San Francisco County
Biographies
M. E. VAN METER, M.D.
M. E. VAN METER,
M.D., whose office is at No. 428 Ellis street, San Francisco, has been a
resident of California since 1884, and engaged in the practice of medicine
since 1874. He was born in La Salle county,
Illinois, in 1851, and is of Scotch
and English descent, being a descendant on his father’s side of one of two
brothers named Van Meter, who came from Holland
and settled in Virginia in an
early day. Our subject’s parents were
both natives of Kentucky, and
moved to Illinois in the early
‘40s. The father, Jacob Van Meter, was a
farmer, and was also interested in other business pursuits. He was a pioneer of Arkansas,
Missouri and Illinois,
and died in the latter State in 1879.
The subject of
this sketch received his early education in the public schools of Brookfield,
Missouri, where he graduated, at the Brookville
Academy, and later entered the Whipple
Academy, Jacksonville,
Illinois, where he took a business course,
graduating in 1870. After leaving school
Dr. Van Meter’s first occupation was teaching, in Missouri,
continuing in that profession for two years.
In 1873 he commenced the study of medicine, under the preceptorship of his brother, Dr. A. Van Meter, of Maltabend, Missouri,
with whom he remained two years. His
health having become impaired, the Doctor came to the Pacific coast, where he
spent about two years in the mountains and teaching school, traveling to regain
his health. Returning to Missouri,
he entered the St. Joseph Hospital
Medical College
(regular) at St. Joseph, Missouri,
in 1877, graduating at that college in 1879.
After his graduation he took a special course on diseases of women at
the same college. He then entered into
practice in Wakenda, same State, remaining until
1883, when he located at Lamar and Marysville, Missouri;
next he went to St. Louis, where he
took a special course in surgery and diseases of women. He came to California
in 1884, locating at Red Bluff, where he built up a large patronage, and while
there was appointed Surgeon for the Southern Pacific Railroad Company, where he
had a large surgical practice among the employees. He also gained an enviable reputation in the
treatment of diseases of women, patients having been brought to him for over 100
miles from adjoining counties. In 1889
Dr. Van Meter came to San Francisco
and entered the California Medical
College (Eclectic), where he took a
full post-graduate course. Being invited
to take a professorship in that college, and recognizing the vastness of the
field offered by this metropolis in his professional work, the Doctor settled
up his business in Red Bluff, and removed to this city, in June, 1890, where he
expects to remain permanently in the practice of his profession. He at first occupied the Chair of Theory and
Practice, but in the latter part of the season of 1890 he was appointed to the
Chair of Clinical and Orthopaedic Surgery, which
position he still holds. He is also
associate editor and dusiness manager of the
California Medical Journal.
Dr. Van Meter is
a self-made man, having paid for his own tuition, in the various schools and
colleges, both literary and medical, at which he has graduated. He is an
enthusiastic and enterprising student of surgery, having among other operations
successfully engrafted the skin of a dog upon a patient suffering from a severe
burn. The operation was attended with
complete success, and is recorded in the annals of surgery, the only case of
the kind on record in the United States. He used the skin from a hairless pup. The was a case of
severe and extensive burn. He took
sections of skin for the face and neck from the father and brother of the
patient. For the arms he used puppy
grafts taken from the two young puppies of the Mexican hairless breed. Dr. Van Meter has also invented some valuable
surgical instruments, which are in use by the profession.
Transcribed 8-6-05 Marilyn R. Pankey.
Source: "The Bay of San Francisco," Vol. 2, Page 262-3, Lewis
Publishing Co, 1892.
©
2005 Marilyn R. Pankey.
California Biography Project
San Francisco County
California Statewide
Golden Nugget Library