Benjamin Rouse was born in Boston, March 23d, 1795, and was brought up as
a builder, working at the trade at first in Massachusetts, and
subsequently removing to New York, where he carried on his business
extensively for about six years. From an early age he had taken great
interest in religions matters, and especially in the establishment of
Sunday schools. In 1830, he accepted the appointment of agent of the
American Sunday School Union for the purpose of going to the West and
establishing Sunday schools and book depositories. For this purpose he
gave up his business and turned his face westward, prepared to endure
hardships and encounter difficulties for the cause in which he was so
deeply interested.
Coming directly to Cleveland, he opened his Sunday school book depository,
near the corner of the Public Square and Superior street. The prospect was
not a hopeful one, but Mr. Rouse had faith, and persevered. There was but
one church building in the place, old Trinity, built by the Episcopalians
with the aid of those of other denominations, and but little religious
sentiment among the people. A Sunday school had for some time struggled
hard to maintain its existence, and had but just become established on a
tolerably firm basis. The depository, aided by the active labors of Mr.
Rouse in the schools, gave a powerful impetus to the cause.
Three months after the opening of the depository Mr. Rouse purchased the
lot on which it stood, for six hundred dollars. In making the purchase he
had little thought of its speculative value, the sole object being a
permanent home for his agency. Time has, however, so enhanced the value of
property that the lot on which stood the little book-room, has now, with
the pile of buildings standing on it, reached a value of eighty thousand
dollars, thus amply repaying Mr. Rouse for his labors in the cause of
religion and morality in the earlier days of the place.
For about three years the depository was continued, and then Mr. Rouse
turned his attention for a while to general store-keeping, abandoning it
finally for the purpose of removing to Richfield, where he went to benefit
the health of his wife. In that place hie remained six years.
Mr. Rouse was a member of the Baptist denomination, and was largely
instrumental in the organization of a Baptist society in Cleveland. When,
in 1835, it was decided to erect a church building on the corner of Seneca
and Champlain streets, the experience of Mr. Rouse, then a deacon of the
church, was called into requisition. In due time the church was built and
a steeple placed on it, which became the wonder and admiration of the
country round about, and Trinity, built by the Episcopalians with the aid
of those of other denominations, and but little religious sentiment among
the people. A Sunday school had for some time struggled hard to maintain
its existence, and had but just become established on a tolerably firm
basis. The depository, aided by the active labors of Mr. Rouse in the
schools, gave a powerful impetus to the cause.
Three months after the opening of the depository Mr. Rouse purchased the
lot on which it stood, for six hundred dollars. In making the purchase he
had little thought of its speculative value, the sole object being a
permanent home for his agency. Time has, however, so enhanced the value of
property that the lot on which stood the little book-room, has now, with
the pile of buildings standing on it, reached a value of eighty thousand
dollars, thus amply repaying Mr. Rouse for his labors in the cause of
religion and morality in the earlier days of the place.
For about three years the depository was continued, and then Mr. Rouse
turned his attention for a while to general store-keeping, abandoning it
finally for the purpose of removing to Richfield, where he went to benefit
the health of his wife. In that place he remained six years.
Mr. Rouse was a member of the Baptist denomination, and was largely
instrumental in the organization of a Baptist society in Cleveland. When,
in 1835, it was decided to erect a church building on the corner of Seneca
and Champlain streets, the experience of Mr. Rouse, then a deacon of the
church, was called into requisition. In due time the church was built and
a steeple placed on it, which became the wonder and admiration of the
country round about, and the especial pride of Deacon Rouse.
On his return from Richfield, Mr. Rouse engaged in the coal business in
connection with Mr. Freeman Butts. About the year 1862, he retired from
active business and thenceforth devoted his time to the cause of
patriotism, religion, and charity. From the breaking out of the war Mr.
and Mrs. Rouse entered vigorously on the work of aiding the nation's cause
by caring for the nation's defenders. Their zeal and activity were
irrepressible, visiting the camps and hospitals, ascertaining the needs of
the soldiers, and then with unresting assiduity collecting money and
materials to supply those needs. Mrs. Rouse became president of the
Soldiers' Aid Society of northern Ohio, and was directly instrumental in
the formation of hundreds of auxiliary societies that made every city,
village, and nearly every home in northern Ohio busy in the work of
preparing and sending forward comforts and luxuries for the soldiers of
the Union. Mrs. Rouse visited camps and hospitals in the South, and her
visits and reports were productive of great good. Her name was known and
respected by thousands of soldiers, was repeated with grateful praise in a
multitude of homes from which brave boys had gone forth to the war, and
has passed into history. In all her labors she was cordially seconded and
efficiently aided by her husband.
Three sons and one daughter have been born to this worthy couple.
Medical.
