Sacramento County

Biographies

 

 

 

 

THOMAS MULDRUP LOGAN, M.D.

(1808-1876)

 

 

   Dr. Thomas M. Logan, a laborer 'in the cause of science, and for the improvement and preservation of the human race, particularly by the organization and encouragement of scientific and literary associations, for the development of mind, the concentration of effort in every good work, and the diffusion of useful knowledge, show him to have been imbued with an enlarged benevolence, a genuine love of truth, and a fervid desire to investigate and apply principles for the general elevation and well-being of society.'¹  The area and period each were thresholds of transition for all structures of government and life, especially so medicine, when Dr. Logan lived in Sacramento.  Antecedent circumstances were not entirely acceptable precedents; self, was power, and character and circumstances too often in conflict.  For more than a quarter century of this period Dr. Logan was one of the greatest medical influences.

   Thomas Muldrup Logan was born in the City of Charleston, South Carolina, July 31, 1808, the son of Dr. George and Margaret White (Polk) Logan.  Dr. George Logan was a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania in 1802---for many years a leading physician of Charleston, 'for 44 years Physician to the Extension Orphan Asylum'² and died in New Orleans in 1861, aged 82 years.

   Colonel George Logan, the first American ancestor of the family, emigrated from Restalrig, near Leith, Scotland, to Charleston, South Carolina, early in the eighteenth century.  The Colonel's son, William, married Martha Daniels, daughter of His Britannic Majesty's Provincial Governor of South Carolina.  A son, George, of this union, grandfather of Dr. Thomas Logan, graduated in medicine at the University of Edinburgh in 1773.  Following a few years of study on the Continent he married, in 1775, Honoria Muldrup, daughter of the Danish Consul, in Scotland, and then returned to Charleston to practice medicine.  Because of failing health he visited the Eastern States in 1793 and died July, 1793, in Salem, Massachusetts, aged 42, leaving a wife and four children.  One of the children, father of Thomas M. Logan, studied medicine and practiced in Charleston.

   Thomas M. Logan received academic and classical education at the Charleston College, commenced study of medicine with his father, and graduated M.D, from the Medical College of South Carolina in 1828. 'His first thesis on the occasion was the “Salix Nigra” as a succedaneum to the official Cinchona.'³  He immediately commenced, and for a year or two pursued, the practice of his profession in Clarendon, South Carolina.  After completion of medical studies he married Susan W. A., only daughter of the Hon. John S. Richardson, Judge, Circuit Court of South Carolina.

   Dr. Logan went to Europe in 1832, and spent a year in Great Britain and France 'in a course of professional culture, chiefly in the hospitals and lecture rooms of Paris.'4  this was the period of an epidemic of cholera to which the Doctor gave careful study, as well as a study of the more recent pathologic views of diseases.  He returned home the following year abetted and stimulated by this advanced course of medical pursuit and practiced for several years in his native city.  He was chosen “Lecturer on Materia Medica and Therapeutics” in the Southern School of Practical Medicine, a summer course under auspices of the Medical College of South Carolina.

   With Dr. Thomas L. Odgier, he commenced the publication of “A Compendium of Operative Surgery,” the first number of which was issued in 1834, and the second in 1836.  'These parts contained descriptions of all the operative procedures for the ligation of arteries, and were illustrated by colored drawings designed and drawn by Dr. Logan.'5  (Colored engraving became, throughout life, one of the Doctor's avocations.)  The work, however, was not completed owing to Dr. Logan's removal to New Orleans in 1843.  There he engaged in the practice of medicine until 1849.  He made other literary contributions at this time:  “Medical Ethics”; an Anniversary Address, April 13, 1844, before the Medico-Chirurgical Society of Louisiana; and “Memoirs of C. A. Luzenberg, M.D., President of the Medico-Chirurgical Society of Louisiana,” published by the Society of New Orleans, 1848.6

   In New Orleans Doctor Logan became visiting physician to Charity Hospital, a position filled with credit until 1847, 'when he received the appointment of Visiting Surgeon to the Luzenbergs Hospital, established by the United States Government under Purveyor Dr. Charles McCormick for the accommodation of soldiers returning from the campaign in Mexico.'7  The hospital closed in 1849, and the discovery of gold in California induced him to leave for that attractive region. 'He sailed from New Orleans in a small schooner, and after a long and tempestuous voyage, arrived in San Francisco January 26th, 1850.  He remained a few months in that City in the practice of his profession, and then went to Coloma and there mined for gold for a short time.  While there, the terrible epidemic of Asiatic Cholera broke out in Sacramento, in October, 1850.   He immediately repaired to that City, to encounter and combat that fearful pestilence, and there he resided to the time of his death.'8

   However, from the Doctor's statement---”I have passed two rainy and two dry months in San Francisco; have traveled through one month of spring and two months of summer among the northern mines, and have resided near three months of summer and fall in Sacramento City.”9 ---he arrived in Sacramento in August, prior to the outbreak of cholera.  There is no existing record he participated in efforts of the Medico-Chirurgical Academy of Sacramento to improve the City's sanitation and have a Board of Health appointed in early days of the cholera epidemic.  There can be no doubt that Dr. Logan lent his aid to the program, for he had experience with cholera, and forever was a leader in sanitary science.  From his office at 286 J street he cooperated with fellows against the terrible scourge, wherein 17 brother practitioners gave their lives.

   In a letter, October 29, 1850, to his brother-in-law Dr. Fenner of New Orleans, Dr. Logan stated: 'In Sacramento City, about three-fourths of a degree north of San Francisco, a totally different climatic condition obtains.  The climate and topography resembles much that of New Orleans; and while the heat of the day is excessive and oppressive, in consequence of the want of refreshing breezes, the morning and evenings are chilly and uncomfortable.  This is generally the case throughout the whole valley of the Sacramento, except that farther in the interior, among the mining regions, the solar heat is more intense.  At Coloma, or Sutter's Mill, where the gold was first discovered, and which may be considered the heart of the mining districts, the thermometer frequently stands 95 to 100 degrees Fahrenheit at meridian, and on the 30th of June last it reached as high as 125 degrees in the shade, at the hotel where I then was.'

