MACRAE 733 MC CRAE Macrae, Donald (1839-1907) In the death of Donald Macrae, which occurred in Council Bluffs, Iowa, on August 14, 1907, Iowa lost one of her highly honored citizens and physicians. Dr. Macrae was called the "Father of the Medical Society of the Missouri Valley," having been active . in its organization, and its first president in 1888. He was born at Pollewe in Ross-shire, Scot- land, October 3, 1839. His father was the Rev. Donald Macrae, minister of Pollewe. He received his education at the University of Edinburgh, from which he graduated with the M. A., subsequently taking his medical degree there in August, 1861. After prac- tising for a year and a half in the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, Dr. Macrae accepted a posi- tion as surgeon for the Cunard Steamship Company, and crossed the Atlantic seventy- five times during his four years service. In 1867 Dr. Macrae married Charlotte Bouchette, daughter of Joseph Bouchette, sur- veyor-general of Canada. Soon afterwards he went to Council Bluffs, arriving in March, 1867, and continued in active practice until illness compelled him to retire a short time before his death. Mrs. Macrae died in March, 1904. Dr. Macrae was for many years identified with the Omaha (Nebraska) Medical College, where, beginning in 1881, he was professor of the principles and practice of medicine. In 1877 he was elected president of the Iowa State Medical Society. The Med. Herald, Sept., 1907. McCrae, John (1872-1918) John McCrae, immortalized as the author of "In Flanders Fields," was distinguished as pathologist and soldier, as well as poet ; the key-note to his character lies in his own expression, "I have never refused any work that was given me to do." He was born in Guelph, Canada. November 30. 1872. His father, David McCrae, who, when more than seventy trained a .field bat- tery in Guelph and brought it overseas for service, was in the Canadian militia and had the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel, and with these practical gifts combined a "love of the out- of-doors, a knowledge of trees and plants, a sympathy with birds and beasts, domestic and wild." The mother of John McCrae was Janet Simpson, the lovely daughter of the John Eckord who, with his two daugh- ters, emigrated to Canada from Scotland in 1851, and settled in Bruce County "in the primeval forest, from which they cut out a home for themselves, and for their children," a man of much force and deeply religious; it was his mother who received the revealing letters from the soldier John McCrae during his stirring days in Europe. With this heritage of intellectual and re- ligious worth John McCrae came well-fitted into the world. His education began with the Shorter Catechism and was continued at school under William Tyler. In 1888 he en- tered the University of Toronto, holding a scholarship for "general proficiency," and graduated in the department of biology in 1894; in 1898 he graduated in medicine at the same University. He became resident house-officer in the Toronto General Hospital, but in 1899 went to Baltimore to accept a similar position in the Johns Hopkins Hos- pital, after which he went to McGill Uni- versity as fellow in pathology and pathologist to the Montreal General Hospital, and later, in the same city, was appointed physician to the Royal Alexandra Hospital for infectious diseases; still later while assistant physician to the Royal Victoria Hospital he was lec- turer in medicine in McGill University. He was a member of the Royal College of Physicians, London. His work with John George Adami, "Text- Book of Pathology" (1912; 2nd edition, 1914) and papers to the number of thirty-three, are his contribution to medical literature, but his verse ran freely in the pages of The Spectator, Punch, Toronto Varsity, Canadian Magazine, Massey's Magazine, Westminster, Toronto Globe, and the University Magazine. "In Flanders Fields" appearing first in Punch, December 8, 1915, was widely copied, became "the poem of the army" and touched the universal heart; other poems also are known and loved by those who read John McCrae. The tenderness of thought and beauty of word- ing of the following have appealed to many : "Beneath her window in the fragrant night I half forget how truant years have flown Since I looked up to see her chamber-light Or catch, perchance, her slender shadow thrown Upon the casement; but the nodding leaves Sweep lazily across the unlit pane, And to and fro beneath the shadowy eaves. Like restless birds the breath of coming rain Creeps, lilac-laden, up the village street When all is still, as if the very trees Were listening for the coming of her feet That come no more ; yet lest I weep, the breeze Sings some forgotten song of those old years Until my heart grows far too glad for tears."