In the early records of Cleveland, as in those of most western towns, the
story of sickness and death fills a large part. Fever and ague, brought on
by exposure, privations, and by the miasma from swamp, river and uncleared
lands, disabled a large number of the early settlers, and hurried some to
untimely graves. There were no physicians, and save a few drugs and the
simples gathered from the river banks and forest, there were no remedies.
In course of time appeared the pioneer doctor with his saddle-bags, and he
was soon followed by a number of his brethren to practice their skill upon
the settlers. When the first Cleveland Directory was issued, in 1837,
there were already established a round two dozen of physicians and
surgeons, and three "surgeon-dentists." It may be interesting to quote
the names of these brethren of the lancet and saddlebags who purged and
bled the good people of thirty-two years ago. They were, J. L. Ackley, F.
I. Bradley, C. D. Brayton, W. A. Clark, Horace Congar, E. Cushing,
Jonathan Foote, S. B. Gay, Robert Hicks, M. L. Hewitt, Smith Inglehart,
Robert Johnston, Burr Kellogg, David Long, P. Mathivet, George Mendenhall,
Joshua Mills, T. M. Moore, W. F. Otis, A. D. Smith, J. Swain, Charles
Terry, Samuel Underhill, Joseph Walrath. The surgeon-dentists were B.
Strickland, and Coredon & Sargeant.
This list has now swollen to proportions that make the two dozen and three
exceedingly insignificant by comparison, and every school of medicine is
represented. There are two Allopathic medical colleges--the Cleveland and
Charity Hospital colleges--and two Homeopathic--the Western Homeopathic
college and the Homeopathic College for Women. There are also three
hospitals, the Charity Hospital (Allopathic), the Homeopathic Hospital on
University Heights, and the Woman's Hospital on Wilson street.
David Long.
Dr. Long was born at Hebron, Washington county, New York, September 29,
1787. In early life he qualified himself for the practice of medicine and
surgery, studying in Massachusetts and graduating in New York city. In
June, 1810, he arrived at Cleveland and commenced his professional career.
At this early day there was no physician nearer than Painesville on the
east, Hudson on the south-east, Wooster on the south, River Raisin (now
Monroe) on the west. The arrival of a physician was, therefore, a matter
of no small gratification to the settlers here and the neighboring
settlements.
In this wild region, without roads, streams without bridges, cabins in
many places eight to ten miles apart, did the young and ardent Long
hopefully commence the practice of medicine. Nor were the hopes of the
early settlers disappointed. In rain and snow, in Winter's cold and
Summer's heat, by darkest midnight or mid-day sun the doctor ever
cheerfully responded to all the calls for his services with alacrity and
zeal, forgetful of self, desirous only to administer timely relief to the
suffering and afflicted. In this he was eminently successful, as many of
those who knew him for more than a third of a century can testify.
In proof of the untiring perseverance of Dr. Long in the early part of his
professional life, it has been stated that on one occasion, in the Fall of
the year, about midnight, he rode nine miles in fifty-one minutes. In
another instance of extreme urgency, he rode, in the day time, fourteen
miles in fifty minutes by changing horses twice on the route. He was a
surgeon in the army during the war of 1812, and brought the news of Hull's
surrender at Detroit to this city, from the mouth of Black River, a
distance of twenty-eight miles, in two hours and fourteen minutes. Such
was his character for promptitude to all the calls that were made upon
him, and they were far from being few.
For kindness to his patients and friends he had no superior. In his zeal
in their behalf, in a few years, he sacrificed in a measure one of the
finest constitutions.
After following his profession thirty years or more, Dr. Long retired
from general medical practice, and engaged in other pursuits more
favorable to his health and congenial to his tastes.
In all public measures for the benefit of our city, in the way of
improvements, schools, churches, every effort in behalf of humanity,
religion or science, Dr. Long was ready to place his shoulder to the work
with all the ardor and enthusiasm of youth.
Dr. Long never had any aspirations for political distinctions, but such
was his popularity and so great the confidence of the people in his
judgment and integrity that he could have obtained it had he so desired.
At one time, however, he was elected to fill a vacancy which had
occurred by the death of one of the three County Commissioners.
Unimportant as this may seem now, it then occasioned intense excitement.
The location of a new county court house, presumptively fixing the
county seat for all time, devolved upon these Commissioners. Newburg and
Cleveland were the contestants, both being villages of about an equal
number of inhabitants--the claims of each supported by a single
Commissioner, yet Newburg having the more central location. Though hotly
contested, Dr. Long was elected, and the result was the erection of the
Court house in the south-west corner of the square, which was demolished
about ten years since.
In the year 1834, Dr. Long united with the Presbyterian church in this
city, and by his daily walk and conduct in the community, by his deeds of
love and charity to the poor, his kindness to the sick and afflicted gave
the most striking evidence of a heart renewed by grace and made meet for
the kingdom of heaven. During his last painful illness his calmness and
resignation showed that he had placed his trust firmly upon the sure
foundation.
