JAMES A. SPALDING, M.D. 1846-1938

Abstract

Dr. James A. Spalding was born at Portsmouth, N. H., Aug. 20, 1846, the son of Lyman Dyer and Susan Parker Spalding, and died at his home in Portland, Me, on Feb. 27, 1938, in his ninety-second year. He was a grandson of Dr. Lyman Spalding, the founder of the Phar¬ macopeia of the United States, which was responsible for effecting uniform writing of prescriptions. After graduating from Dartmouth College, he received the degree of Doctor of Medicine from Harvard in 1870. He had a defect in hearing, which became gradually worse, and he was advised to specialize in diseases of the eyes and of the ears. After he had studied these specialties abroad, he started to practice in Portland in 1873. He became ophthalmologist and otolo¬ gist to the General Hospital and took an active part in the development of the practice of these two specialties and helped to found the ophthalmologic and otologie clinics at Augusta, Bangor and Portland. He was a member of the American Ophthalmological Society, the American Academy of Medicine, the American Academy of Ophthal¬ mology and Otolaryngology, the Medical Association, of which he was once president, and the Cumberland County Medical Association. Dr. Spalding was the author of many medical articles and also wrote several books, including Maine Physicians in 1820. He mar¬ ried Miss Sarah Chase Shepley, of Boston, in 1882. In addition to his interest in the two specialties which he practiced, he was a linguist, being unusually proficient in German, Italian and French and also having studied Spanish and Gaelic. He had an analytic mind, and few things escaped his keen sense of humor. He early came under the influence of Dr. Herman Knapp and through many years was of the greatest help in. the publication of the .Archives of Ophthalmology and the Archives of Otology. Notwithstanding his loss of hearing, his career has been a most distinguished one. On the occasion of a dinner in his honor, on Sept. 19, 1931, Dr. Edwin W. Gehring stated that Dr. Spalding was the Nestor of the medical profession of ; a man of broad culture, profound learning, and wide human sympathies, whose perennial youth startles and delights us. Arnold Knapp.