Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/1108

NAME SPITZKA 1086 SPITZKA Dr. Spencer at once began to practise in the town of Lenox. He was elected to the several offices of the Medical Society of the County of Madison in 1820, and attended a second course of lectures at the Medical Col- lege at Fairfield, and received his M. D. In 1824 Spencer was elected to the Assem- bly of the Legislature of New York State. In 1832 he attended a course of lectures at the University of Pennsylvania, going occa- sionally to the lectures of the Jefferson Med- ical College. His article on "Cholera" was written in Philadelphia in ten days, just preparatory to its delivery in that city. It was well received and noticed in the medical journals of Cincinnati and Philadelphia. At the suggestion of the Hon. John C. Spencer, late Secretary of War (not a relative), to Drs. Spencer and Morgan, a medical college under the powers of the Geneva College was founded. The first course of lectures was delivered in 1835, Dr. Spencer filling the chair of theory and practice of medicine for fifteen years. Through his energy large en- dowments were obtained for the literary and also for the medical department. He removed to Geneva in order that he might be more convenient to the college. In 1847, when the Mexican War broke out, Dr. Spencer was appointed surgeon of the Tenth Regiment of New York and New Jersey Volunteers. He served for nearly one year and a half on the northern line of the Army ; at Matamoras he organized a field hospital and brought everything in connection with it, its appli- ances and appurtenances, to a great degree of perfection. Soon after his return Dr. Spencer removed to Milwaukee, in order to be near the Rush Medical College, Chicago, where he became professor of theory and practice of medi- cine. Owing to ill health he was obliged to resign anci return to Syracuse. The Board of Trustees, however, elected him emeritus professor. Dr. Spencer relinquished his prac- tice in Syracuse to accept a professorship in the Philadelphia College of Medicine about 1852, and accordingly removed to that city, where he continued to reside until the period of his death, which took place on May 30, 1857. Margaret K. Kelly. Abridged from a biography by Dr. James J. Walsh. Trans. Med. Soc, N. Y., Albany, 1858. S. D. Willard. Spitzka, Edward Charles (1852-1914) Edward Charles Spitzka, one of America's most versatile men, will be remembered best as a pioneer neurologist and psychiatrist, and as a notable contributor to the comparative and human anatomy of the nerve system. Dr. Spitzka was born in the City of New York on November 10, 1852, the son of Charles A. Spitzka and Johanna Tag. He was of Germano-SIavonic origin. He attended Public School No. 35, made famous under the principalship of Thomas Hunter, and after a collegiate education at the College of the City of New York, he began the study of medicine at the Medical Department of the University of the City of New York, from which he graduated in the year 1873. The ensuing three years were spent in Europe for the purpose of further study; first at Leip- sic, as a pupil of Wagner, von Coccius, His, Wunderlich, Hagen, and Thiersch; then at Vienna, under the tutelage of Meynert, Politzer, Billroth, Bamberger, Briicke, Arlt and Schenk. It was during his sojourn in Vienna that Dr. Spitzka was most strongly influenced to pursue his career in the man- ner which he did. Under Meynert, renowned anatomist and psychiatrist, and under Schenk, equally distinguished in the field of human and comparative embryology. Dr. Spitzka ac- cumulated a wealth of knowledge which formed the foundation of most of his sub- sequent claims to fame. He then entered into general practice in his native city in 1876, occupying among other positions that of surgeon to the out- door department of Mt. Sinai Hospital and consulting neurologist to the North-Eastern Dispensary and St. Mark's Hospital. He ob- tained a considerable amount of pathological material from the private and public asylums in and near New York City. The results of the analysis of this material were em- bodied in an essay on the "Somatic Etiology of Insanity" which gained the prize offered by the British Medico-Psychological Associ- ation from the fund presented by W. and S. Tuke in international competition. Dur- ing the same year (1876) he obtained the prize of the American Neurological Associ- ation offered by Dr. Wm. A. Hammond (q. v.) for an essay on Physiological Effects of Strychnia. He occupied the positions of pro- fessor of comparative anatomy in the Colum- bia Veterinary College; professor of nervous and mental diseases and of medical juris- prudence in the New York Post-Graduate Medical College (1882-87) ; consulting neurol- ogist in Sydenham Hospital; president of the American Neurological Association (1890) ; president of the New York Neurological So- ciety (1883-84) ; editor of the American Jour- nal of Neurology and Psychiatry (1881-84) ; 1