He filled all the relations of life in a most exemplary manner and thus
embalmed his memory in the hearts of all who knew and survive him. He died
on the first day of September, 1851, at the age of sixty-four years,
lacking a single month.
John Delamater.
Just before the massacre of St. Bartholomew, the ancestors of Dr.
Delamater fled from France to Holland. The family name was then De La
Maitre. Being whole-souled protestants, they migrated with other Dutch
families to the Province of New York, and settled on the banks of the
Hudson, near Kingston. Their names are still visible on the ancient grave
stones of that neighborhood. Like the Huguenots, of South Carolina, they
were Calvinist, or puritans of the French school. They became allied by
marriage to the Rogardus family of New York, and others partook of the
blood of Anneke Jans, whose name has become famous in the New York courts.
The investigation of this connexion and heirship, occupied the last years
of Prof. Delamater's life. It was closed only about a month before his
death. His coadjutor in this work, was the late Chancellor Walworth, of
Saratoga, whose ancestors were also in the line of Anneke Jans.
Dr. Delamater was born in Columbia county, New York, near Chatham, on the
State line of Massachusetts, April 18th, 1787. He died at East Cleveland,
in March, 1867, having almost reached the extreme age of four score years.
The Huguenots like English Puritans, and the Scotch Irish, have made their
mark in North America. John Delamater, while a boy, was destined to be a
farmer, on the soil where he was born. He was transferred to the medical
profession on account of an accident, which injured his ability for manual
labor. His father removed to Schenectady, New York, where his son was put
under the tuition of one of the self-denying clergymen of those times,
whose salary did not meet the expenses of living. At the age of nineteen
his medical education was finished and he commenced practice in his native
town. From thence he moved to Florence, Montgomery county, N. Y. Then
stopped a short time in Albany, N.Y., and in 1816, established himself at
Sheffield, Massachusetts. There was a settlement of negroes in this
ancient borough. Dr. Delamater was then, as ever since, an active
philanthropist. He attended the negroes as physician, Sunday teacher, and
preacher. They also drew money from his purse, which was never very well
filled, and paid back very little, either of his fees or of their debts.
After some years of assiduous labor on his colored charge, his views of
the race underwent a radical change. Among the last utterances of his life
he expressed the opinion, based upon his experience at Sheffield, that the
negro is by nature unfit for citizenship. In the days of the Jeffersonian
Republicans and Adams Federalists, Dr. Delamater was in full accord with
the new and rising Democratic party. He left it during the administration
of General Jackson, and since then was a thorough Whig and Republican. No
one hated slavery more. He saw the remnants of it in his early practice
over the line in Connecticut, but never recovered faith in the capacity of
the colored man for self-government.
Returning to his medical career, in which for sixty years he led in the
profession, it is briefly as follows: While practising in the valley of
the Housatonic, he rode almost constantly on a racking horse, about
sixteen hands high, and almost with the speed of the wind, and
occasionally in a two wheeled vehicle, common in those days, called a
chaise, or more often a "one horse shay." At such times one of his medical
students rode beside him, and drove the horse.
Between calls along the road the Doctor read his works, especially those
relating to cases in hand. This custom of keeping up with the new works
and periodicals of the profession he never relaxed, even after old age and
the most distressing physical infirmities prevented his practice. Neither
was the old shay ever abandoned; our citizens remember it well, moving
carefully along these streets, with its huge calash top and faithful
horse. No storm of rain or snow prevented him from keeping an appointment
while he was able to get in and out of his vehicle.
In 1823, Dr. Delamater was made Professer in the Medical Institute of
Pittsfield, Berkshire county, Mass.; in 1827, at the Fairfield Medical
School, Herkimer county, New York. He was at the same time giving lessons
at Bowdoin College, Mass. While at Fairfield, he was invited to lecture in
the Medical College of Ohio, where Kirtland, Drake and Mussey have
occupied chairs. This resulted in an appointment as Professor in the
Willoughby University, Lake county, Ohio, at that time a flourishing
institution. In 1842, he became one of the Faculty of the Western Reserve
Medical College, at Cleveland.
Almost every man has some prominent talent, though with many it is never
developed. With Professor Delamater it was the ability to give prolonged,
profound and perspicuous lectures. This was his special gift and as usual
in such cases he was not a facile writer. It is said he delivered seventy
courses of medical lectures. His memory was perfect and his reading
embraced everything relating to his profession. A good lecturer requires
not only a clear perception of his subject, but a lucid and fluent
presentation of it. Dr. Delamater never wrote lectures. His memoranda were
of the most meagre kind. They were frequently nothing more than a few
hieroglyphics made on the margin of a newspaper drawn from his vest pocket
as he mounted the desk. Every case he had ever treated and all its details
appeared to be thoroughly fixed in his recollection. He sometimes wrote
medical essays for publication, but with evident reluctance. In cases of
malpractice Dr. Delamater was the especial dread of the attorney whose
side he did not favor. His full, clear and logical statements made a deep
and generally an irresistible impression upon the court and jury.
