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James Clarke White was born in Belfast, Me. , the fifth of seven children of James Patterson and Mary Ann (Clarke) White. The White family originally emigrated to America from the north of Ireland; one of them, William, with other Ulster folk, founded Londonderry, N. H. , in 1725, and another, Robert, Belfast, Me. White's father, a ship-owner, served as mayor of Belfast.
White was graduated from Harvard College in 1853 and from the Medical School in 1856. At the suggestion of Calvin Ellis, he chose Vienna instead of Paris for his postgraduate work, one of the first American medical students to do so; he was most influenced there by Ferdinand von Hebra, the dermatologist.
On returning to Boston, he became an instructor in chemistry in the Harvard Medical School (1858 - 63) and later adjunct professor of chemistry (1866 - 71). By 1860, however, he had established, with Benjamin Joy Jeffries [q. v. ], the first dermatological clinic in the country. In 1865 he began a long association with the Massachusetts General Hospital, his department of dermatology being ultimately recognized in 1870. In 1871 a chair of dermatology was created for him in the Harvard Medical School, the first of its kind to be established in the United States. This he held until 1902. As a pioneer teacher of dermatology, White was without equal. His fame, at first local, in the end became international. He wrote many valuable scientific papers and one book, Dermatitis Venenata (1887), a sound contribution to a then little-known subject. In addition to his interest in dermatology, White was, from his college days, a student of comparative anatomy and natural history. He became a member of the Boston Society of Natural History in 1856 and served as curator of comparative anatomy for a period of ten years (1859 - 69). He found much pleasure in mounting skeletons of animals and in collecting an herbarium of wild flowers of New England. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and president of the Massachusetts Medical Society in 1892. From 1866 on, he was an ardent leader in the reform of medical education. By editorials in the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal (of which he was editor, 1867-71) and by public addresses, he spoke plainly in behalf of reform at every opportunity. Many of his ideas, then considered revolutionary, were adopted by the Harvard Medical School when Charles W. Eliot became president in 1869. Tall in stature and gracious in appearance, White was an effective speaker and by his presence in various official positions did much to put the subject of dermatology on a sound basis in America. Towards the close of his life White wrote Sketches from My Life (1914), a valuable autobiography.
He was one of the founders of the American Dermatological Association in 1876, and served as its first president (1877 - 87). Dermatological societies throughout the world made him an honorary or a corresponding member. In 1907 he was chosen president of the Sixth International Dermatological Congress, the highest honor that could come to a man in his special field of work.
On November 5, 1862, he was married to Martha Anna Ellis, daughter of Jonathan Ellis of Boston. Of three sons, one became a dermatologist in Boston.