   'I have been thus particular in my remarks respecting the temperature, winds, etc., up to the present time, in order to exhibit some data on which to predicate an opinion respecting the probable prevalence of cholera, which has just appeared among us, and as a preliminary to a few observations respecting “the prevailing diseases of California.”  I have already mentioned the deplorable mortality by one disease along, diarrhoea, in San Francisco.  I cannot say whether such continues to be the case now, as I can obtain no statistics from which to make a computation.  My foregoing estimate of 30 per cent mortality was formed from what I witnessed personally while engaged in the practice of my profession in San Francisco last winter and spring, as physician to “the Strangers' Friend Society.”  As my health began to break down under the rigors of a climate so uncongenial to my habits and temperament, I left there in April, in order to recruit my exhausted energies by an excursion among the mining regions, and subsequently settled here in August last.'

   When a resident of Sacramento City for only two months Dr. Logan began a climatological, necrological and meteorological study, a continuance of interests he had followed and statistically recorded since beginning the practice of medicine.  He brought to California instruments recording precipitation, temperature and humidity.  Two months after arriving in Sacramento he wrote Dr. Fenner, of New Orleans, describing California's climate, condition of the Medical Profession, diseases present, cholera epidemic and the hygienic condition of California and epidemics.  Most of his letters were printed in the New Orleans Medical and Surgical Journal.

   On March 19, 1862, the Doctor donated his Meteorological and Necrological Register to the Sacramento Board of Health.  The Register had reached its decennial period.  Dr. Logan agreed to continue such recordations for the benefit of the Board, reserving the right, however, to furnish, as usual, copies of the Meteorological Record to the Smithsonian Institute and 'to make such other use of the same for his private or the public benefit as he may require.'10   This research accorded him national recognition.  It progressed with meticulous accuracy, and 'irregularly published reports were made, up until 1870 when the United States Weather Bureau was established.'  The records were then taken over 'as a part of the Official Records of the Federal Government.'11   

   Dr. Logan's knowledge of the topography of Sacramento was of great help to the Board of Health.  He had studied the terrain and drainage, the flora and other requisites, and wrote on the subjects.  Likewise he investigated and recorded all deaths, past and present.  Dr. V. J. Fourgeaud, a former Sacramento practitioner, in 1861 Editor of the Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal, gave Dr. Logan credit for possessing the only analysis of records or mortality on the Pacific Coast and acknowledged his indebtedness 'for the full and valuable statistics we owe to his preserving industry.'  Thus was Dr. Logan Sacramento's first Weather Bureau, first in fact west of the Rocky Mountains, and similarly the first Western Necrologist.  He preceded the Federal Government by twenty years in coastal meteorology, and was a local, and national purveyor of facts 'that may be derived from a careful study and analysis of the records of mortality.'12 

   The Medico-Chirurgical Association of  Sacramento disbanded in 1854.  There is every likelihood Doctor Logan was a member---his every characteristic would acclaim it so---but no evidence is found to admit the presumption.  He was a member of the Sacramento County Pathological Society, organized in 1858.  The Doctor took a very active part in organizing the Sacramento Medical Society, April 30, 1855, and became Corresponding Secretary.  He joined hands with Harkness, Morse, Houghton, Hatch, Montgomery, Oatman, Mouser, Nixon, Proctor, and thirteen others, to protect regular practitioners and the public 'from the innovations and malpractice of uneducated pretenders, who will display their “shingles” in every community.'13   On May 28, 1856, Dr. Logan presented his “Vis Medicatrix Naturae” essay to the Society, wherein he brought forth 'the peculiar, reparative,(sic) recuperative, and restorative powers of the local climate.'

   He wrote a series of articles, in 1856 and 1857, entitled “Contributions to the History of Medicine in California.”  In his articles Dr. Logan adopted the great Father of Medicine, Hippocrates, as a guide, and similarity in thought is noticeable in Logan's Medical History.  'Logan quoted a view,' stated Dr. Henry Harris,14  'only slightly amplified since the time of Hippocrates, that a country was unhealthful in proportion to the area of undrained alluvial soil that it included.'  The seasons, cold and hot winds, qualities of the waters, topography, and people and their habits all were discussed by Dr. Logan.  The conditions likely to affect public health were weighed by him.  His essays required tremendous research and still remain excellent sources of information.  Dr. Morse published the articles in the California State Medical Journal, printed in Sacramento.

   This series was followed, in 1858, with a report on the topography, meteorology, endemics and epidemics of California, to the State Medical Society.  Therein Dr. Logan reviewed epidemics that occurred in California in preceding years.  In 1859, the American Medical Association printed the report on topography and epidemics of California.  It was a rearrangement by Dr. Logan, after more mature deliberation, of information he had been gathering and wrote about for a few years past.  In 1855, at a meeting of the American Medical Association in Boston, Dr. Logan presented to the section a report on medical topography and epidemics of California.  Some of these articles were published in pamphlet form.

   Dr. Logan accentuated the importance of meteorology on the healthfulness of people, and considered registration of births, deaths and marriages 'equally important in a medical point of view.'  He searched records of Sacramento's undertakers from April, 1850 to January, 1858, and tabulated monthly mortality according to death, age, sex, nativity and ratio of deaths to population, seeking standards for comparison in future.  Letters were written doctors throughout the State for comparable data in their particular locality.  He sought, in 1857, from the State Society, the printing of blank forms for monthly reporting of disease by all physicians.   'This grand desideratum, which the New York State Medical Society has succeeded in consummating,' commented Dr. Logan, 'takes precedence, in our estimation, in importance over the results to be obtained from a registration of deaths for, if all the “cases” of “disease” which occur in the State can be accurately enumerated, we shall possess a view of its sanitary condition far more clear and distinct than can be obtained from the former only.'

