The American Cyclopædia (1879)/Beck, Theodoric Romeyn

BECK. I. Theodoric Romeyn, an American physician, born in Schenectady, N. Y., Aug. 11, 1791, died in Utica, N. Y., Nov. 19, 1855. He was a graduate of Union college (1807), began his medical career in Albany, prepared in 1813 a systematic report on American minerals, became in 1815 professor of the institutes of medicine and lecturer on medical jurisprudence in the college of physicians and surgeons of western New York, and was principal of the Albany academy from 1817 to 1848. In addition he was professor in the Fairfield medical college, 1826-'40, and in the Albany medical college, 1840-'54. He was president of the New York State medical society in 1829, founder and for some time president of the Albany institute, and one of the managers of the New York state lunatic asylum from the time of its foundation, and its president in 1854. His statistical publications relating to the deaf and dumb had a powerful effect in influencing the state legislature to provide for their education. He edited the “American Journal of Insanity” (1849-'53), wrote extensively for scientific periodicals, and published with his brother a celebrated work on the “Elements of Medical Jurisprudence” (1823; 7th ed., with notes by Dr. Dunlap and Dr. Darwell, London, 1842; 10th ed., 2 vols., Albany, 1850). II. John Brodhead, an American physician, brother of the preceding, born in Schenectady, Sept. 18, 1794, died in Rhinebeck, N. Y., April 9, 1851. He was a graduate of Columbia college (1813), practised in New York, and was in 1822 one of the founders and for seven years the chief editor of the “New York Medical and Surgical Journal.” In 1826 he became professor of materia medica and botany in the college of physicians and surgeons, and afterward exchanged the chair of botany for that of medical jurisprudence, which, together with that of materia medica, he filled till his death. He coöperated with his brother in his “Elements of Medical Jurisprudence,” and published “Medical Essays” (1843), “Infant Therapeutics” (1849), and “Historical Sketch of the State of Medicine in the Colonies” (1850). III. Lewis C., an American naturalist, brother of the preceding, born in Schenectady, N. Y., Oct. 4, 1798, died in Albany, April 21, 1853. He was a graduate of Union college (1817), and professor successively of botany in the Rensselaer institute at Troy (1824-'9), of botany and chemistry in the Vermont academy of medicine, of chemistry and natural history in Rutgers college, and of chemistry in the Albany medical college. In 1837 he was appointed mineralogist in the geological survey of New York. He published works on botany, chemistry, adulterations, the “Mineralogy of New York” (4to, 1842), &c.