Pliny Earle (physician)
Encyclopedia
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Doctor of Medicine
Doctor of Medicine is a doctoral degree for physicians. The degree is granted by medical schools...
(December 31, 1809 - 1892) was an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
physician
Physician
A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...
, psychiatrist
Psychiatrist
A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. All psychiatrists are trained in diagnostic evaluation and in psychotherapy...
, and poet
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...
.
Biography
Pliny Earle was born in Leicester, MassachusettsLeicester, Massachusetts
Leicester is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 10,970 at the 2010 census.-History:Leicester was first settled in 1713 and was officially incorporated in 1714....
, and was the son of the inventor Pliny Earle.
He graduated at the University of Pennsylvania
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
in 1837, then studied in the hospitals of Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, and visited institutions for the insane in European countries. In 1840 he became resident physician of the asylum for the insane (now known as Friends Hospital
Friends Hospital
Friends Hospital, located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is recognized as one of the premier mental hospitals in the United States.Founded by Quakers in 1813 as "The Asylum for Persons Deprived of the Use of Their Reason," and later known as the "Frankford Asylum for the Insane," it was the first...
) at Frankford, Pennsylvania
Frankford, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Frankford is a large and important neighborhood in the lower Northeast section of Philadelphia situated about six miles northeast of Center City. Although its borders are vaguely defined, the neighborhood is bounded roughly by the original course of Frankford Creek, now roughly Adams to Aramingo...
(now part of Philadelphia), where he remained two years. From April 1844 till April 1849, he was physician to Bloomingdale asylum, in New York. He immediately afterward visited insane hospitals in Europe. In 1853 he was appointed visiting physician to the New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
lunatic asylum, and in the same year delivered a course of lectures on mental disorders at the College of physicians and surgeons, New York. In 1863 he became professor of materia medica
Materia medica
Materia medica is a Latin medical term for the body of collected knowledge about the therapeutic properties of any substance used for healing . The term 'materia medica' derived from the title of a work by the Ancient Greek physician Pedanius Dioscorides in the 1st century AD, De materia medica libre...
and psychology in Berkshire medical institute in Pittsfield, Massachusetts
Pittsfield, Massachusetts
Pittsfield is the largest city and the county seat of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the principal city of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area which encompasses all of Berkshire County. Its area code is 413. Its ZIP code is 01201...
, the first professorship of mental diseases ever established by a medical College in the United States. His lectures there were limited to the one course of 1864, owing to his appointment as superintendent and physician-in-chief of the state hospital for the insane in Northampton, Massachusetts
Northampton, Massachusetts
The city of Northampton is the county seat of Hampshire County, Massachusetts, United States. As of the 2010 census, the population of Northampton's central neighborhoods, was 28,549...
.
He held this place until October 1885 in 1871 he visited forty-six institutions for the insane in Europe. Dr. Earle was, so far as known, the first person that ever addressed an audience of the insane in any other than a religious discourse. His introduction of lectures on natural philosophy at the Frankford asylum, in the winter of 1840-1841, was the initiative to a system of combined instruction and entertainment, which has been widely adopted, and is now considered essential to the highest perfection of an institution for the insane. In the winter of 1866-1867, at the hospital in Northampton, he delivered a course of lectures on insanity before audiences in which the average number of insane persons was about 250.
He was also a founder of the American Medical Association
American Medical Association
The American Medical Association , founded in 1847 and incorporated in 1897, is the largest association of medical doctors and medical students in the United States.-Scope and operations:...
, the New York Academy of Medicine
New York Academy of Medicine
The New York Academy of Medicine was founded in 1847 by a group of leading New York City metropolitan area physicians as a voice for the medical profession in medical practice and public health reform...
, the Association of Medical Superintendents of American Institutions for the Insane
Association of Medical Superintendents of American Institutions for the Insane
The Association of Medical Superintendents of American Institutions for the Insane, also known as The Superintendents' Association, was organized in Philadelphia in October, 1844 at a meeting of 13 superintendents, making it the first professional medical specialty organization in the U.S...
, and the New England Psychological Society.
Non-fiction
- A Visit to Thirteen Asylums for the Insane in Europe (1840)
- The History, Description, and Statistics of the Bloomingdale Asylum (1848)
- Institutions for the Insane in Prussia, Germany, and Austria (1853)
- An Examination of the Practice of Bloodletting in Mental Disorders (1854)
- The Curability of Insanity (1887)
External links
- Biographical sketch and portrait at The American Journal of Psychiatry