   Support from his confreres was minimal.  Interest, seemingly, was alone Dr. Logan's, and, undaunted, he continued to press the project.  His statistics revealed half the deaths in Sacramento were “zymotic,” i.e., from endemic, epidemic and contagious diseases, as classified in that day.

   Posterity is indebted to Dr. Logan for his recordations on the cholera epidemic at Sacramento.  Without his letters and treatises on this subject much factual data would be missing.  His first written comment on the disease was in a letter, October 29, 1850, to Dr. Fenner.  'On the 7th of October,' he stated, 'the steamer Caroline arrived in San Francisco, from Panama, and was reported to have on board during her passage twenty-two cases of cholera, of which number fourteen died.  She was not quarantined.  Since this period several well-marked cases and deaths of cholera have occurred at San Francisco where the disease still exists.  There is now but little apprehension entertained of its assuming a malignant type in that city, and I am disposed to think that the usually prevailing high winds there are of favorable influence against the spread of the disease.

   From a 'climatic account' Dr. Logan was most apprehensive for Sacramento; he had 'every reason to apprehend the worst.' The first case the Doctor observed was on October 18, but 'from this period the disease has continued to occur more frequently.' One month later he wrote:  “As I apprehended, our worst fears have been realized—-for never, in the history of this cosmopolitan disease, since its first appearance in the Gangentic delta in 1817, and its subsequent progress around the globe, which it has at last encompassed, has any visitation been so destructive and appalling . . . The like mortality is unprecedented, and only to be surpassed by the Black Death and awful plagues of the fourteenth century.  Even in Paris, in 1832, when I first encountered the disease, and where the mortality was regarded excessive---amounting to 18,000 out of a population of 800,000, the proportionate number of deaths was not so great, by more than one-half: there, only one in 44 died; but in Sacramento City, one out of every 17 inhabitants fell a victim to the scourge, and this a most moderate calculation, based solely upon the mortuary record of the two coffin-makers and undertakers.'

   Of the ninety physicians embraced in the population not one fled; all remained and 'performed their duties with an unflinching firmness and fidelity worthy of all honorable mention.  In the renowned colleges of Castile, under the special control of a royal junta, whose prerogative once extended over this far-distant country,' wrote Dr. Logan, 'the degree of Medico-Cirujano was never conferred without the most solemn oath being exacted from the candidate. . . No such solemn declaration is required in schools and colleges, but under moral suasion of our free government, and the example of the illustrious patriots who have exalted the character of a nation, our graduates go forth imbued with the American spirit of usefulness---with a sense of duty, far more stringent than any legal obligation, and, confronting every difficulty in the hour of danger and distress, vie with each other in the emulation of working for a public good.'

   The origin, the cause, of pestilence was the moot question before these physicians. Dr. Logan was studying the possibility of a meteorological and topographical basis.  The floods, and a terrain not permitting proper drainage and made worse by the primary levees; marshy, wooded, tule land with its “effluvial” emanations; variations in seasons, with the changes thereby brought about; improper sanitation, and insanitary housing of the transient population, all were given careful consideration by Dr. Logan, and communicability was not overlooked.  Looking, searching, pondering for an unknown---an unknown that was brutally and tragically piling one body beside another, or upon others, in the city cemetery.  Fortunately, “Heaven from all creatures hides the book of fate.”

   When the Doctor passed through Sacramento in the spring, on his way to Coloma, he stated 'it was nearly all under water, and the only way I could get along through the streets was on little foot-bridges or in a canoe.  Whether the exhumation of the soil, necessary for building of the levee, has had any influence in the causation of cholera, I am unable at the present time to decide.'  He wondered if there was tulleric influence; many believed it the true one. Dr. Logan cited a strong case in point:  the steamer Montague left Sacramento on 18th October, 'before a single case of cholera had occurred,' with forty-three passengers, and reaching San Francisco on the 22d, six passenger had died of cholera.  'No other cause is assigned for the sickness on board, except that the schooner was ballasted with surface soil taken in at Sacramento.'  The case seen by Dr. Logan on the 18th 'had just come in from the country, and stopped in my hospital in the suburbs, unable to proceed on his way into the city.  Whether he had communication in any manner, directly or indirectly, with San Francisco, or the passengers of the steamer Caroline, which arrived at that city, from Panama, on the 7th October, I am unable to say.'

   There was need for closer communion of physicians throughout the State.   Dr. Logan perceived the scientific assets to be derived through such liaison, and, with the cooperation of Dr. E. S. Cooper of San Francisco, set the project in motion.  Logan wrote personal letters to doctors throughout the State, and, with Cooper, issued a call for the organization of the California State Medical Society, to 'develop, in the highest possible degree, the scientific truths embodied in the profession.'15  The systematization, and orderly workmanship essential to such a task, is characteristically Logan.  Dr. G. L. Simmons, a living participant, speaking to the State Society in 1891 said, “this Sacramentan (Logan) was also largely instrumental in forming the first State Medical Society in this city in 1856.”

   At this first meeting Dr. Logan was elected Corresponding Secretary and one of a committee to draft a Constitution and By-Laws.  He offered a preamble and resolution for a medical journal 'on the shores of the Pacific,' and recommended Dr. Morse, publisher, as 'one of the pioneers of our noble profession who has identified himself with every work of progress in this community---moral, social, or medical---a gentleman thoroughly drilled, by long experience, in the tactics of editorial discipline...'

   The second meeting of the Society, February 11, 1857, in Sacramento, found Dr. Logan representative of the Sacramento Pathological Society, chosen Chairman of the Committee on Medical Topography.  Also he was reelected Corresponding Secretary.  This State Society enjoyed but brief existence, in reality disbanding in 1858, though it continued to elect officers until 1860. 'During its last meeting in 1859, on the claim that Dr. R. Beverly Cole had insulted the women of the South, the gallant co-founder of the Society, Dr. T. M. Logan, and all the other Southerners, walked out.'16

   In 1861, Dr. Logan's article on a “Case of Primary Cancer of the Stomach” was printed in the Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal.17  Another article, a “Foreign Body in the Trachea” was given the same journal in 1863.18   During April he lectured to the Young Mens(sic) Christian Association, in the First Congregational Church in San Francisco, on “Five Years Meteorological Observations in California.”   The same year Dr. Logan was appointed one of a “Special Committee on Medical Topography and Epidemic Diseases” for the American Medical Association.  During 1864 the Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal19  printed his “Contributions to the Physics, Hygiene and Thermology of the Sacramento River,” an address he had some time previously delivered before the California Academy of Natural Sciences.  In 1864 he gave a report on the Medical Topography and Epidemics, 'embracing a period of six years, in continuance of a report he had the honor to submit in the year 1858.'  In 1866, his article on “A New Mode of Treating Fracture of the Patella” was published.