After he became unable to visit patients he was consulted with never
ceasing confidence by physicians and by patients, especially those
afflicted with chronic complaints.
His moral and religious qualities were as conspicuous as his mental ones.
He carried the faculty of conscientiousness to a length which the most
conscientious would regard as extreme. Against the poor his charges for
professional service were merely nominal and were never pressed, and with
the rich he was so moderate and easy that with a large practice he was
barely able to maintain his family, which, like himself, were afflicted
with prolonged constitutional diseases. His rare Christian virtues are
described with fidelity and beauty in the farewell discourse of Rev. W. H.
Goodrich, of the First Presbyterian Church, which, being in print, may be
read and preserved by the numerous friends of the good old man.
Jared Potter Kirtland.
Prof. Kirtland belongs to the class of self-made naturalists who attain to
greater eminence than others of equal talents and better advantages.
Success in this branch of science requires not only a native genius, but
enthusiasm and never tiring perseverance; to the rich and the educated
these last qualifications are frequently wanting, or, if they are not,
instead of growing with the progress of life, they become more and more
weak instead of more and more strong. Industry and ambition are more than
a match for education in minds of the same order.
[Illustration: Your Fellow Citizen, J. P. Kirtland]
Dr. Kirtland originated at Wallingford, Connecticut. His father,
Turhand Kirtland, in 1799, was appointed general agent of the
Connecticut Land Company, on the Reserve. He removed to Poland, in
Mahoning county, the next year, where he became a prominent citizen of
the new county then known as New Connecticut. So long as the Company
existed he was continued in the agency, and survived until 1833 to
witness the developments of the region.
Jared appears to have been left in Connecticut, probably to secure the
advantages of those common schools which were wanting in this western
wilderness. The young man made his appearance in Ohio on horseback, July
4th, 1810, at the age of fifteen years. He was destined to be a physician,
and in 1817 he was sent to the celebrated medical school of Dr. Rush, in
Philadelphia. After leaving that institution he set forth on the way of
life with horse and saddle bags, dispensing advice and prescriptions,
according to the custom of the times, to the people of the townships
around Poland. Every old settler knows what a time the pioneer doctors
had. Their patients were scattered far and wide in log cabins which stood
in small clearings in the forest surrounded by gigantic trees. A messenger
rushed in at any hour of the day or night from a distressed, perhaps a
distant family, requiring immediate attention. It was the duty of the
frontier physician to saddle his horse at the moment and return with the
messenger. The route more often lay along a narrow trail through the
woods, over roots and logs, with mud and water on all sides. In dark
nights, or in storms of rain and sleet, the overhanging boughs of the
trees dripping with water, these visits were not of the most cheerful
character. In those early days bridges were behind roads in regard to
condition and repairs, and it was frequently necessary, in order to reach
a suffering patient, to do as Cassius did--plunge in and trust to a
faithful horse--in order to cross swollen creeks and rivers.
While engaged in this rude professional practice, acquiring a good
reputation as a physician, he was closely observing the fishes, reptiles,
shells and animals of a region teeming with animal and vegetable life.
Scientific works were scarce in that new region, but living subjects were
abundant. This exuberance of life was of more value to a scrutinizing
mind than a surplus of books and a deficiency of specimens. An unusually
rich field for the naturalist lay open to his daily observation for
twenty years.
During his residence at Poland, Dr. Kirtland was twice elected to the
House of Representatives for Ohio. In that body he directed his efforts
especially to a change in the Penitentiary system. It was mainly through
his zeal and activity that the old style of treating State prisoners was
abandoned, and they have been made a source of revenue and not of expense.
Convict labor has thus proven by experience to be valuable to the public
and to the convict a relaxation of the rigor of his situation.
It was while studying the habits of the fresh water shells of the
Mahoning and its branches that Dr. Kirtland made a discovery which
attracted attention throughout the scientific world. The classification
of species had been made upon mere difference of form. Dr. Kirtland
perceived that in the same species a difference of form was due to sex in
_testacea_ the same as in all other animals, and that too many species
had been adopted. This bold announcement, coming from the back woods of
Ohio, created quite a commotion among naturalists. It was, however,
found, on investigation, to be true, though it rendered obsolete a large
number of terrible Latin phrases.
