Page:A cyclopedia of American medical biography vol. 2.djvu/360

 RICIIARD30X

320

RICKETTS

Physicians of Philadelphia ami of the American Surgical Association. His chief writings aiijieared in the "North American Medical and Chirurgical Re- view," the "New Orleans Medical and Surgical Journal," the "Transactions of the American Medical Association," and in those of the American Surgical Associ- ation. The chief are:

"Injuries of the Knee-Joint." ("Tran- sylvania Journal of Medicine," vol. x, 2.

"A Case in Which Death resultetl from the Thompsonian Practice, with an Au- topsy" (ibid.)

"An Essay on Tenotomy with Illus- trative Cases." ("Western Journal of Medicine.")

"Report on Statistics of Hernia, with New Operation for the Radical Cure." ("Semi-Monthly Views," vol. i, 1859.)

" Six Operations for Strangulated Her- nia, Five of Which had Favorable Issue."

In 1S41 he "extirpated successfully the parotid gland. He amputated both legs at the hip-joint at one time in the same subject, and the patient recovered, grow- ing afterwards extremely fat." (This was years prior to the use of anesthetics or antiseptics.)

In 1854, while demonstrator of anat- omy in the University of Louisville, Rich- ardson published his work entitled" Ele- ments of Human Anatomy: General, Descriptive and Practical " (1854). This was the first and only systematic treatise of the kind ever published in the valley of the Mississippi. It consisted of one volume, octavo, seven hundred and thirty-four pages and two hundred and sixty-nine illustrations, with several marked improvements in the arrangement of its subjects, and with the unique feature of " substituting English for Latin terms wherever this appeared to be practicaljle and judicious." Dr. Richardson sub- sequently became a professor in one of the schools of Philadelphia. He did his best work, however, in New Orleans, w^here he occupied the chair of surgery in the Tulane University, and was visiting physician to the Charity Hospital.

His first wife was Sarah E., a daughter

of Dr. Charles Wilkins Short, a prominent physician of Kentucky, after whom the Shortia was named. Mrs. Richardson on her May up the Mississippi to join her husband was drowned with her three children below Vicksburg through the destruction of the steamboat by fire.

Richardson was elected president of tlie American Medical Association at Buffalo, in 1878.

Several 3^ears after the loss of his wife, he married Cora Slocum, a relative of the Brashear family of Kentucky and after his death in 1892 Mrs. Richardson con- tributed $100,000 to build a memorial addition to the Tulane University in memory of her husband. A. S.

"Some Reminiscences in the Lives and Char- acters of the Old-time Pliysicians of Louis- ville, by T. B. Greenley, M. D." American Practitioner and News, March 15, 1903. Transactions of the Kentucky State Med- ical Society, 1875.

Tr. Am. Med. .Assoc, Phila., xxix, 1879. Med. and Chir. Rev., Phila., 1857-61. T. G. Richardson, in memory of, by vari- ous authors, N. Orleans., Tulane Univ., 1S9.3. N. Ore. M, and S. J., 1S95-6, n. s., vol. xviii

Ricketts, Howard Taylor (1871-1910).

Howard Taylor Ricketts, one of the most notable young workers in the field of medical research, died in the American Hospital in the City of Mexico, May 3, 1910, from typhus fever, contracted while pursuing investigations regarding its cause.

He chose the most dangerous of all positions in the field, when, with a great future before him, he chose first to seek in its favorite jungle the typhus germ in Mexico, and died for humanity. That his heroism was not unique, in fact com- paratively commonplace, did not lessen its value.

Born in Findlay, Ohio, on February 9, 1871, he received his literary degree from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, in 1894 ; graduating from the Northwestern University Medical School, Chicago, in 1897. He served as interne in Cook County Hospital from 1897 to 1899, then continued his research work, being made