Adams, Horatio (1801–1861)
Horatio Adams, son of Rev. Solomon Adams, of Middleton, Mass., was a prominent member of the Middlesex South Branch of the Massachusetts Medical Society, and was born in Waltham, Massachusetts, February 20, 1801. He graduated from the Harvard Medical School in 1826 and practised in Waltham until the time of his death, April 22, 1861. In 1858 he delivered the annual discourse on "Investigations Upon the Subject of Vaccination" before the Massachusetts Medical Society (Communications Massachusetts Medical Society, vol. ix). The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal says of him: "It is believed that he was the first in this country who succeeded in proving the identity of the variolous and vaccine diseases. After reading an account of Mr. Ceeley's experiment of inoculating the cow, he was induced to repeat it and succeeded in obtaining the same results. From a crust obtained by inoculating a cow with variolous matter, a child was vaccinated and a vesicle appeared having all the characteristic marks of the true cow pox."
In the year 1852 he published (Transactions American Medical Association, vol. v) a paper, "On the Action of Water on Lead Pipes, and the Diseases Proceeding From It." This was considered a valuable contribution to the subject.