   He became a collaborator for the Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal in 1867 under editorship of the Drs. Henry Gibbons, father and son.  Dr. Logan attended the American Medical Association meeting in Cincinnati and at the conclusion of the session sailed on his second trip to Europe, to attend the International Medical Congress, convening August, 1867, in Paris.  'To M. Jaccond, the General Secretary, I handed my credentials from Toland Medical College, and from the American Medical Association, and immediately received a “Carte de Membre Adherent.”20  Sittings were held in the Ecole de Medeciene and papers and discussions were in French, a language in which the Doctor was versatile.  'No estimate can be formed of the number in attendance,' wrote Dr. Logan, but 'physicians are continually coming and going from all parts of the world, and yet such is the immensity of the hosts of people now in Paris, and such the enormous sources of excitement, that our medical meeting sinks into comparative insignificance.'  Dr. Logan was disappointed in hospitalities of the Paris hosts for he wrote, 'with the exception of the grand dinner on the 24th, no other civility has been extended.'  Following the Medical Congress a few months were spent visiting medical institutions in France, England and Germany.

   On return to Sacramento Dr. Logan resolved to remove to San Francisco.  December 2, 1867, Dr. F. W. Hatch presented Dr. Logan's resignation as Secretary of the City Board of Health.  At the beginning of 1868 he opened an office at 641 Market Street, between Second and Third, opposite Montgomery Street.21  On the 24th of March, Logan read a paper before the San Francisco Medical Society on “Mushrooms and the Poisoning, with cases.” which was published in the Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal.22  Dr. Logan was Corresponding Secretary at the reorganization of the San Francisco Medical Society in February, and, with Dr. T. F. Morse, placed on the Committee on Ethics.23

   Unhappy in his new surroundings, or because the climate of San Francisco was still unhealthful, he returned to Sacramento at the end of the year.  The Sacramento Society for Medical Improvement came into being during Dr. Logan's absence, otherwise the original membership would have been thirteen instead of twelve.  However, he immediately joined the Society, and being the oldest practitioner by eleven years was accorded the honor to be the first to sign the Constitution.

   On February 16, 1869, at a meeting of the Medical Society, he gave a paper on “the Medical History of 1868.”  After presenting the History the Society moved 'the Secretary be authorized to arrange for the publication of the paper in the Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal, and for the issue of a pamphlet copy of the Essay as a publication of the Society.'  The paper was one of many of Logan's literary efforts---exhaustive, imaginative, analytical---and wrapped around a passionate desire for understanding of epidemiological diseases, with the small pox epidemic accentuated.  Small pox had been a most devastating epidemic---difficult, today, to comprehend the disfigurement and death created.  'As during the 17th century it was, in Europe, the most terrible of the ministers of death, so here, in the 19th century, it would seem to have lost none of its virulence, nor loosened its hold upon man, on account of any improved prophylaxis,' stated Logan.  'What the great historian of England, in his comparison of variola and the plague, has recorded, applies with peculiar force to California, inasmuch as neither the latter disease nor any other equally appalling, has ever made its appearance here.  “The havoc of the plague,” writes Macauley, “had been more rapid, but it visited our shores only once or twice within living memory; but the small pox was always present, filling the church-yard with corpses, leaving on those whose lives were spared the hideous traces of its power, turning the babe into a changeling at which the mother shuddered, and making the eyes and cheeks of the betrothed maiden objects of horror to her lover.” ' This graphic picture, so Logan stated, was not overdrawn: it was here reproduced 'during the late epidemic visitation, with the same if not greater resulting suffering and fatality than at any time or at any placed during the worst years of the past or present century, has been positively proven beyond record.  Let us carry our thoughts back to that gloomy period, when we ourselves were shunned and almost ostracized by the community for doing our duty, in endeavoring to assuage the immense amount of suffering which overwhelmed the miserable subjects who passed through the varying stages of this most loathsome disease---a few only surviving tortures far worse than death itself.'

   The following July, Dr. Logan read a paper before the San Francisco Medical Society on a “Case of Dystocia (painful or slow delivery of birth), Complicated with Adherent Placenta.”  There were no inactive moments in Dr. Logan's life.  To accomplish so much in various fields and concurrently maintain an active medical practice creates wonderment and admiration.  He was one of the most productive writers of medical literature in the nation.  Through his essays, personal correspondence and medical society activities, he was better known by medical confreres of the West than any other physician.  Ere 1870 arrived he had gained favorable national recognition.  'He was a ready writer,' stated Dr. Toner, 'and was always found to be an advocate of progress in the sciences, and his benevolence at the same time led him to make persistent efforts for the improvement of the physical, mental and moral condition of the race.   His name is closely identified with all measures in this direction in California for over a quarter of a century.'

   In a straightforward and unpretentious manner Logan, February, 1869, spoke forcefully to the American Medical Association:  'Imbued with the conviction that the beginning of wisdom is the knowledge of ignorance, and conscious of the difficulties which, on every hand, beset him, the scientific physician explores cautiously, doubts judiciously, and determines slowly.' Such logic proclaimed his spiritual being; for twenty years he had pursued that path.  Public hygiene, epidemics, quarantines and needed sanitary provisions for cities, towns, and countries had long received careful scrutiny. Then he crystallized a determination a California State Board of Health should be instituted.  The small pox epidemic, 1868-1869, was the culmination causing crystallization.  'During the rainy season of 1868-1869,' said Logan, 'the whole Pacific Coast was afflicted with one of the most readily preventable of all the diseases to which humanity is subject.  Had the popular prejudice against the resort to revaccination been timely met and overcome, I confidently think that small pox would not only never have assumed the epidemic form, but would never have found an entrance into our State.'  Loss of hundreds of lives moved Logan to act for creation of a State Board of Health.  The few local Boards of Health in the State were unequal to, and without power for, general needs.  A central power was requisite.

