BARD, John, physician, b. in Burlington, N. J., 1 Feb., 1710; d. in Hyde Park, N. Y., 30 March, 1799. He was tlie son of a New Jersey magistrate of Huguenot origin, and after attending a classical school was apprenticed to a surgeon of Philadelphia. Establishing himself in New York in 1746, he soon took rank as one of the ablest of American medical men. In 1759, when an epidemic of malignant fever threatened New York, having been commissioned to devise means to check the spread of the disease, he recommended the purchase of Bedlow's island for the isolation of cases of infectious disease, and was placed in charge of the hospital that was built in accordance with his suggestion. He was the first president of the New York medical society. He left a paper on malignant pleurisy, and several treating of yellow fever, all of which were published in the "American Medical Register."—His son, Samuel, physician, b. in Philadelphia, 1 April, 1742; d. in Hyde Park, N. Y., 24 May, 1831. He was graduated at King's (now Columbia) college in 1768, and studied medicine in Edinburgh. After receiving his doctor's degree in 1765 he travelled in Europe extensively. In 1767 he began practice in New York in partnership with his father. Through his exertions a medical school in connection with King's, now Columbia, college was established the year after his return. In 1769 a hospital was built, but its loss by fire caused a delay in its establishment until 1791. He was professor of the practice of medicine in the medical college, and subsequently dean of the faculty. While the seat of government remained in New York he was Gen. Washington's physician. In 1798 he retired to Hyde Park, where he occupied himself with agricultural and scientific pursuits during the remainder of his life, returning, however, to render charitable services during the prevalence of yellow fever, on which occasion he contracted the disease. When the Columbia college medical school was organized as a separate institution, under the name of the college of physicians and surgeons, in 1813, Dr. Bard became its first president, and he held that station during the rest of his life. He was the author of a treatise, "De Viribus Opii" (1765); one on "Angina Suffocativa," printed in the "Transactions of the American Philosophical Society"; one on "The Use of Cold in Hæmorrhage"; a "Manual of Midwifery " (1807) ; and " The Shepherd's Guide." He entered into the speculation of raising merino sheep, introduced into the United States by his friends Chancellor Livingston and Col. Humphrey, and in the last-mentioned book he gave the fruits of his knowledge and experience regarding the prevention of the infectious diseases to which they were subject. A biography of him was written by John McVickar (New York, 1822).—William, son of Samuel, b. in New York in October, 1777; d. 17 Oct., 1853, was a pioneer in life insurance in the United States, and for twelve years from its foundation in 1830 the president of the New York life insurance and trust company.—Another son, John, b. in Hyde Park, N. Y., 2 Julie, 1819, was the founder of St. Stephen's college, at Annandale, N. Y., a diocesan training-school for students for the ministry of the Protestant Episcopal church, preparatory to entrance in the general theological seminary in New York city. His wife, Margaret, a sister of John Taylor Johnston, co-operated zealously with him in his religious benefactions. She died in Rome, Italy, 10 April, 1875. Mr. Bard died in Washington, D. C., 12 Feb., 1899.
BARKER, Fordyce, physician, b. in Wilton, Me., 2 May, 1819; d. in New York city, 30 May, 1891. He was graduated at Bowdoin, and studied
medicine at Harvard and in Edinburgh and Paris,
finishing his studies in the latter city in 1844.
He began the practice of his profession m Norwich in 1845, and at the same time was appointed professor of midwifery in the medical department of Bowdoin College. From 1850 till 1857 he filled a similar place in the New York Medical College, and from 1860 in Bellevue Hospital Medical College. In 1856 he was made president of the New York State Medical Society, and in 1882 president of the New York Academy of Medicine. He was the author of several works, including a series
of clinical lectures "On Puerperal Diseases" (New
York, 1S72). and "On Sea-Sickness" (1870).
BARKER, George Frederic, physicist, b. in Charlestovvn, Mass., 14 July, 1835. He received an academical education and was apprenticed to a manufacturer of philosophical apparatus in Boston, with whom he remained until he became of
age. In 1856 he entered the Yale, now Sheffield,
Scientific School, and was graduated two years
later. While in his final year he was made assistant
in chemistry under Prof. Silliman, and during the
winters of 1858-'9 and in 1860-'l he was assistant to Dr. John Bacon, professor of chemistry in Harvard Medical College. In 1861 he became professor of natural sciences in Wheaton (Ill.) College. A year later he was acting professor of chemistry in Albany Medical College, where he remained for several years, and at the same time pursued a course of medical studies, being graduated in 1863. He was then called to the chair of natural sciences
in the Western University of Pennsylvania at Pittsburg. In 1865 he became demonstrator of chemistry in the medical department of Yale College, occupying Prof. Silliman's chair during his absence in l866-'7, and in 1867 was placed in charge of the department of physiological chemistry and toxicology at the same institution. Since 1873 he has been professor of physics at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. He was one of the commissioners of the United States to the International Electrical Exhibition in Paris in 1881, and a delegate to the International Congress of Electricians held at that time. The French government conferred on him the decorations of the Legion of Honor, with the rank of commander. In 1884 he was appointed by the president a member of the U. S. Electrical Commission. Prof. Barker has frequently been called upon to testify in important patent cases, and he was requested by the department of justice to act as one of the government experts in the suit against the American Bell Telephone Company. The toxicological and chemical evidence given by him in the Lydia Sherman poisoning case in 1872 was remarkable for its clearness, and has been inserted as a typical case in Wharton's and Stille's "Medical Jurisprudence." During the winter of 1859 he gave a series of public lectures in Pittsburg, Pa., and his "Lecture on the Forces of Nature," delivered in 1863 before the chemical society of Union College, has been published. In December, 1871, his lecture "On the Correlation of Vital and Physical Forces," before the American Institute of New York, attracted universal attention, and it was afterward republished in France. In 1859 Prof. Barker was elected a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and he has filled the offices of vice-president (1872) and president (1879). In 1876 he was elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences. His published papers have appeared principally in the "American Journal of Science and Arts," the "American Chemist," and more recently in the "Proceedings of the Ameri-
