Holtz, Ferdinand Carl (1843–1908).
Ferdinand Carl Holtz, ophthalmologist of Chicago, Illinois, inventor of the well-known Holtz's operations for entropium, ectropium, trichiasis and trachoma, was born at Wertheim, Baden, Germany, July 12, 1843. His early education he received in the Lyceum at Wertheim, his medical training at Heidelberg (1863–66) and Berlin (1866–67). His medical degree was conferred at Heidelberg in 1865. The teachers who chiefly influenced him at Heidelberg were Helmholtz, Simon and Knapp; at Berlin, Graefe, Virchow, and Langenbeck. After a tour of study to Vienna, Paris, London, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Dublin, he came to America and settled in Chicago in 1869. He was ophthalmic surgeon at the Illinois Eye and Ear Infirmary from 1876 until his death. On the resignation by Dr. Holmes of the chair of ophthalmology and otology in the Rush Medical College, Dr. Holtz was appointed in his place, and this position, too, he held for many years. For a time he occupied the chair of ophthalmology at the Chicago Polyclinic, and he was associate editor of the Journal and Examiner.
His more important writings may be found in the Archiv fur Augenheilkunde, Zeitschrift fur Ohrenheilkunde and in the medical journals from 1876 to 1882.
In 1873 he married Emma, daughter of A. Rosenmerkel, of Chicago.
Dr. Holtz was a man of middle height, thick and stocky, with bushy hair and florid complexion; German to the core, versatile, contentious, sincere and hot-tempered. He was, withal, very unassuming and modest, and extremely helpful to all the younger men with whom he came in contact, who were trying to succeed in ophthalmology. He was a hater of shams and quackery, and was thoroughly aroused and vehement whenever the subject came up. He was naturally inventive, and, even as he lectured to the students, would strike out one original idea after another. Dr. Seth Scott Bishop, of Chicago, declares, "I have never known a more constructive mind." And, similarly, Dr. Franklin Coleman: "In the plastic surgery of the eye, I know of no one who introduced so varied a number of operations as Dr. Holtz."
Dr. Holtz died March 20, 1908.
Holyoke, Edward Augustus (1728–1829).
Edward Augustus Holyoke, first president of the Massachusetts Medical Society, centenarian, was born in Marblehead, Massachusetts, August 1, 1728, and died in Salem, March 31, 1829, thus living to the great age of one hun-red years and eight months, lacking one day.
His ancestor, Edward Holiock, as it was spelled in the records, emigrated from England and was a Freeman in Lynn, Massachusetts, in 1638. His father, Edward Holyoke, minister at Marblehead, who was born in Boston and graduated from Harvard College in 1705, was elected president of the college in 1737 and presided over its destinies for thirty-two years, until his death in 1769. Edward Augustus' mother, Margaret Appleton of Ipswich, a second wife, was descended from John Rogers, the first Smithfield martyr. Edward Augustus was the eldest son and the second of eight children. When nine years old, his father moved to Cambridge to take up his duties of president of the college, and here the boy received his education, finally graduating from the college with the class of 1746.
In 1747 he began the study of medicine with Dr. Berry of Ipswich, and remained with him nearly two years, settling in Salem in 1749, to pass the rest of his life there in the practice of medicine. At first patients were few and far between, and he found it hard to gain a livelihood. In the course of lime, however, it was said that there was not a single house in town to which he had not been called at some time, as physician.
In all the affairs of life, Dr. Holyoke was most methodical and industrious, and during busy days he would snatch up a book to occupy a few moments of leisure, between visits. Because he found that his patients were in the habit of summoning him after he had gone to bed at night, he acquired the custom of sitting up late, and, so one biographer says, of rising late in the morning, these hours—seven in summer and eight in winter—being specified as late. It is recorded that during a professional life of nearly eighty years he was never once at a greater distance than fifty miles from Salem, his longest journey being a trip to Portsmouth in 1749, when he was absent five days. When he was married in 1759, he was away from Salem for a week, while following the custom prevalent at the time, of "sitting up for company," in other words, with his bride, receiving the congratulations of their friends. Dr. Holyoke is reported to have said to a professional brother that this was "very tedious and irksome."
He was twice married, first to Judith, daughter of Benjamin Pickman, who with her only
