American Medical Biographies/Pomeroy, Oren Day

2356641American Medical Biographies — Pomeroy, Oren Day1920

Pomeroy, Oren Day (1834–1902)

Oren Day Pomeroy, otologist and ophthalmologist of New York, was born in Somers, Connecticut, October 11, 1834, and died of apoplexy at Whitestone, Long Island, March 19, 1902. He was educated at a boarding-school in Ballston, New York, at the high school in Somers, Connecticut, and at Monson Academy, Massachusetts; he studied medicine at the Berkshire Medical Institution, Pittsfield, the University of the City of New York and at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York, where he took his M. D. in 1860. Settling in practice in New York he devoted himself to diseases of the eye and ear; through Dr. C. R. Agnew (q. v.) he was appointed assistant and chief of clinic of the eye and ear department in his alma mater at the organization of the department in 1866; he was assistant surgeon in the Manhattan Eye and Ear Hospital from its foundation until 1873, when he was elected a surgeon and director, holding the positions until his death. Other positions he occupied were: consulting physician to the New York Foundling Asylum, the Paterson (N. J.) Eye and Ear Infirmary; professor of ophthalmology at the Northern and Demilt dispensaries; professor of otology at the New York Polyclinic. He was a charter member of the American Otological Society, being president of the latter society in 1872.

Dr. Pomeroy was the author of a text-book on "Diseases of the Ear," a book that marked the transition between the old school and the modern school of treatment. His contributions to the medical literature on the surgery of the eye and ear were numerous, many of them appearing in the transactions of the American Ophthalmological Society and American Otological Society and in the New York Medical journals.

In 1865 he married Hannah M., daughter of Abial Miles of New York.

For several years previous to his death he had been in poor health and had retired from practice.

Trans. Amer. Otolog. Soc., 1902–4, vol. viii.
Phys. and Surgs. of U. S., W. B. Atkinson, Phila., 1878.
New York Med. Rec., 1902, vol. lxi, 502.