In the publication of his views, and afterwards for his descriptions of
the fishes of Ohio, he found a liberal patron in the Boston Society of
Natural History. When the State of Ohio organized a geological survey, in
1838, the department of Natural History was of course given to him. There
was barely time to make a catalogue of the fauna and flora of the State
before the survey was suspended, but many of his figures and descriptions
of the fishes have since been published in the transactions of the Boston
Society. This appointment broke up his large medical practice in Trumbull
and adjacent counties. He now accepted the appointment of Professer in the
Ohio Medical College at Cincinnati. About 1838, Prof. Kirtland removed
from Poland to Cleveland, to perform the same duties in the Cleveland
Medical College. With a restless energy he went beyond natural history and
medicine in his investigations, into the field of horticulture,
floriculture and agriculture.
Purchasing a rugged farm on the ridge road five miles out of Cleveland, he
entered with zeal into the business of scientific farming. Here he
demonstrated that a stiff clay soil derived from the underlying Devonian
Shales may be made highly productive in fruit. His success stimulated
others along the ridge road, until the old pastures and meadows on that
side of the city have been changed into the most profitable orchards and
gardens in the vicinity. This required twenty years more of time and
industry, during much of which he came daily to the college and delivered
one or more lectures. In the lecture his style is entirely
conversational, but rapid, fluent, and always intelligible. Here all the
varieties of his studies come into play, as it were, spontaneously. He is
equally at home among the birds, the insects and the reptiles, the fishes
or the mammalia. Their habits are as familiar as those of his children and
grandchildren. He writes but seldom, and thus the teachings of so many
years on so many subjects are confided principally to the memory of the
many hundreds of students to whom they have been delivered.
For several years Dr. Kirtland has declined to lecture on any subject. He
is verging upon four score, a period which with most men, is necessarily
one of rest if not of weariness, but he has never known what it is to
rest. No farmer in Rockport is up earlier or attends more closely to his
grounds. All the valuable varieties of peaches, pears, cherries and
grapes, have been tested by their actual product, or are in the process of
being tested. He is enthusiastically fond of the culture of bees and of
every variety of flowers which will thrive in this climate. A number of
new varieties of cherries have been originated on the Kirtland farm, and
after trial those which are valuable have been scattered over the country.
There are very few men who are enabled to make so many applications of
science to practical subjects, and still fewer who are permitted to live
long enough to witness the fruits of their labors.
Theodatus Garlick.
We are almost at a loss in what class to place Dr. Garlick. By natural
taste and genius he belongs to the artists. His devotion to the healing
art arose principally from the necessities of our race for something to
eat and wear. He had the fortune, probably good fortune, to be born in
Vermont, at Middlebury, March 30th, 1805, in view of the Green
Mountains, among rocks and mountains. This region is principally famous
for marble, slate, iron ore, and hardy young men, generally known as
Green Mountain boys.
An older brother, Abel B. Garlick, having been apprenticed to a marble
cutter, came out West, sometime after the war of 1812, and located at
Cleveland. In 1816, Theodatus, at the age of eleven years, had drifted
as far as Erie, Pennsylvania; in 1819, to Cleveland. The Winter of
1819-20, he spent at Black River, which was then the leading ship yard of
the lakes.
Abel B. had artist's ability also. In this region no marble was to be
found, but a tolerable substitute existed in the fine grained blue
sandstone at Newburg. A mill was erected at the quarry on Mill creek,
below the falls, where these stones were sawed, as they are now, into
handsome slabs.
Like other New Englanders, the Vermont boys are early impressed with the
idea of self-support. Although Theodatus much preferred fun and frolic to
hard labor, he entered cheerfully upon the business of a stone cutter at
the age of sixteen. Their marble yard (without marble) was on Bank street,
where Morgan & Root's block now stands. Abel marked the outlines of the
letters upon incipient grave stones in pencil, and Theodatus carved them
with his chisel. Most of the renowned sculptors of Ohio, such as Powell,
Clevenger and Jones, took their first lessons in the same way. All of them
have left samples of their untutored skill in various angels and cherubs,
now mouldering in old churchyards. The blue sandstone monuments, on which
Dr. Garlick cut inscriptions fifty years since, are still to be seen in
the early cemeteries of the Western Reserve; some are touching enough, but
not a few are more ridiculous than mournful. When Nathan Perry became so
prosperous that he proposed to remove the old wooden store on the corner
of Water and Superior streets and replace it with a brick one, he
concluded to expend something upon ornament. He ordered two oval stone
signs to be made and to be built into the walls over the two doors, one on
each street. These were among the earliest efforts of Dr. Garlick. Both of
these stones were in existence until the ground was cleared for the
present Bank building, when they were broken up and put into the cellar
wall. In those days it was one of the duties of an apprentice to sharpen
the tools at a blacksmith's forge. The young man concluded to carve flying
cherubims with their stone trumpets to ring in the ears of coming
generations no longer.
