Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/639

NAME JARVIS 617 JARVIS well-known New York divine and philanthro- pist of the last century, an Englishman by nativity and one of the first preachers of the Baptist faith in the new world. A brilliant preacher and tireless worker among the poor and distressed of New York, he was recog- nized as one of the advanced and constructive philanthropists of his day. The Reverend John Stanford was the first chaplain to the Almshouse, now Bellevue Hospital, where an oil painting of this benefactor, by Morse the portrait painter and inventor of the tele- graph, adorns its walls. Dr. Jarvis received his early training in pri- vate schools in Baltimore. It cannot be said that he took his studies seriously, having a mind diverted by the more fascinating woods and the fields, where his inborn love for na- ture and all its wonders found contentment and jo-. With the bees and the butterflies, the caterpillars and the praying mantis, the boy found a new world of thought, which to his inquiring mind brought endless specula- tion as to their function in the great plan of nature. In the little garden about his home the grapevines and the trees (apple, peach and cherry) which he had planted long bore fruitful evidence of his boyish enthusi- asm. His widowed mother, unable to com- prehend the unusual child, oft expressed her misgivings as to his future, little realizing the depth of character and promise for things out of the ordinary. If the unusual is eccentric, he may have been so described, for his attri- butes were not the commonplace and the pro- saic, but a yearning for the key to the many wonders with which our daily life brings us in contact, but which few pause to penetrate. As a mere boy, he delved in astronomy, chem- istry and physics and the microscope was his constant joy. He was a photographer in the days of the wet plate, a stenographer and a mechanic of uimsual resourcefulness. His boyish ingenuity suggested objects for domes- tic use — a mouse trap, a stationary basin, a steam gun, a stationary steam engine. His draughtsmanship, unusual in a boy, developed in later life to a high degree, and his drawings of the diseased and normal organs, prepared by him for his various medical contributions, were clear and accurate. Approaching man- hood, he suddenly decided upon medicine as a career, though his mother had always prom- ised for him the vocation of the farmer. Graduating at the University of Maryland Medical College at the age of 20, he pursued post-graduate work at the Johns Hopkins with Professors Roland and Martin in the biologi- cal laboratories, and advanced chemistry with Remsen. Outside of the domain of medicine, he offered a wide diversity of attainments. A student of Latin and Greek, he was also fa- miliar with French and German, — the latter he spoke fluently. His great diversion was music, and the piano and zither were his fre- quent solace. In his laboratory he worked out many useful formulas and perfected his remarkable array of surgical devices which bear his name. He was deeply religious, an earnest student of the Bible and not only a believer but a doer of the word. The New Testament he had translated for his own in- struction from the Greek, Latin, French and the German a somewhat unusual procedure prompted probably by a desire to familiarize himself with the manner in which the great promises of the Gospel appeared in those tongues. His library held volumes of precious value to the student of sacred things and he conducted in the latter years of his life a class for Bible study in one of the New York Churches. Dr. Jarvis moved to New York in 1877, taking up the general practice of medi- cine in the eastern section of the city. De- ciding upon laryngology as a specialty, he was appointed an assistant to the service of Pro- fessor Franck Bosworth in the throat clinic of the Bellevue Out Door Poor. In 1881, at the early age of 26, he was des- ignated lecturer on larj'ngology at the Uni- versity Medical College, and subsequently clinical professor of diseases of the throat. Dr. Jarvis was a visiting physician to the City Hospital and for a brief period lectured at the University of Vermont. While a member of many medical societies he showed little in- terest in their activities, beyond the opportuni- ties offered in the way of medical progress and research ; he never desired nor sought office, though an active contributor to the scientific work of the New York and American Laryn- gological Societies, the New York Medical So- ciety, the Academy of Medicine and the Amer- ican Medical Association. Dr. Jarvis first came into prominence as an original worker by the invention and intro- duction to intra-nasal surgery of the Jarvis wire snare ecraseur. The little device, though simple in itself, was based upon the introduc- tion of a new material for intra-nasal sur- gery. His claim to originality in the employ- ment of this piano wire has not been disputed excepting by one German mechanic. His biographer has had no convincing proof that piano wire was Used in intra-nasal surgery