Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/24

ABRAMS. It was said of him that he had stopped More detrimental and furthered more useful measures than any other medical man in Michigan. These same characteristics were not only evidenced in state affairs, but had an influence national in scope. In much demand as a public speaker, he rarely spoke at length, but always with a wonderfully earnest manner and a masterful delivery. His knowledge of history, combined with his enthusiasm, made him a most interesting speaker. Without doubt he was the best authority in the state on Cornish history, beliefs and customs. In short, he was ever loyal to the spirit of his ancestry. Dr. Abrams was the owner of a fine medical library with full files of about twenty periodicals.

He was intensely patriotic and at the time of his death was president of the local chapter of the Red Cross, member of the state committee, Council of National Defense, and, as acting president of the State Board of Health, was much interested in Camp Custer, and made frequent visits there.

Physically, Dr. Abrams was rather small, but wiry and active. At one time he was fond of wrestling, and very proficient in the art. His fingers were remarkably slender and quick in the most delicate operations.

Besides being a member of the American Association of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, Dr. Abrams belonged to the American Medical Association, was a member of the state and local medical organizations, charter member of the A. K. K., one of the oldest medical fraternities; also member of the American Society of Social and Political Economics, and the American Geographical Society.

He was surgeon to various railroad and mining companies in the Upper Peninsula; consulting surgeon and lecturer on gynecology and obstetrics at the Lake Superior General Hospital, Lake Linden; surgeon-in-chief to St. Joseph's Hospital at Hancock.

His last appearance in public was in addressing a gathering for the Red Cross the evening before his death. His talk was masterly and full of feeling. It was remarked that he spoke from first to last as one inspired, as one apart and loookinglooking [sic] on. His death occurred suddenly, shortly before midnight, May 20, 1918, after an evening spent in study in his library.



Ackley, Horace A. (1813–1859)

Horace A. Ackley, surgeon of Cleveland, Ohio, was born in Genesee County, New York, in 1813, and received his early education in the district schools. At an early age he displayed a special bent towards medicine, acquiring some preliminary instruction in the towns of Elba and Batavia in his native county and subsequently attending medical lectures in the College of Physicians and Surgeons of the Western District of the State of New York, situated at Fairfield, Herkimer County, receiving there his M. D. in 1833, at the early age of eighteen. The following year he settled in Rochester, New York, and at the request of Dr. John Delamater, who had been one of his teachers in Fairfield, delivered at Palmyra a course of lectures on human anatomy. In 1835, Dr. Ackley removed to Akron, Ohio, and in the following year was appointed demonstrator of anatomy in the Willoughby Medical College, Ohio. Soon after he removed to Toledo, where he practised for several years and married in 1837 Miss Sophia S. Howell of Willoughby. On the organization of the Cleveland Medical College in 1843 he was called to its chair of surgery, and continued to occupy this position until his resignation in 1858. During the epidemic of cholera which decimated Sandusky in 1849, on the call for medical aid by the afflicted city, Dr. Ackley abandoned his practice, organized a relief corps of physicians and proceeded at once to the seat of the epidemic.

He was president of the Ohio State Medical Society in 1852.

Though for fifteen years the most active and eminent operative surgeon of Northern Ohio, no written records of his work have been preserved. But the almost unanimous testimony is conclusive in establishing the fact that Dr. Ackley was a bold and skilful operator, who divided with Dr. R. D. Mussey of Cincinnati the vast majority of the major surgical practice of his day in the region west of the Alleghanies and north of the Ohio River.

He was gifted with a most remarkable self-possession in the presence of danger, which stood him in good service, whether holding a mob at bay, in the performance of a dangerous surgical operation, or finding a mistake of diagnosis after the conclusion of the operation. He was considered a splendid medical witness, and his assistance was sought in all cases where medical testimony would affect the verdict. Particularly was this so in cases of malpractice and medical jurisprudence. It