Having a robust physical constitution, he became passionately fond of
hunting and fishing. In 1822, he lived with a brother in Newbury, Geauga
county, which was then a forest full of game. In a letter referring to the
sporting days of his youth, he wrote as follows:
My brother and myself started out very early one morning for a deer that
we knew had been feeding around the cabin that night; within a quarter
of a mile from the cabin my brother shot him, and as he fired, up jumped
eleven elk; one of our neighbors shot five of them within an acre of
ground; they were near together, at bay, fighting with the dogs. I
helped to get them in; they were a part of a larger herd, we counted
their beds in the snow where they had lain at night, and there were over
one hundred in the drove.
[Illustration: Yours Truly, T. Garlick]
Ten or fifteen years previous to that time, one of those tornadoes, which
occasionally visit this region, had prostrated the timber along a tract a
mile wide and several miles in length, through the township of Newbury. A
thicket of bushes had sprung up among the fallen trees, which furnished
excellent browsing ground and shelter for game, of which there was an
abundance of bear, wolves, elk, deer, turkeys, &c., constituting quite a
paradise for a young Nimrod.
He finally determined to become a physician, and after some years of the
usual experience of medical students, practicing some, and assisting at
operations, he entered the medical department of the University of
Maryland, in the city of Baltimore, where he graduated in 1834.
No sooner was his diploma secured than the artist again broke forth. He
suddenly produced bas-reliefs in wax of five favorite professors without
sittings, which were pronounced perfect likenesses. General Jackson and
Henry Clay gave him a short sitting, and the next day their statuetts were
on exhibition. Mr. Clay expressed his satisfaction for his own in an
autograph letter. Another miniature in relief, full length, of Chief
Justice Marshall, from a portrait by Waugh, was pronounced by Mr. Bullock,
an English virtuoso, as equal to anything produced by Thorwaldsen. But
being surrounded by medical men, who, like men of all professions, regard
their own as more important than any other, Dr. Garlick was induced to
turn his artistic skill upon anatomical models.
He located at Youngstown, Ohio, the same year that he graduated, at which
place, and at the Medical College of Cleveland, he devoted nearly two
years in getting up models of all parts of the human body, taken from
subjects in the dissecting room. They may yet be seen in the Medical
Colleges at Cleveland, Buffalo, Toronto, Charleston, South Carolina,
Cincinnati, and other places. These were such close imitations of nature
that the late Professer Mussey, of Cincinnati, pronounced them superior to
the French models at Paris by Auzoux. At Youngstown he made a life size
bust of Judge George Tod, copies of which are now in the family. In 1853,
after a successful practice at Youngstown, he came to Cleveland, and
formed a partnership in surgery with the late Professer H. A. Ackley, and
for a number of years was a member of the Board of Medical Censors of the
Cleveland Medical College, and vice president of the Cleveland Academy of
Natural Science. As he was a naturalist, he applied the principles of the
anatomical models to animals and parts of animals, especially fishes. He
entered with great zeal upon the artificial propagation of brook trout and
other fish in connection with Dr. Ackley. In 1857, he published a small
book, which is the standard work of the United States on this subject.
He was a skillful physician and surgeon, a diligent student of natural
history, a keen sportsman, and a great lover of the fine arts. A good
physical constitution is at least one-half of the capital of any man,
however gifted in mind. In this respect he was like Christopher North,
with few equals. In the rude contests of strength among the young men of a
new country, the races, wrestling matches, and occasional fights, he never
felt like backing down; but of late years this powerful frame has been
partially stricken with paralysis.
The doctor still resides in this city, devoted to natural science,
especially botany, but the days of his personal activity are past.
J. L. Cassels.
John Lang Cassels, M.D., LL.D., was born in Stirlingshire, Scotland, and
in 1827, while quite a young man, came to this country. Soon after, he
studied medicine with Prof. John Delamater, in Fairfield, New York, and
graduated in 1834, in the College of Physicians and Surgeons located at
Fairfield, N. Y. He was Demonstrator of Anatomy in that school three years,
two years during his pupilage and one after his graduation. He opened an
office for the practice of medicine in Earlville, New York, in the spring
of 1835, and in the fall of the same year received and accepted the
appointment of Professor of Chemistry in Willoughby University, Ohio,
which connection he retained until the fall of 1843, when he and his
associates opened and established the Cleveland Medical College, in which
he still occupies the chair of Chemistry.
In 1837, he received the appointment of First Assistant Geologist of the
New York State Geological Survey, which he occupied for several seasons,
performing field labor in the summer and lecturing on chemistry in
Willoughby Medical College during the winter. His connection with the New
York survey gave him an excellent opportunity to become an expert
practical geologist; his location being on the Hudson river district,
offered him a fine field of action, as it is really the key to the geology
and mineralogy of the State.
In the winter of 1839, he gave a course of demonstrated lectures on
chemistry before the Young Men's Library Association in Cleveland, the
first public lectures on science ever given in the city. The following
winter the citizens of Cleveland invited him to lecture again on the same
subject, and he complied. The city at that time contained mostly young
people--only two gray-headed men attended the Stone Church.
