physician scientist bacteriologist
Aristides Agramonte y Simoni was born on June 3, 1868 in Camaguey, Cuba, the son of Dr. Eduardo Agramonte y Pina, a prominent physician, and Matilde (Simoni y Argilagos) Agramonte. His father, serving as general of brigade in the Cuban Army of Liberation, was killed in the battle of San José del Chorilla on March 8, 1871. His family escaped to Merida, Yucatan, and later emigrated to New York City.
Agramonte attended the public schools of New York City, the College of the City of New York, and the College of Physicians and Surgeons, where he obtained his medical degree in 1892.
After an internship in Roosevelt Hospital he served in Bellevue Hospital and with the city health department. He specialized in pediatrics in addition to his laboratory work in pathology and bacteriology.
Following the outbreak of the Spanish-American War he entered the medical service of the United States army as an acting assistant surgeon on May 2, 1898, and was sent to Cuba, where, after the occupation of Habana, he was placed in charge of the army medical laboratory in that city. He was on this duty when in 1900 the famous yellow-fever board headed by Maj. Walter Reed was convened, and Agramonte was named a member with Dr. James Carroll and Dr. Jesse W. Lazear both, like himself, acting assistant surgeons.
The work of the board completed, Agramonte was discharged from the army on August 31, 1900, when he accepted the professorship of bacteriology and experimental pathology in the University of Habana. For thirty years he held actual or titular possession of this post, and during all this time he was a leader in the progress of scientific medicine in his country. He was for years a member of the Board of Infectious Diseases of the Sanitary Department of the government, a member of the National Board of Health, and for a time secretary of health and charities in the cabinet. He continued his interest in yellow fever, particularly in the search for the specific causative agent.
In addition to his scientific work he was the outstanding practitioner of Habana and had a practical monopoly of practice among the American colony of Cuba's capital.
Early in 1931 the University of Louisiana created in its medical school in New Orleans a department of tropical medicine and invited Agramonte to head the department. He accepted and moved his family to New Orleans, where he set to work on plans for his new duties. He was there but a few weeks when he died suddenly from an attack of angina pectoris.
Agramonte was an influential leader of scientific medicine in Cuba and as a member of the Reed Yellow Fever Board of the U. S. Army that discovered (1901) the role of the mosquito in the transmission of yellow fever. He was the recipient of many honors from foreign lands and was named Laureate of the Institute of France. With his associates on the Yellow Fever Roll of Honor he was voted by the Congress of the United States a gold medal.
Member of the Officers of the Spanish-American War, the American Academy of Sciences, the American Society of Tropical Medicine, the Association of Military Surgeons
Agramonte was a tall man of heavy build, handsome of face and of figure. He is described as a "charming gentleman and a delightful host. "
Quotes from others about the person
"His special qualifications as a pathologist and his energy and ability contributed greatly to the success of the board. Of special value were his contributions to the demonstrations of the board disproving the then generally accepted theory that the bacillus icteroides was the causative agent of yellow fever. "
He was married on April 17, 1895, to Frances Pierra of Brooklyn, New York, who with a daughter, Estelle Agramonte, survived him.
