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Daniel Drake
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DANI EL DRAKE [178$-T872]
The Amencan Journal of Surgery N.S. Vol. XXII. December. 1933
AMERICAN
PHYSICIANS
DANIEL DRAKE
0
NE of the most picturesque
medica figures of the earIy West was DanieI Drake. He was born in New Jersey in 1785. When he was a chiId his famiIy moved to Kentucky and there among the pioneers he spent his earIy years in direst poverty. His struggIes for an education are epic. Without money, famiIy or inffuentia1 friends he overcame every obstacIe and reached the topmost peaks of his profession. Drake became a pupi of WiIIiam Goforth, the “pioneer of Jennerian vaccination in the West,” and his dipIoma was made out and signed by his teacher. It was the first medica dipIoma issued west of the AIIeghanies. Drake started He never graduated from a in practice. recognized schoo1 of medicine, but the University of PennsyIvania in 1815 conferred upon him an academic degree. He was restIess, combative. “He changed his IocaIity as a teacher no Iess than seven times during his Iife, and two important medica facuIties, the MedicaI CoIIege of Ohio (182 I) and the MedicaI Department of Cincinnati CoIIege ( I 835) were founded by him.” Drake founded the Western Journal of the Medical and Physical It existed from 1827 to 1838, Sciences.
and in its time was the Ieading journaI in the west. In its numbers appeared his writing on MedicaI Education, one
of which has become famous. This essay appeared as a reprint in 1832. In 1841 Drake pubIished an account of a IocaI disorder known as “the trembIes” or miIk sickness. He described an epidemic of choIera which appeared in Cincinnati in 1832. In 1831 he wrote a number of papers on the eviIs of city Iife. Three years later he wrote an essay of mesmerism, whiIe his MoraI Defects in MedicaI Students appeared in 1847. As a resuIt of three decades of labor he wrote a great work on “Diseases of the Interior VaIIey of North America” (1850-54). A second voIume appeared after his death. Garrison says that there “was nothing Iike this book in Iiterature unIess it might be Hippocrates on Airs, Waters, and PIaces. . . . ” In 1810 he wrote on the Climate and Diseases of Cincinnati, and in 1822 a “Narrative of the Rise and FaII of the MedicaI CoIIege these are among the of Ohio.” Today rarest of Americana. Drake was aIways we11 dressed. He was an interesting Iecturer and had a “splendid He was kind, gentIe, detested voice.” vulgarity and coarseness. He had a poetic bent and wrote creditabIe verse. He did a great work in creating worthy medica teaching in Cincinnati. DanieI Drake died in 1852 in his sixty-eighth year. T. S. W.
_
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DANI EL DRAKE [178$-T872]
The Amencan Journal of Surgery N.S. Vol. XXII. December. 1933
AMERICAN
PHYSICIANS
DANIEL DRAKE
0
NE of the most picturesque
medica figures of the earIy West was DanieI Drake. He was born in New Jersey in 1785. When he was a chiId his famiIy moved to Kentucky and there among the pioneers he spent his earIy years in direst poverty. His struggIes for an education are epic. Without money, famiIy or inffuentia1 friends he overcame every obstacIe and reached the topmost peaks of his profession. Drake became a pupi of WiIIiam Goforth, the “pioneer of Jennerian vaccination in the West,” and his dipIoma was made out and signed by his teacher. It was the first medica dipIoma issued west of the AIIeghanies. Drake started He never graduated from a in practice. recognized schoo1 of medicine, but the University of PennsyIvania in 1815 conferred upon him an academic degree. He was restIess, combative. “He changed his IocaIity as a teacher no Iess than seven times during his Iife, and two important medica facuIties, the MedicaI CoIIege of Ohio (182 I) and the MedicaI Department of Cincinnati CoIIege ( I 835) were founded by him.” Drake founded the Western Journal of the Medical and Physical It existed from 1827 to 1838, Sciences.
and in its time was the Ieading journaI in the west. In its numbers appeared his writing on MedicaI Education, one
of which has become famous. This essay appeared as a reprint in 1832. In 1841 Drake pubIished an account of a IocaI disorder known as “the trembIes” or miIk sickness. He described an epidemic of choIera which appeared in Cincinnati in 1832. In 1831 he wrote a number of papers on the eviIs of city Iife. Three years later he wrote an essay of mesmerism, whiIe his MoraI Defects in MedicaI Students appeared in 1847. As a resuIt of three decades of labor he wrote a great work on “Diseases of the Interior VaIIey of North America” (1850-54). A second voIume appeared after his death. Garrison says that there “was nothing Iike this book in Iiterature unIess it might be Hippocrates on Airs, Waters, and PIaces. . . . ” In 1810 he wrote on the Climate and Diseases of Cincinnati, and in 1822 a “Narrative of the Rise and FaII of the MedicaI CoIIege these are among the of Ohio.” Today rarest of Americana. Drake was aIways we11 dressed. He was an interesting Iecturer and had a “splendid He was kind, gentIe, detested voice.” vulgarity and coarseness. He had a poetic bent and wrote creditabIe verse. He did a great work in creating worthy medica teaching in Cincinnati. DanieI Drake died in 1852 in his sixty-eighth year. T. S. W.