   'At the session of 1869-70 of the California Legislature, an Act, previously prepared by him (Logan) or under his directions, was pressed, establishing the State Board of Health of California.'24  'The measure gave the Board little power and there were no additional health laws that provided any activities related to enforcement.'25  The 'little power' was not oversight---it was political.  Senator Burnett introduced the Bill, and finally, after much opposition, the law was enacted on March 18, 1870, and approved by Governor H. H. Haight.  The first meeting of the State Board of Health was held in Sacramento on April 22d, that year.  'The Governor was to appoint to the Board five physicians for a term of four years, two of whom were to be residents of Sacramento.  It's yearly appropriation was $4,000, $2,500 apportioned to the permanent secretary and $1,500 for traveling and office expense and outlay incident to the collecting of data.  Thus every three months, for such was the law's requirement, those doctors, without compensation other than traveling expense, went by stage or stream to join their two colleagues in a meeting of the Board at Sacramento.  Five most excellent citizens they were, and, considering time and money, it was expedient that they be citizens of regions close to Sacramento.'26

   Dr. T. M. Logan was chosen permanent secretary, 'a position very congenial to his tastes,'27  and for which he had outstanding qualifications.  His capabilities and influence on the Board already were material and added many additional honors in this chapter of the Doctor's life.  Until death he remained permanent secretary, and gave the work an unstinted and proficient patronage.

   A prevailing force was Dr. Logan.  In 1847 he was a participant at the birth of the American Medical Association.  His interest in that national organization never waned.  After becoming an adopted son of California, a land in that day far removed from eastern States, he, nonetheless, by personal correspondence, by many essays submitted, and by occasional attendance at national meetings, tried to hold close contact.  Since 1865 he had been a permanent member.  In 1867, Dr. Logan attended the American Medical Association meeting in Cincinnati.  There he began the groundwork for a national conclave on the Pacific Coast, to be held on completion of the Transcontinental Railroad.  At that time 'there was not in existence one solitary medical society in California,' and, continued Logan---quoting from D. W. Yandell, M.D., of Kentucky:  “In the great republic of science, all geographical lines should be abolished.”  'The idea forced upon my mind by the utterance of these words---of holding one of the sessions of the National Association in California, and on which hinged my every hope of restoring the morale of the profession in the State of my adoption---was communicated to several of the delegates from other States around me---three of whom, Drs. Davis, Storer and Toner, were present at the last meeting in San Francisco---who assured me of its feasibility, if ever the transcontinental railroad should be finished.'28  With this encouragement, sensing a desire of eastern doctors to see the West, of which they had heard and read so much the past twenty years, he added even greater curiosity through his writing and power of speech.  He planted the seed.  He exacted promises of cooperation from closer acquaintances.  The short period of depression in 1866-7 had, too, emphasized the western drift of emigration---from slightly under 250,000 in 1865 to 460,000 in 1873.  This added further to general interest in the Pacific area.

   The State Medical Society had been in 'innocuous desuetude' for approximately ten years.  Because of medical cliques it was hopelessly mired.  A national meeting in the West would restore State organization, give uplift to medical science west of the Rocky Mountains and permit eastern physicians 'to kneel side by side with us at a common altar, and pour the acquisitions of their lives into a common treasury.'29  The last tie in completion of the Pacific Railroad was laid May 10, 1869.  At the annual meeting of the American Medical Association in 1870 it was voted to adjourn to meet again in San Francisco in 1871.  The time was now opportune to reorganize the State Medical Society, since a host society to the National Association was a requisite.  Only one State organization then existed (the Sacramento Society for Medical Improvement) that, in any degree, represented the profession.  Thus it was the California State Board of Health, through Dr. Logan, permanent secretary, sought a Convention, to meet at San Francisco, October 19, 1870, to reorganize the State Medical Society.

   Dr. Logan made a very appropriate address of welcome:  'thanking the members for their cordial response to this call and reviewing the earlier, happy organization of the State Medical Society, which, though lamentably dissolved had, through its impetus, moved the profession 'onward and upward.'  The intended visitation of the American Medical Association was discussed:  'They come not for the purpose of self-aggrandizement or personal ambition, nor yet to advance the schemes of parties, or to stir up sectional antipathies, but solely as a bond of brothers, to stimulate our industry and keep alive our professional ardor, while participating in these social amenities which constitute the true link between science and philanthrophy(sic).  I would therefore invoke you, by all the stirring claims of duty, of hospitality, and of professional pride by which as a society we have been bound and are now about being rebound together, so to conduct our proceedings with unanimity and concert of action, that they may subserve the noble ends for which we are now assembled---that still more brilliant memories may adorn our annals and render us more worthy of the high compliment which, in its wisdom, our National Association has determined to accord us.'

   Dr. Logan's influence in drafting the Constitution, his election as President of the reorganized Society, his planning for the American Medical Association meeting in San Francisco in May, 1871, and the annual session of the reorganized State Society in Sacramento in October, 1871, required a vast amount of work and a finesse that, perhaps, no other contemporary might have performed.  Burying old resentments and holding diverging cliques on a plane of equity, through an appeal to their 'claims of duty, of hospitality, and of professional pride' was accomplished, even when there were moments Dr. Logan felt that “no matter how much you feed a wolf he will always return to the forest.”  Dr. Toner, of Washington, D.C., expressed the eastern doctors' feelings toward Logan when he said: 'The Doctor was very active and efficient in his exertions to afford proper facilities for the meeting of the American Medical Association which met at San Francisco in 1871.  He had made himself familiar with the requirements of the association, and in conjunction with the physicians of that city gave us a grand reception.  The kind welcome, with the profusion of hospitalities and very agreeable entertainments, left nothing to be desired.  The physicians from the States east of the Rocky Mountains returned delighted with their visit, and all extravagant in their praises of the hospitality and goodfellowship of the physicians of California.  As a slight mark of their appreciation, Dr. Logan was elected one of the Vice-Presidents of the Association.'