In 1815, he spent most of the season in visiting and collecting specimens
of mineral in the lead region of Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa and Missouri,
thus becoming familiar with the geology of their rich mineral region.
In 1846, he spent the whole season in exploring the Lake Superior country,
coasting the south shore in a bark canoe, having for his traveling
companions two Indians and a half-breed voyager. At this date there were
no steamers on Lake Superior, and but a very few small sailing craft. It
was during this time that he took squatter possession of a mile square of
the iron region of that country, for the benefit of the Cleveland Iron
Company. He was the first white man that had visited this region, now so
famous for its ferruginous wealth. Near the close of the season he spent a
short time geologizing Isle Royale, and returned to Saut St. Marie on the
steamer Julia Palmer, which had, during the summer, been hauled over the
passage of Saut St. Marie. During the winter following, at the request of
a number of Clevelanders, he gave a public lecture on the Lake Superior
region; at the close of which he said he would venture a prophecy: "Such
was the character of the climate, scenery, etc., of Lake Superior that the
time was not far distant when it would become as great a resort for
invalids and pleasure-seekers as Saratoga and Newport now are." Also, that
there is iron enough in the iron district sufficient to furnish a double
track of the much talked of Whitney's railroad. These statements were then
received with a stormy manifestation of incredulity.
In 1859, the Jefferson College of Mississippi conferred the Degree of LL.D.
on Dr. Cassels.
In 1861, he was elected a corresponding member of the Imperial Geological
Institution of Berlin, Prussia.
For the last ten years, in addition to the duties of his chair in the
Cleveland Medical College, he has regularly filled the chair of chemistry
and natural history in the Western Reserve College at Hudson. During the
past twenty years he has given several courses of popular experimental
lectures in his favorite branches of chemistry and geology in a number of
our neighboring towns, Akron, Canton, &c. He is also the regular lecturer
in these branches in the Female Seminary in Painesville.
Perhaps few men have been as extensively engaged in texicological
examinations during the past twenty years as Dr. Cassels. Many of these
have been of great interest, both in a social and moral point of view. In
all such cases he is regarded with great confidence, both on account of
his scientific skill and his high sense of moral integrity.
As an analytical chemist he has few superiors, and is much of his spare
time engaged in the analysis of waters, ores, coal, limestone, &c. In
1866, he analyzed the water of Cleveland which is brought from Lake Erie
and distributed through the city. He analyzed this water taken from
different parts of the city and from the point where it entered the pipes
to be forced into the reservoir; also from a point in the lake three
thousand four hundred and fifty feet from the shore, where he advised that
the inlet pipe ought to be located. All these analyses are embraced in his
report to the Trustees of the city water works; in which also are many
valuable suggestions respecting supply pipes and the character of the
water for steam purposes.
J. S. Newberry.
J. S. Newberry, M.D., LL.D., was born at Windsor, Connecticut, of old
Puritan stock, his ancestry having formed part of the colony which in
1635, emigrated from Dorchester, colony of Massachusetts Bay, and founded
the town of Windsor, the first settlement made in Connecticut.
[Illustration: Yours Very Truly, J. S. Newberry]
The family continued to reside at Windsor for two hundred years, during
which time it held an honorable place in that community and contributed
several representatives, who took an important part in the affairs of the
State government, or in the defense of the colony against the Indians, and
in the French and Indian and Revolutionary wars. Dr. Newberry's
grandfather, Hon. Roger Newberry, a distinguished lawyer, and for many
years a member of the Governor's council, was one of the directors of the
Connecticut Land Company, which purchased a large part of the Connecticut
Western Reserve. The town of Newberry received its name from him. His son,
Henry Newberry, inherited his interest in the land of the company, by
which he became possessed of large tracts in Summit, Ashtabula, Medina,
Lorain and Cuyahoga counties, including one hundred acres now within the
city of Cleveland. Looking after these interests he made three journeys on
horseback (the first in 1814,) from Connecticut to Ohio, and, in 1824,
removed his family to Summit county, where he founded the town of Cuyahoga
Falls, remaining there till his death, in 1854.
Dr. Newberry graduated at Western Reserve College, in 1846, and from the
Cleveland Medical College in 1848. The years 1849 and 1850, he spent in
study and travel abroad. Returning at the close of the latter year he
established himself, early in 1851, in the practice of medicine in
Cleveland. Here he remained till 1855, when his professional business
became so engrossing as to leave him no time for the scientific study to
which he had been devoted from his boyhood. To escape from too great
professional occupation, and impelled by an unconquerable passion for a
scientific career, in May, 1855, he accepted an appointment from the War
Department, and became connected with the army as acting assistant
surgeon and geologist to the party which, under Lieutenant R. S.
