Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/1105

NAME SPALDING 1083 SPALDING was the brother-in-law of John Baynham, the noted surgeon. The following articles are known to have been published by him ; "The Medical Topography and Diseases of a Section of Virginia," and "Cases Illustrative of the Use of Muriate of Lime in Palsy from Diseased Vertebrae" {Philadelphia Journal of Medical and Physical Sciences, 1823, vol. vi). He died at his home in the seventy-sixth year of his age. Robert M. Slaughter. Spalding, Lyman (1775-1821) Lyman Spalding was born in Cornish, New Hampshire, June 5, 1775, son of Colonel Dyer and Elizabeth Parkhurst Spalding, of Plain- field, Connecticut. His father served in the Colonial and Revolutionary wars and was eminent in the militia. When Lyman was eleven years of age, Dr. Nathan Smith (q. v.) settled in Cornish, was attracted by the studi- ousness of the boy, caused him to be edu- cated at the Charleston Academy nearby and afterwards at the Harvard Medical School, where he obtained his degree in 1797. He was at once enlisted by Dr. Smith in the foundation of the Dartmouth Medical School as chemical lecturer and demonstrator, in 1797. Finding, at the beginning of 1799, that he could not earn a living by lecturing, Dr. Spalding settled in VValpole, and six months later in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Although Portsmouth boasted of several excellent physicians, among them Dr. Ammi Ruhamah Cutter (q. v.). Dr. Spalding began an active campaign in vaccination, and tested the value of the new inoculation against the virulence of smallpox, in July, 1801. He also printed yearly bills of mortality of Ports- mouth, sent them to the leaders in medicine in America and Europe, and in this way he became well known in American medicine. He studied anatomy in the cooler weather and built an anatomical museum. He culti- vated medicinal plants and exhibited to the medical society his own specially prepared opium. He was also very active in the New Harhpshire Medical Society, served eight years as secretary and librarian and obtained an appointment as contract surgeon for the United States troops in Portsmouth. He corresponded vivaciously, for life, with Dr. Nathan Smith, lectured once more at Dartmouth in the autumn of 1779 and then resigned his chemical lectureship. He became well known as a surgeon, did all the opera- tions of that day, was appointed on the board ■of health of Portsmouth and did excellent service in suppressing an epidemic of yellow fever. He also constructed an excellent gal- vanic battery and used it largely in his prac- tice in nervous diseases. In 1802 Dr. Spalding married Elizabeth Coues, daughter of Capt. Peter Coues, ship master out of the Harbor of Portsmouth. Hearing in 1808 that the famous Alex- ander Ramsay (q. v.) was to lecture on anatomy at Dartmouth, Dr. Spalding went there, with two pupils, and some material for dissection, and acted as demonstrator, for the odd old Scotchman. He next tried to get money for a voyage to Europe, but money was scarce and he was obliged to satisfy him- self with spending the winter of 1809-10 in Philadelphia, where he devoted most of his time to anatomy with Caspar Wistar (q. v.), and was, at the time, the first American physician to succeed in injecting the lym- phatics. The fame arising from these injections brought to him in 1810 an unlooked-for invitation to lecture at the Fairfield (Her- kimer County, New York) Medical School. Here, for seven years, he worked hard as a pioneer lecturer, in Western New York, ob- tained license to give degrees, and for four winter semesters did all of the work, cover- ing anatomy, surgery, materia medica, obstet- rics and chemistry. He was its president for four years. If his prognostications concerning the suc- cess of the school failed to come true, it was simply because he could not foresee that politicians would divert needed and prom- ised funds to other colleges. Immediately after obtaining the presidency of this col- lege he established himself and his family in New York City, and practised there the rest of his life. During his nine years in the metropolis he exhibited that same med- ical energy which had always distinguished his career. He obtained a good practice, made wide acquaintance with leaders in medi- cine and literature, wrote papers on fever, vaccination, hydrophobia, printed a paper on scull cap in hydrophobia which made much stir and laid the foundation for the United States Pharmacopoeia. As early as 1815 he had urged the estab- lishment of a national pharmacopoeia and in 1817 he read his first paper concerning it before the New York County Medical Society. It was received in silence and referred to a committee, which finally reported concerning the plan, but buried it in much verbosity, hard now to comprehend. Three years of steady letter writing followed, to physicians