   During the meeting Dr. Logan took the floor and resolved a Chair of Hygiene, independent of Physiology, be established in all medical schools, and there be established an agency of Federal Government to coordinate and administer all medical and health functions of the Federal Government, exclusive of those of the Army and Navy.  He asked for a Secretary of Public Health in the President's cabinet. . .; if not the first, he was certainly the foremost protagionist(sic).  He advocated the appointment of a Committee, composed of one member from each state, to memorialize Legislatures of the several states to follow examples of Massachusetts and California in establishment of State Boards of Health.

   When the American Medical Association meeting concluded, and 123 eastern and 89 local doctors returned to homes with happy memories, Logan turned his attention to the first annual meeting of the reorganized State Medical Society, in Sacramento, October 11, 1871.  His opening and valedictory address described the Past, Present and Future interests of the Society.  Dr. Logan was disturbed 'that there are some outside of us---several, I am sorry to say, in San Francisco---who not only are not in accord with us, but are exhibiting a lack of efficiency in the noble cause in which our National and State societies are engaged.'  He gave proof of benefits the American Medical Association had conferred on the science of medicine.  He referred to the several registration laws connected with the three most important eras of human life---birth, marriage and death---passed.'  The recommendation principally was Logan's, a program he had pressed to reveal as advantageous, for many years.  He informed the State Society of the American Association's efforts to raise standards of medical education, and influences brought to bear to prevent importation of adulterated and spurious drugs and medicines.  One after another he brought forward the objects and aims of the National Association.  'Look at it from any point of view, educational, medical, hygienic, legislative or ethical,' said he, 'and it presents a spectacle of moral power and grandeur to which the opponents of medical progress cannot long remain indifferent.'  He hoped they would feel 'in the language of our immortal Drake, “devoted to our profession, jealous of its character and ambitious of its honors.” ' Dr. Logan felt the State Society owed the National Association much, and 'should ever gratefully cherish the memories of the past; such was the discordant character of the material to be operated upon; such the various and conflicting interests which were to be reconciled; such the difference of tastes, habits and motives to be synthetically analyzed and resolved into one harmonious whole, that nothing short of the great impetus imparted by the advent of our National Association could have encompassed the desired end.'

   Such were some of the contingencies observed by Doctor Logan in 1867.  He set into motion, through preconceived plans, rejuvenation of the State Medical Society.  The Society lay dormant for eleven years, previous partisans cross-wise without unanimity.  He sought a medico-historical register of all regular physicians in the State, with names of colleges from whence they graduated, and dates of diplomas and licenses.  He felt the benefits of such a register to be incalculable:   'it is only those who have heretofore and do still show themselves unworthy of being in good company that speak against it---in a word it is the silent censor of the profession, which, while it never condemns, never speaks well of any one unless he is deserving of it.'  Dr. Logan suggested incorporation into the Society mutual aid for widows and orphans of deceased members.  He recommended diffusion of knowledge of the principles of medicine to the public, 'to give the truths correctly, and not in the wrong directions, as by the friends of quackery.'  His address closed:  'The proud consciousness of having done my duty, approved, as it has been, by the constant kindness and courtesy at your hands---especially being historically and honorably identified with the great medical awakening of the past year---will continue, like the evening star, to shed the scintillations of a pure, heaven-descending joy on my declining day of life.'

   Dr. Logan's remarks were vigorous, sincere and straightforward. . .erudite, kindly, politic. . .and condescending.  Knowledge of the man's past accomplishments, his work presently performed, and charm of his diction and speech gave him the respect and confidence of the State membership, as well as of the National Assembly a few months previous.

   Dr. Logan attended the meeting of the American Medical Association in Philadelphia in 1872.  He made an elaborate report from the Committee on Public Hygiene setting forth the great importance of the subject, and recommended the Committee be continued as a permanent section on State Medicine and public(sic) Hygiene.  This they agreed to do.  He proffered a resolution the Association acknowledge the rights of women to study and practice medicine in all branches, but condemning public association of the sexes in mixed classes and clinics.  The resolution was indefinitely postponed.  The third day of the meeting Thomas M. Logan, M.D. was elected President of the American Medical Association.  St. Louis was selected the next place of meeting.

   His election as President of the National Association was a great honor and a compliment to the profession of California and Sacramento.  However, it was not the only honor received:  “Besides being elected 'Emeritus Professor of Hygiene in the Willamette University of Oregon,' and elected an Honorary member of the New Hampshire State Medical Society, which I attended and addressed the meeting, I have received from Vienna the documents declaring that I have been chosen Honorary Member of the Imperial Zoological and Botanical Society, and also, of the Vienna Imperial Medical Society.”30 

     A banquet of welcome was given President Logan by fellow doctors of Sacramento, May 20th.  For the flattering reception afforded him by associates Logan was grateful:  'thanked them with a pleased fervor, and hoped “in May next I shall have the proud pleasure of welcoming a strong delegation from Sacramento in St. Louis.” '

     “Honor and ease are seldom bedfellows,” and 1872 and 1873 were exceptionally heavy years for Dr. Logan. The Agassiz Institute made its appearance on the Pacific Coast in 1872, and Doctor Logan became a serviceable president of the Sacramento branch.  His obligations as Secretary of the Sacramento and State Boards of health were heavy.  Leadership of the American Medical Association called for continual, weighty demands.  In June, 1873, he accepted the Chair of Hygiene in the Medical Department of the University of California.  With Logan vivacity, he outlined and began lectures on a course for juniors and seniors in both medical and acamedic(sic) departments.  With all of this, and more, he attended an active practice:  a compulsion, for Dr. Logan was economically dependent upon daily labor.

