Page:American Medical Biographies - Kelly, Burrage.djvu/912

PARRY 890 PARSONS Parry, John Stubbs (1843-1876) John S. Parry, the first to publish a sys- tematic treatise on extrauterine pregnancy, the only son of Seneca and PrisciUa S. Parry, was born on the fourth of January, 1843, in Drumore, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. His mother, when widowed, worked her farm and educated her four children well. John was known as a boy as "the little doctor," and when seventeen studied medicine under Dr. I. M. Deaver, then matriculated at the University of Pennsylvania, and took his M. D. there in 1865. When he became a resident in the Phila- delphia Hospital he had an opportunity of studying an epidemic of puerperal fever and gathering notes for a valuable paper. On leav- ing the hospital in 1866, he married Rachel P., daughter of William and Annie Sharpless, of Philadelphia, and settled to practice in that town. He acted as visiting obstetrician to the Philadelphia Hospital, and with his colleague. Dr. E. L. Duer, re-organized the lying-in wards and utilized the valuable clinical material for the students. One result was his "Observa- tions on Relapsing Fever in Philadelphia in 1869-70." As a member of the Pathological Society and the College of Physicians and Surgeons he wrote many papers for the meet- ings, notably one on "Rachitis," his conclusions as to its equal prevalence in Philadelphia being supported by exhaustive statistics; another paper was on "Inherited Syphilis." Appointments and honors came rapidly: He was physician for women's diseases at the Presbyterian Hospital; counsellor of the College of Physicians; president of the Ob- stetrical Society, and surgeon to the State Hospital for Women and Infants, which he had helped to found. Although in bad health he made a big fight to complete his notable book — "Extrauterine Pregnancy" (1875) — and many remember how in his library, pale, hag- gard and racked with cough, he toiled day and night. He was persuaded on its completion to go to Florida, though but little hope was enter- tained of his return. This proved to be the case, for he died in Jacksonville, March 11, 1876, at the age of thirty-three. His biographer, Dr. J., V. Ingham, describes him as a writer never idle, and gives a list of some thirty-five excellent articles, reviews, and his additions to the second American edi- tion of "Leishman's System of Midwifery," notably those on "Forceps" and a whole chap- ter on "Diphtheritic Wounds of the Vagina." Trans. Coll. Phys., Phila., 1876, 3 s., vol. ii (J. V. Ingham) pp. xlv-lviii. Quart. Trans. Lancaster City and Co. Med. Soc, 1881-2, vol. ii (J. Price), 88-90. Parsons, Ralph Lyman (1828-1914) Ralph Lyman Parsons was born July 30, 1828, at Prattsburg, Steuben County, N. Y. He received his early education at the Frank- lin Academy of that town, subsequently con- tinued his studies at Amherst College, where he graduated in 1853, and pursuing his medi- cal studies in the New York Medical College, graduated M. D. from that institution in March, 1857. Until 1860 he was assistant physician at the New York City Lunatic Asylum, and from 1862 to 1865 in private prac- tice in New York and visiting physician to Demilt Dispensary. From 1865, for twelve years he was superintendent of the New York City Lunatic Asylum. He served most faithfully during epidemics of typhus fever and cholera which destroyed the lives of many patients. During this try- ing period he had an overcrowded institution, untrained attendants and an inadequate num- ber of medical assistants, deficiencies in diet and clothing and lack of facilities for proper classification. He utilized the pavilion system of building on Blackwell's Island and favored the isolation of epileptic patients, and his pa- tients are said to have formed the nucleus of the first epileptic hospital in these pavilions under the charge of Dr. Echeverria. In 1877 and 1878 he was medical superin- tendent of Kings County Hospital for the Insane. Upon his retirement he was in pri- vate practice again in New York for two years. In 1880 he established a private sani- tarium for mental diseases at Sing Sing, later Ossining, N. Y., where he died in February, 1914, at the age of eighty-six years. He re- tained his mental and physical activity until his death. Institutional Care of the Insane in the U. S. and Canada. H. M. Hurd, vol. iv, pp. 471-472. Medico-Legal Jour., 1890, vol. viii, p. 97. Portrait. Parsons, Usher (1788-1868) Illustrious for his extraordinary medical services on the United States Frigate La'a'- rcnce, at the battle of Lake Erie under Com- modore Oliver Hazard Perry, Dr. Usher Par- sons deserves perpetual re-discovery by the medical profession of the United States. For many years after that battle, people talked of "Usher Parsons," and cheers were given for him whenever he attended a medical meeting. "Who is that"? "Why, that is Dr. Parsons." "What ! Usher ! Let me know him at once," was another way in which he was mentioned. He was born in Alfred, District of Maine, August 18, 1788, the youngest of the nine children of William and Abigail Frost Blunt Parsons. His father was descended from