Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/437

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415
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FRIEDENWALD 415 FRISSELL ing an office student of Dr. N. R. Smith (q. v.), and graduating in the spring of 1860 at the University of Maryland. He then visited Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Paris, and London to continue his medical studies. He was particu- larly attracted by Arlt and Von Graefe. While spending much time on general medicine, he devoted himself especially to ophthalmology. Returning to Baltimore in 1862 he did not limit himself to special work, but like many others of that day practised general medicine beside the specialty. At the time of his return there was no other ophthalmologist in the city, George Prick (q. v.) having retired from prac- tice a long time before. In 1873 he was elected to the professorship of diseases of the eye and ear in the College of Physicians and Surgeons, a position which he filled with great merit until his death, Au- gust 26, 1902. "He was always interesting . . . and en- thusiastic. As he grew older his interest did not flag, and there was no change in the tone and vigor of his lectures. He was always ready for a joke or a good story to enliven his class, an<l there existed between teacher and student a very pleasant good fellowship." He held a high position in the profession of his state, and in 1890 was elected president of the Medical and Chirurgical Faculty of Mary- land. Dr. Friedenwald kept always in mind the relation of ocular diseases to general medi- cine ; his most important contributions being "Opticneuritis," Optic Nerve Atrophy" "Ocu- lar Paralysis," "Uraemic Amaurosis" and, per- haps better than all, "The Relation of the Eye to Spinal Diseases." He published an important literary contribution on "The History of Jew- ish Physicians," in 1897. He was one of the founders of the Maryland Ophthalmological Society and served as its first president, besides being visiting ophthalmologist to the city, phy- sician to the Hebrew Hospital and to the Nur- sery and Children's Hospital. He was deeply interested in all medical affairs and in com- munal matters as well. A service of the most important kind was his calling into existence, in 1890, the present Association of American Medical Colleges, which has played so impor- tant a part in raising the standard of medical teaching in this country. He died in Baltimore August 26, 1902. H.RRY FkIEDENWALD. Life, Letters and Addresses of Aaron Friedenwald, by Dr. Harry Friedenwald. Baltimore, 1903. Friedenwald as Man, Friend and Colleague, Dr. W. Simon; as Teacher, Scientist and Piiysician, Dr. John Ruhr.ih. Jour, Alumni ,ssoc. Coll. of Phys. and Surgs., Baltimore, 191.?, vol. v, 97-107. Frissell, John (1810-1893). John Frissell was born in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, March 8, 1810, his father a farmer, Amasa Frissel, whose forebears were Scotch, his mother of English parentage, by name Wilcox. Their four sons were given a good education and John Frissell went froin the old Hadley Academy to Williams College, where he graduated A. B. in 1831. He then studied medicine with Dr. Ebenezer Emmons, a physician in Williamstown. Young Frissell served as his assistant for two years in the laboratory and during the next three years attended lectures at Berkshire Medical Insti- tution, Pittsfield, Massachusetts, graduating M. D. in 1834 and taking the degree of A. M. from Williams College the same year. Dur- ing these years and the year following he was al.so prosector and demonstrator of anatomy under Professor Willard Parker (q. v.). In 1846 he went to Wheeling, West Virginia, and soon becaine the leading surgeon of the slate and of the adjacent parts of Pennsylvania and Ohio. He was the medical founder of the Wheeling Hospital in 1850 and served as superintendent of the Military Hospital at Wheeling during the Civil War, with the rank of assistant surgeon. His work during fifty-five years of practice covered the whole field of surgery. For ten years before Morton's discoveries regarding anesthesia Dr. Frissell did capital operations on patients who heroically suffered or were nauseated and relaxed by antimony and wine of tobacco, or stupefied by whiskey. He prac- tised during the periods when bleeding was a universal remedy and when it had been en- tirely abandoned. He saw the rise and fall of many remedies, extolled as specifics, whose very names are now forgotten. He was al- ways the thoughtful, careful, conservative sur- geon, and the wise, cautious and observing practitioner. Dr. Frissell married, in 18.50, Elizabeth Ann Thompson, daughter of Col. John Thompson, of Moundsville, Virginia. They had three sons : John Thompson, who died at twenty- six of typhoid fever; Charles M., who became a Wheeling practitioner, and a third son, Walker I. Dr. Frissell was one of the charter mem- bers and the first president of the West Vir- ginia State Medical Society in 1867. He died at his home in Wheeling, West Virginia, at the advanced age of eighty-four. John L. Dickey. Prominent Men of West Virginia, Wheeling, 1890. Trans. Med. Soc. West Virginia, Wheeling, 1894. J. L. Dickey.