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PICTORIAL & BIOGRAPHICAL
HISTORY OF
INDIANAPOLIS & MARION CO.,
INDIANA
Published:
Chicago
Goodspeed Brothers, Publishers,
1893
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DR. ALEMBERT WINTHROP
BRAYTON, of Indianapolis, Ind., was born in Avon, N.
Y., Mar. 3, 1848, a son of Elijah and Helen P. Brayton,
also of the State of New York, at present residents of
Chicago. The family is of Scotch descent, and like all
those in whose veins course that blood, possesses fine order
of intellect and is of a religious nature. During his
early life Dr. Brayton's father was a lumberman in
the Lake George region and later was engaged in milling in
Pike, Wyoming county, N. Y. His wife, Helen Parker,
was of English descent and a native of Vermont. The
early schooling of the subject of this sketch was acquired
at his mother's knee, and he does not remember when he could
not read. In order that he and his brothers might have
better educational advantages and be brought up to a life of
usefulness, rather than the enforced idleness which so often
characterizes village life, the father removed westward and
settled on a farm on the prairies of Kankakee County, Ill.,
about fifty miles south of Chicago, where he put his boys to
work following the furrow, planting "sod corn" and harrowing
in spring grain. These years were useful and happy
ones, and lessons of morality and industry were learned
which ever afterward remained with them. At odd times
they attended the district school in the vicinity of their
prairie home, and this, with the sunday school books, which
they obtained at the Manteno Methodist Church, and such
literary works as the farmers of the vicinity had in their
possession, constituted the educational opportunities and
material. Horace Greeley's Weekly Tribune,
the New York Christian Advocate and Journal, the
Ladies' Repository and the Atlantic Monthly also
found a place in their home. In 1863 the family moved
to Blue Island, a few miles south of Chicago, and this
growing city was thereafter a considerable factor in the
experience and education of its members. After
attending the Blue Island High School for three years,
Dr. Brayton and his brothers entered the Cook County
Normal School, located at Englewood, Ill., and so came under
the daily instruction of that most fascinating and
successful educator. President Daniel S. Wentworth,
of Chicago. From this school Dr. Brayton
graduated in 1879, and immediately after be principal of the
Glencoe schools, Cook County, but the following year was
elected professor of natural science in the Normal School.
However, he decided to first take a course in Cornell
University, Ithaca, N. Y., but owing to the great Chicago
fire, he left the university at the completion of the
sophomore year, and took up the work of biological teaching
in the Normal School. In January, 1877, being
earnestly solicited by David S. Jordan, now president
of Leland Stanford University, but then professor of natural
sciences in Butler University and a classmate of the
Doctor's in Cornell University, Dr. Brayton moved
with his family to Indianapolis, and at once interested
himself in zoological researches with Prof. Jordan.
He there completed his university course, taking the degree
of bachelor of science at Butler University, the degree of
master of science being afterward conferred upon him by the
State University at Bloomington, Ind., and by Purdue
University at Lafayette, Ind., on account of the meritorious
work some college students he, in 1877, visited the southern
Alleghany Mountain region in the interests of ichthyological
science. Many rivers and streams of the South were
seined, the result being that some twenty new specimens of
fish were discovered and were described and published by
Prof. Jordan and Dr. Brayton in Bulletin No. 12
of the United States National Museum. The following
summer was also spent in these researches in the Alleghanies,
at Beaufort, N. C. and the Smithsonian Institution. In
1879 Mr. Brayton contributed a list, with scientific
and literary notes upon the "Birds of Indiana," which was
published in the annual report of that year of the Indiana
Horticultural Society. In 1882 the Doctor published a
"Report on the Mammals of Ohio," which occupied 175 pages of
Volume IV of the Geological Survey of that State.
Dr. Brayton began his medical studies in Chicago,
resumed them in Indianapolis, and in 1879 took the degree of
doctor of medicine from the Medical College of Indiana.
The following autumn he was elected professor of chemistry,
toxicology and medical jurisprudence in the College of
Physicians and Surgeons of Indianapolis, giving two full
courses of eighty hours each term, and doing considerable
expert work in criminal toxicology and allied cases in
medical jurisprudence. In the fall of 1881 he was
elected to the same position in the Medical College of
Indiana. After four years of exacting work in
chemistry he was elected to the chair of physiology in the
same institution, and two years later to the chair of
pathology, clinical medicine and dermatology, which he still
holds. He has been on the consulting, clinical and
teaching staff of the Indianapolis City Hospital and
Dispensary since commencing the practice of medicine, and
has devoted himself particularly to diseases of the skin.
The result has been that in these charities skin diseases
have received the attention of an expert. Some
extremely unusual cases have have been met with in
his dermatological practice and have received widespread
attention by the medical journals of the country.
Dr. Brayton has had a large consultation business in
this department of medicine, to which he has devoted much
thorough work and painstaking investigation. He has
been a faithful attendant of the Marion county Medical
Society, to which he has contributed numerous papers and
discussions, and of which he has been both president and
secretary. He also belongs to the Indiana State
Medical Society, the proceedings and transactions of which
he has edited for the past four years. Since the
establishment of the Indiana Medical Journal,
September, 1892, Dr. Brayton has been almost
continuously a member of its editorial staff, and when the
journal came into possession of a stock company, in April,
1892, Dr. Brayton was unanimously elected its
editor-in-chief, a position he still holds, and for which he
is admirably adapted. Under his management the journal
has greatly increased its range and usefulness, and has
become the recognized organ of the medical profession in
Indiana, and now is one of the leading State journals of the
West. Dr. Brayton was on the editorial staff of
the Indianapolis Daily Journal for six years.
He has always taken a great interest in the scientific
education of young men, and has urged them to take a full
collegiate course. He has been a member of the
Gentlemen's Literary Club and the Contemporary Club of
Indianapolis, and of other organizations devoted to the
advancement of the social and intellectual life of his
community. His wife, Jessie M. Dewey, is a
native of Chicago, a graduate of the Chicago Normal School,
an ardent student of ornithology, and is of artistic tastes
and literary habits. They were married in Chicago June
24, 1874, and have seven children, the two elder of whom,
May and Nelson, are in the junior year of Butler
University.
Source: Pictorial & Biographical History of
Indianapolis & Marion Co., Ind., Publ. Chicago, Goodspeed
Brothers, Publishers, 1893 - Page 303 |
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