Page:A cyclopedia of American medical biography vol. 2.djvu/423

 SHUMARD

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SILLIMAN

Lunsford C. Yandell, he furnished, m 1847, for the "Western Journal of Medicine and Surgery" an elaborate paper entitled " Contributions to the Geology of Kentucky," in which he attempted to show the connection between certain geological formations and particular diseases. The paper attracted much attention, and was widely copied by the medical and secular press.

Other po.sitions of trust and honor awaited Dr. Shumard. In 1850 he assisted in making a geological survey of Oregon; and soon after his return home he was employed on the palaeon- tology of the Red River country, in continuation of the explorations com- menced by his brother, Dr. George G. Shumard. In 1853 he was appointed assistant geologist and palaeontologist in the Missouri Survey. Five years afterwards he was commissioned as geologist for Texas. But, after he had been busy at work for two years, and was almost ready to publish his report, he was suddenly, in consequence of a change in the governorship of the State, superseded, and of course obHged to retire from the field. This proved to be his last effort as a public geologist.

He then began practice in St. Louis and in 1866 was elected professor of obstetrics in the University of Missouri, thus adding somewhat to his slender income. After some time, however, his health broke down, and he was obliged to abandon, not only his chair, but his practice.

On the fourteenth of April, 1867, he died of pulmonary trouble, in the forty- ninth year of his age.

At the time of his decease he was presi- dent of the St. Louis Academy of Science. All of his contributions to scientific jour- nals, which were numerous and varied, had a bearing more or less direct upon geology and palaeontology, wdth the history of whose progress on this continent his name will live.

S. D. G.

Autobiognipliy of 8. D. Gross, Phila., 1S87.

Silliman, Benjamin, Sr. (1779-1864).

Benjamin SiUiman, born in Connecti- cut on August 8, 1779, had his A. B. and A. M. degree from Yale in 1796 and 1799; his A. M. and M. D. from Bowdoin College, both in 1818, and the LL. D. of Middlebury College in 1826. From 1802- 1858 he was professor of natural science at Yale, and edited the "American Journal of Science and Arts" from 1818 until his death at New Haven on Novem- ber 13, 1864. A bronze statute to his memory stands in the grounds of Yale University.

An Address eomnien. of Benjamin Silliman, .\ew Haven, 186.5 (Theo. D. Woolsey). l>eading American Men of Science. D. S. Jordan.

Silliman, Benjamin, Jr. (1816-1885).

This son of Benjamin and Harriet Trumbull Silliman, who was born on December 4, 1816, followed his father along the road of natural science for, after graduating from Yale in 1837, he became assistant teacher on this subject at Yale and associate editor with his father of the "American Journal of Sci- ence and Arts," until the close of the first fifty volumes in 1845, when the chief editorship devolved on him, with James D. Dana. In 1849 the University of Charleston gave him her honorary M. D. and that same year he was made professor of medical chemistry and toxicology at Louisville University, but after five years resigned to take his father's chair of chemistry at Yale.

Editorial duties engros.sed him in 1853 when, in connection with the Crystal Palace exhibition, he worked up "The World of Science, Art and Industry," and in 1854 "The Progress of Science and Mechanism." His "First Principles of Natural Philosophy or Physics," 1858, had a second edition in 1861. Yale benefited considerably by his generosity and the results of his mineralogical researches in California. In 1868 he presented the whole of his collection to the Museum.

He married, in 1840, Susan H.,