    Thomas M. Logan, M.D., President of the American Medical Association, presided at the annual St. Louis session in 1873.  His Presidential Address had received much thought---a characteristic of Logan---and the contents, his diction and accomplished manner of delivery made a profound impression.  It was a constructive and progressive road along which the President sought to lead fellow practitioners.  He sought basic training for physicians:  'Everyone urging a broader and more complete culture, our Association calls upon all schools and colleges in the land, and upon all who teach in and control them, to exact a high and liberal preliminary education; not so much in ancient classics---though the grace imparted through them adds to the dignity and influence of the physician---but in modern languages, philosophy, and every department of physics and of knowledge.'  In former years the American profession depended upon foreign authors for literature, wherein, now, 'the American supply (was) as various and profound in learning as it is for the most part correct in literary and classical elegance.'  Operative experience and practical knowledge, because of the Civil War, had been gained, thus 'elevating the claims of American surgery.'  Certain operations by American surgeons had been legitimized---ovariotomy, as an instance.  'Even in the young city of my adoption, containing between 16,000 and 17,000 inhabitants,' commented Dr. Logan, 'two (one by J. H. Wythe, D.D., M.D., and another by G. G. Tyrrell, L.R.C.S.I. and K., and G.C.P.I.) successful trophies have been added, within the last thirteen months, to the triumph of chirurgical science.'  Again, Dr. Logan appealed for a Public Hygiene program, for a Central Sanitary Bureau 'to be inaugurated by the Government under the auspices of the Association'---to be presided over by a Secretary of Public Health.

    He asked for more intimate relationship with people, through newspapers and lecture rooms. . .'With dull apathy we have seen the flowers of most other professions seeking to avail themselves of these elements of power, some for good, some for evil.  The clergyman has not trusted alone to supernatural power in keeping alive the truths of revelation and arousing in the people a due respect for its lessons.  They have watched with “jealous care” the education of the young, and from Sabbath school to the university they exercise the greatest control.  And Legislators, through their political organizations, public speeches, and control of the press, hold the masses, as it were, in the hollow of their hands.'

   The President made a general survey of medicine; of participants and those it contacted.  He weighed frailties needing attention, and surveyed the continued accomplishments.  Logan's was a philosophy still pertinent, though not to be truly and fully valued unless each of his many writings are studied in their whole.  Behind his 'energetic disposition and industry, wisdom and uniform stability of character, substantial professional acquirements, unexceptionable habits, affable manner and kindly disposition'31 there was a depth of thought and profoundness of study.  He had that Fifth Estate:  “the simplicity to wonder, the ability to question, the power to generalize, the capacity to apply.”  It was the assessment of a contemporary, Dr. G. L. Simmons, that 'he spent years of his life in keeping alive the sacred fire of pure medical science. . .all without pecuniary reward, and at a time in the history of our State when the rush for wealth was the absorbing passion, and when “time was truly money” . . .but his best monument may be seen in connection with the earlier sanitary records of the State and the powerful influence he always exerted in favor of the local, State and National organizations of medical men.'

   By March, 1872, an Act to regulate pharmacy was approved.  Dr. Logan gave support to the Act, bringing sales of poison under control, but wished to go further by bringing 'the man who prescribed it under similar scrutiny.'

   New York, in 1874, and Nevada, in 1875, had each passed medical practice laws.  In '73, Dr. Oatman's resolution, accepted by that body (State Medical Society), branded as a misdemeanor the use of the term “Doctor” except by a graduate.  To Dr. Oatman's beginnings, Drs. Morse and Logan at about the same time added the feature of a neutral board of examiners to pass upon the applicant's diploma or qualifications.  The Medical Practice Act was finally won in the Twenty-first legislative session of 1875 and 1876, and approved by Gov. Irwin April 3, 1876.'32

   Dr. Logan had the goodwill and respect of his contemporaries, in Sacramento and elsewhere.  His accomplishments in life's progress were thereby aided and abetted.  Logan never lost sight of the proverb:  “The only way to have a friend is to be one.” and with Drs. Montgomery, Hatch, Simmons, Toner, H. Gibbons, Sr. and others, there was real affection and close communion.  As events in Logan's life accomplishments unfolded the efforts of friends in his behalf are readily seen.  At the time of the Doctor's death comments of Dr. Gibbons reveal how close was their companionship:  “There are reasons why this event should be deeply felt by the senior editor.  Both were born in the same year, both graduated in the same year, both came to California in the same year.   We have been intimately associated in the medical societies of the State for more than twenty years, and for the last six years in the State Board of Health, of which he has been Permanent Secretary since its organization.”33 

   Doctor Logan lost his wife in 1864.  To this union there was a son, Thomas M. Logan, Jr.  Logan, Jr. graduated from the Medical College of South Carolina in 1856, and lived and practiced in the South---in 1866 he was practicing in Columbia, Alabama.  In 1866, Dr. Logan 'married Mary A, eldest daughter of Samuel Greeley, Esq., a farmer of the town of Hudson, New Hampshire.  'This lady survived him, but without children.'34

   Following are the locations of the office and home of Dr. Logan during practice in Sacramento:35 

 

1850      Established October, 1850, changed to Logan and Kenzie, August 1851, then to Logan, Patrick and Morse, May

                1852, then to Logan and Morse, July 1852, and to present styles December ,1852.

1851      Logan, Dr. Thomas M.  Office 286 J. street.

1853-4   Logan, T. M., Physician and apothecary, 67 K; South Carolina.

1854-5   Logan, Thomas M., physician, 57 K.

1855      Logan, Thomas M., physician, 57 K.

1856      Logan, Thomas M., (M.D.) office 57 K., Ns, SC.

1857-8   Logan, Dr. T. M., Apothecary.  Office 6K. Street; Ns, Sc.

1858      Logan, T.M., physician and druggist, 67 K. street; m, S.C.

1859-60 Logan, T.M., druggist, 67 K street; s; S.C.

1861-62 Logan, Thomas M., Physician, Surgeon, and druggist, 67 K. street.

