Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/689

KNAPP, after which he walked nearly all the way to Georgetown, arriving destitute of almost everything

After the Civil War he went abroad and took a course at the Berlin University and returning began active practice in Georgetown.

In 1874 he assisted in the reorganization of the Central Dispensary, and was appointed lecturer on diseases of the eye and ear in the summer course of Georgetown University. In 1876 he was appointed professor of physiology in the medical department of Georgetown University and maintained his connection with it to the end of his life. He was a most excellent teacher and through his omnivorous reading, the works of the great German masters were made accessible to the students and the functions of the different organs portrayed in apt language by the lecturer, aided by physiological experiments and by charts and drawings from his own hands.

He was elected president of the Medical Society in 1886, and president of the Medical Association of the District of Columbia 1895– 1896. In 1889 Georgetown University conferred upon him the degree of Ph. D. He died in Washington, May 20, 1905.

Dr. Kleinschmidt was not a prolific writer. He was the author of a timely address on "The Necessity for a Higher Standard of Medical Education," Washington, 1878, and an excellent report on "Typhoid Fever" presented to the Medical Society of Washington, District of Columbia, 1894. He also assisted (q. v.) and  (q. v.) in the preparation of numerous and valuable monographs.



Knapp, Jacob Hermann (1832–1911)

Jacob Hermann Knapp, a New York ophthalmologist and otolaryngologist, founder of the Ophthalmic and Aural Institute at New York, founder and for a long time one of the editors of the "Archiv fur Augen—und Ohrenheilkunde," and inventor of numerous ophthalmic and aural instruments, was born of wealthy parents, March 17, 1832, at Dauborn, Hesse Nassau, Germany, his father being Johann Knapp, member of the German Reichsrath. For a time the subject of this sketch desired to be a poet, but, later, at his father's request, he turned his attention to medicine, especially ophthalmology. After the usual training in the humanities, be began to study medicine in 1851, the very year in which the newly-discovered ophthalmoscope was announced to a slowly attentive world. After a number of years at Munich, Wurzburg, Berlin, Leipsic, Zürich, and Giessen, he received his degree in 1854 at the university last mentioned. He then proceeded to study ophthalmology at Paris, London, Utrecht, and Heidelberg, at length becoming assistant to A. von Graefe. In 1860 he qualified as privatdocent for ophthalmology in Heidelberg, and, five years later, was appointed full professor of the subject. He was also founder of the first University Eye Clinic in Heidelberg. His numerous scientific contributions of this period were published in Von Graefe's Archives.

For three years only, however, he filled the Heidelberg chair, for, in 1868, at the age of thirty-six he removed to New York City, where he at once founded a private clinic for diseases of the eye and ear. This clinic was shortly afterward incorporated as the Ophthalmic and Aural Institute. It was open to rich and poor alike, and became the greatest institution of its kind this side the Atlantic.

In 1882 Knapp became professor of ophthalmology at the Medical Department of the University of the City of New York—a position which he held till 1888—when he accepted the like chair in the College of Physicians and Surgeons, the Medical Department of Columbia University. In 1903 he was made emeritus professor at this institution.

For the last few years of his life, Professor Knapp, who had always been vigorous and energetic, began to feel that his powers were failing. He, therefore, like the calm, courageous person that he was, began to set his house in order, preparing for the great journey of no return. He died of pneumonia at his country residence, Mamaroneck, New York, May 1, 1911, being 79 years of age.

A fund was established by the Section of Ophthalmology of the American Association that is known as "The Hermann Knapp Testimonial Fund." This fund, each year, supplies an honorarium "to any member of the section or to any distinguished man who comes before the section, as its guest, by special invitation of the officers and executive committee of the section, and presents an especially meritorious and valuable address or thesis bearing on ophthalmic practice." An appropriate sum raised by voluntary subscriptions is further set aside each year for a period of five years, for the purpose of procuring a suitable bust of Dr. Hermann Knapp, the bust to be placed in a location selected by a committee representing the section.

Knapp was a medium-sized man, of firm and elastic carriage, in fact of a somewhat military bearing. His beard was blonde, till