Nevada
County
Biographies
ORMISTON SWAYZE, M. D.
Dr.
Ormiston Swayze holds a place in the front rank of
the able and skillful physicians and surgeons in the Sacramento Valley and in
his home community, Nevada City, is very highly esteemed also as a man and
citizen. He was born in the province of
Ontario, Canada, on the 6th of June, 1867. The family has lived for four generations on
the same estate in Ontario. The paternal
great-grandfather, Captain Isaac Swayze, who lived in the New Jersey colony,
remained loyal to the crown during the war of the Revolution, and moved to
Ontario, where he received a grant one thousand acres of land, which occupied a
beautiful site, overlooking the Niagara River.
This place is still in the possession of the Swayze family, and two
four-pound cannon, which are mounted in front of the manorial residence, serve
to recall the War of 1812. On this place
were born Ormiston Swayze, his father and his
grandfather. The mother, who was born in
England, was descended from John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough. The Doctor in both paternal and maternal
lines is descended from sterling old English stock.
Ormiston Swayze received his early education in the public
schools of his native province and when ten years of age, on account of his
mother’s health, accompanied her to California.
When a lad of about fourteen years, he went back to Canada and entered
Woodstock College, from which he was graduated with the degree of Bachelor of
Arts. Soon afterward he went to
Cleveland, Ohio, and took up the study of medicine under the direction of his
cousin, Dr. Nathaniel Schneider, at that time chief surgeon for the Lake Shore
& Michigan Southern Railroad, with headquarters in Cleveland. Dr. Swayze assisted Dr. Schneider in his work
at the Huron Road Hospital, at Cleveland, and later matriculated at the
Cleveland Hospital Medical College.
While there he rose to the position of first assistant hospital surgeon,
and in 1889 was graduated with the degree of Doctor of Medicine. Among others who signed his diploma was the
late Mark Hanna. Returning to California
in 1889, he served for three years as lecturer and professor of dermatology in
the Hahnemann Medical College of San Francisco, which is now a part of the
medical department of the University of California. In 1903 he went to Europe for special work on
diseases of the eye, ear, nose and throat and after his return to San Francisco
took up practice as a specialist in those lines. Subsequently he made a second trip abroad for
post-graduate work on those subjects.
For some time after, he carried on practice in San Francisco, and then
moved to Sacramento, where he was taken ill with malaria, because of which he
found it advisable to move to Nevada City in 1919. At that time he was considerably run down in
health, weighed but one hundred and twenty-five pounds, but during the
subsequent years he has not only built up a good practice, but has measurably
rid himself of the malaria. His practice
is extensive, covering a broad territory, extending as far as Grass Valley.
Doctor Swayze was married in Grass
Valley in 1919. His religious connection
is with the Protestant Episcopal Church.
He was affiliated with the San Francisco County Medical Society, the
California State Medical Society, the Institute of California Surgeons and the
American Institute. He is regarded as
one of the ablest physicians and surgeons in this section of the Sacramento
Valley, is extremely popular generally because of his kindly and unassuming
manner, his learning and skill in his profession and the notable and uniform
success which has crowned his efforts.
Transcribed by
Gerald Iaquinta.
Source:
Wooldridge, J.W.Major History of Sacramento Valley
California, Vol. 3 Pages 182-183. Pioneer Historical
Publishing Co. Chicago 1931.
© 2010
Gerald Iaquinta.
Golden Nugget Library's Nevada County Biographies