American Medical Biographies/Piffard, Henry Granger
Piffard, Henry Granger (1842–1910)
Henry Granger Piffard, author of the first systematic treatise on dermatology in America, was born in Piffard, Livingston County, New York, on September 10, 1842, his paternal ancestors coming from Dauphiné, France, and his mother's being of Dutch extraction.
He was educated at the Churchill Military Academy at Ling and at the University of the City of New York, where he took his A. B. 1862 and A. M. 1865 and his M. D. at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York, in 1865, serving as interne at Bellevue Hospital. He specialized in skin diseases. He married, in 1868, Helen H., daughter of Gen. William K. Strong, of New York.
One of his best contributions to medical literature was the translation, from the French of A. Hardy, of the "Dartrous Diathesis" (1868). Following this came "A Guide to Urinary Analysis" (1873); "An Elementary Treatise on Diseases of the Skin" (1871); "Practical Treatise on Diseases of the Skin" (1891).
His appointments included: surgeon to the New York Dispensary for Diseases of the Skin, and professor of dermatology in the University of the City of New York. In 1862 he served for a short time with the Sanitary Commission on the James River, Virginia.
He won distinction as a microscopist, pathologist and electro-therapeutist and had inventive capacity as well as mechanical ingenuity.
His membership included the Medical Society of the County of New York; the New York Academy of Medicine; the New York Dermatological Society, of which he was president in 1876.
Dr. George Henry Fox of New York, in the Journal of Cutaneous Diseases, for February, 1911, gives some reminiscences of Henry Grainger Piffard. Dr. Piffard began to collect foreign works on skin diseases. He was a fair German and a better French scholar, but knew very little of Italian. To supply this deficiency he at once subscribed for one or two Italian medical journals, selected a teacher, and attacked the language with his customary vigor. Happening to run across an advertisement of a book, entitled something like "Trattato della Pelle et cetera," he gave his bookdealer an order for it. The bookdealer, in a polite note, informed him that this was an expensive work, published by the Italian Government, and that it would take several weeks to import it. Piffard replied in language more vigorous than polite— "Expense be damned"; when he wanted a book he expected his dealer not to talk about it but to get it. In about two months, during which time his knowledge of Italian had rapidly increased, the book arrived and with it a bill for about $60. To his surprise and dismay he discovered at first glance that it was not a strictly dermatological work, but an elegantly bound and elaborate treatise on the tanning of hides.
Dr. Piffard died of pneumonia in New York, June 8, 1910.