1863-64 Logan, Thomas M., physician, 63 K. street.

1866      Logan, Dr. T.M., office and res. over 69 K. street.

1869      Logan, Dr. T.M., office Morse bldg, cor 2d and K., res. Same.

1870      Logan, Thos. M., physician and surgeon, cor. K. and Second.

1871      Logan, T. M., Physician and surgeon, office s e cor K. and 2d sts, upstairs, res same.

                “Dr. Thomas M. Logan, Secretary of State Board for Health.  Office and residence, southeast corner of K and

                Second Streets, where he may be found at all hours of the day and night.”

1872      Logan, T.M., physician, res K street, bet 2d and 3rd.

1873      Logan, T. M., physician and surgeon, office and res s e cor. 2d and K (upstairs)

1874      Logan, T.M., physician and surgeon, office and res s e cor. 2d and K

1875      Logan, Thomas M., physician and surgeon, office and re Fratt Bldg. s e cor. K and 2d.

1876      Logan, Mrs. T. M. (widow), res Fratt Bldg., s e cor 2d and K.

1878      Logan, Mrs. T. M. (widow) res. 85 J bet 3rd. and 4th.

 

   The Fratt building, where Dr. Logan had an office and residence, was the meeting place of the first State Board of Health.  It continued to meet there as long as Dr. Logan lived.  The building still exists.

   Doctor Logan was a member, and held elective positions in many, of the following medical and scientific societies:

 

                President of the American Medical Association.

                President of the State Medical Society of California.

                President of the Agassiz Institute, of Sacramento.

                Permanent Secretary of the California State Board of Health.

                Secretary Sacramento City Board of Health.

                Meteorologist of the State Agricultural Society of California.

                Member of the Sacramento Society for Medical Improvement.

                Corresponding Secretary of the Sacramento Medical Society.

                Corresponding Member of the California Academy of Natural Sciences.

                Corresponding Member of the Gynecological Society of Boston.

                Member of the Medical Society of Charleston, South Carolina.

                Member of the Medical and Chirurgical Society of Louisiana.

                Member of New Syndenham Society of London.

                Member of Medical Society of San Francisco.

                Life Member of the Y.M.C.A., San Francisco.

                Honorary Member of New Hampshire State Medical Society.

                Emeritus Professor of Hygiene in the Willamette University of Oregon.

                Honorary Member of the Imperial Medical Society of Austria.

                Honorary Member of the Imperial Botanical and Zoological Society of Vienna.

                Corresponding Member of the Surgical Society of Ireland.

                Member Adherent to the International Medical Congress of Paris. 

 

   Death accepted the noble character on February 13, 1876.  'His last illness was contracted in the public service,' stated Dr. Henry Gibbons, Sr.36 :  'Being in the Senate Chamber on business connected with the State Board of Health, he was overheated by the stifling atmosphere of the apartment, and after walking home in the cold night air, he was seized with a chill, which lasted several hours and was followed by pneumonitis.  Though the pulmonic inflammation passed off, his strength never rallied, and he gradually succumbed.'

   Dr. Logan was buried in the State plot of the Sacramento City Cemetery: there to relax from the weighty burdens so honorably and efficiently shouldered for 26 years, and there to rest in silence “until the morning of Eternity.”

 

 

 

   1  Memorial, Drs. J. F. Montgomery, W. R. Cluness and F. W. Hatch.

    2  Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal, v. II, April, 1869, p. 496.

    3  J. M. Toner, M.D., of Washington, D.C.

    4  Dr. J. Montgomery, March 29, 1876.

    5  J. M. Toner, M.D.

    6  Ibid.

    7  Ibid.

    8  Dr. J. Montgomery.

    9  Dr. Logan, in letter to brother-in-law, Dr. Fenner, of New Orleans.

  10  City Board of Health Record Book.

  11  Ibid.

  12  Dr. V. J. Fourgeaud.

  13  Sacramento Union, May 25, 1855.

  14  California's Medical Story, H. Harris, p. 166.

  15  J. T. Morse, M.D., in opening remarks.

  16  California and Western Medicine, p. 9, July, 1945.

  17  v. VI, 1863, p. 151.

  18  Ibid.

  19  Letter from Dr. Logan to the Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal, November, 1867, p. 256-259.

  20  Ibid.

  21  The Sacramento Daily Union, January 4, 1868, p. l, col. 2.

  22  Pacific Medical Journal (new series), v. I, p. 468.

  23  Ibid, p. 481.

  24  Minutes of the Sacramento Society for Medical Improvement, v. 2, February 23, 1876, p. 55.

  25  California's Health, v. 2, No. 13, January 15, 1944, by Guy P. Jones.

  26  California's Medical Story, H. Harris, p. 164.

  27  Dr. J. M. Toner.

  28  Thomas M. Logan, M.D., Annual Address before State Medical Society of California, Transactions, 1870

        and 1871, p. 39-63.

  29  Thomas M. Logan, M.D., Annual Address before State Medical Society of California, Transactions, 1870

        and 1871, p. 39-63.

  30  Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal, v. XV, June, 1872, a letter from Dr. Logan.

  31  Life and Professional Labors of Thomas Muldrup Logan, M.D., of California, by J. M. Toner, M.D., of

        Washington, D.C., Medical Society of California Transactions, 1875-76, p. 136-143.

  32  California's Medical Story, H. Harris, p. 182-4.

  33  Editorial (H. Gibbons, Sr.), Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal, v. IX, No. 10, March, 1876, p.485.

  34  J. M. Toner, M.D.

  35  Sacramento Directories.

  36  Pacific Medical and Surgical Journal, v. IX, No. 10, March, 1876, p.485.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Transcribed 3-24-17  Marilyn R. Pankey.

­­­­Source: “Memories, Men and Medicine A History of Medicine In Sacramento, California by J. Roy Jones, M.D., Pages 383-405. Publ. Sacramento Society for Medical Improvement, 1950.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sacramento County Biographies

Golden Nugget Library's Sacramento County

Golden Nugget Library