 1.djvu/115

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Scotia, he took his arts course, as his father had done before him, and after graduating as B. A. at King's, took his professional course at Edinburgh and Glasgow, graduating from the latter as M. D. in 1838.

He was a member of the Medical Soci- ety of Nova Scotia, and its President in 1855, 1856, and 1865. He began practice in Halifax about 1837 and succeeded his father as surgeon of the Provincial Poors' Asylum in 1S40. He was elected one of the members to repre- sent Halifax in the Dominion House of Commons in 1S72, and was a member of the Dominion Senate from 1879 till his death.

Succeeding his father in 1S40, he soon secured a large practice and high social standing. He was a strikingly hand- some man, of commanding presence, of great vigor, much of which he retained even beyond his four score years, along with his head of abundant dark curly hair, even then but little streaked with gray. Antiquarian research and relics connected with notable persons and places always greatly interested him, and his home, "Rosebank," on the North West Arm, was a veritable museum of curios. Just a few specimens may be mentioned; a brass mortar captured from the Russians at the Redan the day after the death of the Nova Scotia heroes, Parker and Welsford; a St. Helena medal, such as were given to the survivors of the Napoleonic wars; a Louis XIV chair which had belonged to Governor Went- worth the last of the Royalist governors of New Hampshire; and a vast collection of old walking sticks, including one that had belonged to Major Andre whom Washington hanged as a British spy; and another, a malacca with gold head owned by Dr. Benjamin Rush. He had also quite a collection of original letters and autographs of distinguished people, such as letters of the poet Pope, Benedict Arnold, Isaac Watts, Benjamin Franklin the Duke of Wellington, and autographs of Queen Anne, Goorge II, and Lord North.

ALTER

In 1840, Dr. Almon married Elizabeth, a daughter of Judge Ritchie, sister of Sir William Ritchie, chief justice of Canada. He had a familyof six sons and five daughters.

His eldest son, Dr. William Almon, a graduate of Harvard, became a surgeon in the Confederate Army and died of fever in Virginia in 1862.

Another son, Dr. Thomas R. Almon, educated at King's College, Windsor, and at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York, was associated in practice with his father, but died April 20, 1901, three months after him.. D. A. C.

Alter, David (1S07-18S1).

Physician and electrician and dis- coverer of the principles of the prism in spectrum analysis.

David Alter was born in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, in the locality now embraced by Allegheny Township, not far from Freeport. His father was a Swiss from near Lucerne, his mother of German nationality.

At the age of eight or nine he read the life of Benjamin Franklin, and was strongly drawn to the study of electricity. Independently of the labors of Morse and Wheatstone he perfected an electric tele- graph in 1836 which consisted of seven wires, the electricity deflecting a needle on a disc at the extremity of each wire. So perfect was his system that he was en- abled to transmit messages from his work- shop to the members of his family in the house. In 1837 Dr. Alter invented a small machine which was run by electric- ity and on June 29, 1837, published in the "Kittanning (Pennsylvania) Gazette" an elaborate article on the use of electric- ity as a motive power under- the title of "Facts Relating to Electro Magnetism." This article was widely read and was re- ferred to in Silliman's "Principles of Physics." In 1S45 Dr. Alter, in associa- tion with Dr. Edward Gillespie and James Gillespie of Freeport entered into the manufacturing of bromine from the mother liquid of salt wells, by a process which he and his partners invents I and