Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/1259

NAME WILLARD 1237 WILLARD of Ph. D. from the University in 1871, and the honorary A. M. from Lafayette in 1882. Dr. Willard early selected surgery as his chosen branch of medical practice and from the time he graduated in 1867 up to a short time before his death he was continuously connected with the anatomical and surgical departments of the University. Prior to his graduation in medicine, during the Civil War, he served under the United States Sanitary Commission at City Point and Petersburg. In 1867-1868 he was resident physician at the Philadelphia Hospital and from 1881 to 1907, served as surgeon to the Presbyterian Hospital. He was consulting surgeon to the Home for Incurables and the State Hospital for the Chronic Insane at South Mountain. In 1887 Dr. Willard was appointed lecturer on orthopedic surgery in the University, and was clinical professor of orthopedic surgery from 1889 to 1903, and professor of orthopedic surgery since 1903. In this subject his interest was always most en- thusiastic. It was he who organized this de- partment at the University and secured the erection of the orthopedic ward in the Agnew wing of the University Hospital. He was president of the American Orthopedic Asso- ciation in 1890, of the Philadelphia County Medical Society in 1893-1894, and of the Phila- delphia Academy of Surgery in 1900. He was fellow of the Philadelphia College of Physi- cians and of the American Surgical Associa- tion, in which latter society, since 1895, he held the office of recorder. The strenuous professional career which Dr. Willard had and the high regard which his professional brothers had for him is evinced by the following partial list of offices he held. At the university he was demonstrator of surgen,- from 1870 to 1877; demonstrator of anatom3' from 1867 to 1870; attending ortho- pedic surgeon to the University Hospital ; surgeon to the orthopedic out-patient depart- ment from 1877 to 1889. He was president of the American Surgical Association in 1901 ; fellow of the American Orthopedic Associa- tion; the Philadelphia Academy of Surgery; the Philadelphia County Medical Society; the Pennsylvania State Medical Society ; the Philadelphia Pathological Society; and the Philadelphia Obstetrical Society. Dr. Willard married in 1881 Elizabeth M. Porter, a daughter of the Hon. William A. Porter, a granddaughter of Governor D. R. Porter, and had one son, Dr. DeForest Porter Willard. He was perhaps one of the most eminent orthopedic surgeons. He specialized in this branch of surgerj' long before it was recog- nized as a special branch, and was in every sense a pioneer who should rank with Andry, Potts, Stromeyer, Mutter and Sayre. His special course of lect'ures given in 1887 at the university, was the first delivered on this subject. Beginning in 1887, in the out-patient depart- ment, Dr. Willard organized the Orthopedic Department in 1889, and with the assistance of the Ladies' Auxiliary raised $150,000 for the department within the last eighteen years, which made it possible to establish the Chil- dren's Orthopedic Ward and Orthopedic Clinic, and special gymnasium and machine shop, ren- dering the department the most efficient of the sort connected with any teaching institu- tion. Dr. Willard planned the magnificent buildings of the Widener Memorial School for Crippled Children in Philadelphia for Mr. P. A. B. Widener and was surgeon-in-chief to the school from its opening in 1906 until his death. He had had an attack of acute multiple neuritis in 1906, but after this had prepared for the press his book on "Surgery of Childhood, including Orthopedic Surgery," published in 1909. He died October 14, 1910, at his home in Lansdowne, Pennsylvania, of double pneu- monia. His writings are shown in tolerably full list in the catalogue of the surgeon-general, Washington, D. C. Old Penn. Weekly Review, Oct., 1910. Portrait. Amer. Jour. Orthoped. Surg., Phila., 1910, viii, 411-413. Portrait. N. Y. Med. Jour., 1910, xciii, 827. Jour. Amer. Med. Asso., 1910, Iv, 1485. WilUrd, Sylvester David (1825-1865) Sylvester Willard's ancestors came to Massa- chusetts from England in 1634, he himself being the son of David Willard, physician, and Abby Gregory, daughter of Lieut. Mat- thew Gregory of Albany. Sylvester Willard's name is worthy of perpetuation because of his industry in writing biographies of his med- ical predecessors and his great efforts to ameliorate the condition of the insane. He was born in Wilton, Connecticut, June 19, 1825, went to school in his native town and graduated at the Albany Medical College in 1848. By 1852 he was making headway as a young doctor in New York. Ten years later patriotism led him to work as a volunteer sur- geon among the soldiers in the battle of West Point, nor did his efforts for their relief cease with the war, for he helped raise the sum of $200,000 for the disabled. Perhaps Sylvester Willard is best known by his determined and well-planned investigations as State Commissioner into the conditions of