Background

Nathan Smith Davis was born on January 9, 1817 in a farmhouse at Greene, Chenango County, New York, United States; the son of Dow Davis and Eleanor Smith, both of English descent.

Education

At Greene Davis spent his first sixteen years, attending district school in the winters with one six months’ session at Cazenovia Seminary, in Madison County.

In 1834 he commenced the study of medicine under Dr. Daniel Clark in the near-by village of Smithville Flats.

After three courses of medical lectures at the College of Physicians and Surgeons of the Western District of New York at Fairfield, he was graduated in January 1837.

Career

Davis began practise in Vienna, New York in 1838. During the latter year he moved to Binghamton, New York, where he remained nine years.

There he soon became prominent in medical affairs.

He was secretary of the Broome County Medical Society from 1841 to 1843, and from 1843 to 1846 he represented the county society at meetings of the Medical Society of the State of New York.

He moved to New York City in 1847, where he took charge of the dissecting room of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, lectured on medical jurisprudence, and assumed editorial charge of the Annalist, a semi-monthly medical journal.

In 1849 he went to Chicago to fill the professorship of physiology and pathology at Rush Medical College, and in 1850 was given the chair of principles and practise of medicine and of clinical medicine. During the latter year he headed a movement for the introduction of a sewage system and an adequate water supply for the city, then of 27, 000 inhabitants, and for the establishment of a public hospital.

Through his efforts, funds were raised to furnish twelve beds, the nucleus for Mercy Hospital, the oldest and now one of the largest hospitals in Chicago.

In 1859, a group from the faculty of Rush Medical College, including Davis, founded the medical department of Lind University, which later became the Chicago Medical College and still later the medical department of Northwestern University. Upon this faculty Davis was professor of principles and practise of medicine and later emeritus professor until his death. He was dean of the faculty during his entire active association with the school.

Davis was among the small group that organized the Illinois Medical Society and the Chicago Medical Society. He was one of the founders of Northwestern University, of the Chicago Academy of Science, the Chicago Historical Society, the Union College of Law and the Washingtonian Home.

He was editor of the Chicago Medical Journal from 1855 to 1859.

In 1860 he founded the Chicago Medical Examiner, which he edited until its merger with the Chicago Medical Journal in 1873. He was editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association for the first six years after its establishment in 1883. At different times he was also editor of the Northwestern Medical and Surgical Journal, of the Eclectic Journal of Education and Literary Review, and of the American Medical Temperance Quarterly.

Besides editorials and journal articles he wrote: A Text Book on Agriculture (1848); History of Medical Education and Institutions in the United Slates (1851); History of the American Medical Association (1835); Clinical Lectures on Various Important Diseases (1873), which went through two editions; Lectures on the Principles and Practice of Medicine; and History of Medicine, with the Code of Medical Ethics (1903).

One of his chief interests was the temperance cause, which he supported actively with tongue and pen. He was honorary member of many medical and scientific societies in this country and abroad, and held official positions in most of the societies to which he belonged.

Achievements

• Davis presented a resolution upon the elevation of standards of medical education, which led to the organization of the American Medical Association. He founded the medical department of Lind University, which later became the Chicago Medical College and still later the medical department of Northwestern University and the Chicago Medical Examiner. He was one of the founders of Northwestern University, of the Chicago Academy of Science, the Chicago Historical Society, the Union College of Law and the Washingtonian Home.

Works

More photos

• book

  • History of medical education and institutions in the United States, from the first settlement of the British colonies to the year 1850 with a chapter on the present condition and wants of the profession, and the means necessary for supplng those wants, an

    (This book, "History of medical education and institutions...)

  • A text book on agriculture

    (This reproduction was printed from a digital file created...)

  • Lectures on the Principles and Practice of Medicine

    ( This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur...)

  • History of medicine: with the code of medical ethics

    (This book was digitized and reprinted from the collection...)

  • CLINICAL LECTURES ON VARIOUS IMPORTANT DISEASES; Being A Collection Of The Clinical Lectures Delivered In The Medical Wards Of Mercy Hospital, Chicago.

Personality

To his apparently frail body was united a tireless energy and an intense intellectuality. His head was disproportionately large, with a high and broad forehead. His portrait taken in his later years shows the face of a zealot, long, thin, and smooth shaven, with flaming eyes and a ruff of neck whiskers.

Connections

Davis married Anna Maria Parker on March 5, 1838.

Father:

Dow Davis

Mother:

Eleanor Smith

Wife:

Anna Maria Parker