Williamson, U.S.A., made an exploration of the country lying between San
Francisco and the Columbia river. The results of this expedition are
embodied in Vol. 6 P. R. R. Reports. The reports of Dr. Newberry on the
"Geology, Botany and Zoology of North California and Oregon," are
republished in a volume of 300 pp., 4to., with 48 plates. In 1857-8, he
accompanied Lieutenant J. O. Ives, U.S.A., in the exploration and
navigation of the Colorado river, one of the most interesting
explorations made by any party in any country. The object of the
expedition was to open a navigable route of communication with our army
in Utah. To this end an iron steamer was constructed in Philadelphia,
taken in sections to the head of the Gulf of California, where it was put
together and launched. With this steamer the river, before almost
entirely unknown, was navigated for five hundred miles, opening a route
of travel which has since been extensively used. Beyond the point reached
by the steamer the course of the river is for several hundreds of miles
through the "Great Cañon," as it is called, a chasm worn by the stream in
the table lands of the "Colorado Plateau." This cañon has nearly vertical
banks, and is nowhere less than three thousand feet deep; in some places
six thousand feet, or more than a mile in depth.
The party with which Dr. Newberry was connected, spent nearly a year in
exploring the country bordering the Colorado, adding much to our knowledge
of our western possessions, and giving, in their report, an interesting
and graphic description of, perhaps, the most remarkable portion of the
earth's surface. Half of the report of the Colorado Expedition was
prepared by Dr. Newberry, and so much importance was attached to his
observations by his commanding officer, that in the preface he speaks of
them as constituting "the most interesting material gathered by the
expedition."
In 1859, having finished his portion of the Colorado Report, Dr. Newberry
took charge of another party sent out by the War Department, to report to
Captain J. N. Macomb, topographical engineer, U.S.A., for the exploration
of the San Juan and upper Colorado rivers. The Summer of 1859 was spent in
the accomplishment of the object had in view by this expedition, during
which time the party traveled over a large part of Southern Colorado and
Utah and Northern Arizona and New Mexico, filling up a wide blank space in
our maps and opening a great area before unknown, much of which proved
rich and beautiful, abounding in mineral wealth, and full of natural
objects of great interest. Among the results of this expedition were the
determination of the point of junction of Grand and Green rivers, which
unite to form the Colorado, and the exploration of the valley of the San
Juan, the largest tributary of the Colorado; a stream as large as the
Connecticut, before almost unknown, but which, though now without an
inhabitant upon its banks, is for several hundred miles lined with ruined
towns or detached edifices built of stone, and once occupied by many
thousands of a semi-civilized people. The report of this expedition made
by Dr. Newberry, containing much new and interesting scientific matter,
was finished just before the war, but yet remains unpublished.
Immediately after the commencement of the war, the United States Sanitary
Commission was organized. Dr. Newberry was one of the first elected
members, and it is, perhaps, not too much to say that no other one
individual contributed more to the great success that attended the labors
of that organization. In September, 1861, he accepted the position of
Secretary of the Western Department of the Sanitary Commission, and from
that time had the general supervision of the affairs of the Commission in
the valley of the Mississippi; his head-quarters being first at
Cleveland, and subsequently, as the frontier was carried southward, at
Louisville, Kentucky.
Through his efforts branches of the Sanitary Commission were established
in the principal cities of the West, and agencies for the performance of
its work at all important military points, and with each considerable
sub-division of the army. Before the close of the war the entire West was
embraced in one great System of agencies for the production and
distribution of supplies, and the care of sick and wounded on the
battle-field, in hospital or in transitu. The magnitude of the work of the
Sanitary Commission at the West may be inferred from the fact that there
were at one time over five thousand societies tributary to it in the loyal
States of the Northwest--that hospital stores of the value of over
$5,000,000 were distributed by it in the valley of the Mississippi--that
over 850,000 names were on the records of its Hospital Directory at
Louisville, and 1,000,000 soldiers, for whom no other adequate provision
was made, were fed and sheltered in its "homes."
Of this great work Dr. Newberry was the responsible head, and by the
wisdom and energy displayed by himself very much of the harmony and
efficiency which characterized this organization are to be ascribed.
As his labors in connection with the Sanitary Commission were drawing
to a close, Dr. Newberry was appointed Professor of Geology in the
School of Mines of Columbia College, New York city. He entered on the
duties of the position in 1866. In 1869, he was appointed by Governor
Hayes to the office of State Geologist, created by the Ohio General
Assembly of that year.
The scientific acquirements of Professor Newberry have given him a
world-wide fame. As a Geologist his reputation ranks among the foremost.
He has been honored with the membership of the most of the learned
societies of this country, and of many in Europe; was one of the original
corporators of the National Academy of Sciences; was recently elected
president of the American Association for the advancement of Science, and
is now president of the New York Lyceum of Natural History.