Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/932

PETERSON total of twenty-seven titles. In 1873 he traveled through the South and Southwest to study this disease, and afterwards assisted in preparing a report, published by order of Congress. At one time he was president of the Medical Society of the County of New York, and he held a similar office in the New York Neurological Society in 1876–77.

He married Georgina, daughter of Andrew Snelling, May 16, 1849.

Paralysis carried him off, October 21, 1893, at his home on Long Island, at the age of seventy-four.



Peterson, Robert Evans (1812–1894)

Robert Evans Peterson, publisher, was born in Philadelphia, November 12, 1812, son of George and Jane Evans Peterson. He received a commercial education and engaged in the hardware business until 1834, when he married Hannah Mary, only daughter of Judge John Bouvier. He then studied law with his father-in-law and assisted him in editing his law works. He was admitted to the bar in 1843, and in order to absolve the debt of his clients, Daniels and Smith, booksellers, purchased their business, conducting it as R. E. Peterson & Co. On the death of his father-in-law, in 1851, he established with George W. Childs the publishing house of Childs & Peterson, which became involved in 1857–8. Mr. Peterson then retired from the publishing and bookselling business and took up the study of medicine. He was graduated at the University of Pennsylvania M. D. in 1863, but did not practise, devoting his life to study. He presented Judge Bouvier's valuable law library to the University of Pennsylvania.

His wife died in 1870 at the home of her son-in-law, George W. Childs, Long Branch, New Jersey, and he was married a second time, in 1872, to Blanche, sister of Louis M. Gottschalk, the pianist; after her death in 1879 he was married to her sister Clara.

He published Bouvier's "Law Dictionary" and Bouvier's "Institutes of American Law edited "Familiar Science a Guide to Scientific Knowledge of Things Familiar," Dr. Kane's "Arctic Explorations" and numerous textbooks. He was the author of "The Roman Catholic Church not the Only True Religion; Not an Infallible Church," 1869.

He died in Asbury Park, N. J., October 30, 1894.



Phares, David Lewis (1817–1892)

William and Elizabeth Starnes Phares came to West Feliciana, Louisiana, from Virginia, and their son was born there, January 14, 1817. In 1832 he entered the Louisiana State College at Jackson, Louisiana, now Centenary College, and graduated from the Louisiana State College in 1837, and in April, 1839, from the medical department of Louisiana University. "The day he graduated he was elected a member of the faculty without his knowledge or consent and Dr. Barton introduced him to the other members of the faculty as one of their number." This position he declined and returned home to West Feliciana, and from there moved to Whitestown, now Newtonia, Wilkinson County, Mississippi, where he practised until 1880. In 1840 the degree of A. M. was conferred upon him by the University of Kentucky.

In 1836, during college vacation, he married Mary Armstrong Nesmith, of Amite County, and had three sons and five daughters.

In 1842 he erected buildings for and opened Newton Female Institute and in 1852 was largely instrumental in building Newton College.

During the Civil War, Dr. Phares continued in private work; in 1863 he was thrown from his buggy and received injuries from which he suffered for the remainder of his life.

In 1878, by request of the State Association, he prepared a report on the medical plants of the state, some seven hundred in number. He was one of the leading spirits in the founding and building of the Mississippi Agricultural and Mechanical College and at its opening in 1880 he was assigned the chair of biology, which he filled until 1889.

In 1881, after the death of his first wife, he married Mrs. Laura Blanche Duquercron, of Starkville, Mississippi, and by her had two sons who died in infancy.

In 1889 he moved to Madison Station, Mississippi, but on May 3, 1891, was stricken with paralysis and had a second attack October 13, 1891, dying on September 18, 1892. "A constant student, an accurate observer, a painstaking physician, temperate in all things save work, a conscientious Christian. He was also recognized as an authority on the medical virtues of indigenous plants of the South. When he discovered and promulgated the value of viburnum prunifolium and gelsemium his name became imperishable and he proved himself greater than the chieftain of many battles by placing in the hands of his comrades two weapons to wage war against the foes of flesh."

