Rash's Surname Index
Notes for Joseph PARRISH
PARRISH, Joseph, physician, was born in Philadelphia, Pa., Nov. 11, 1818; son of Dr. Joseph (q.v.) and Susanna (Cox) Parrish. He attended a Friends school, and was graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, M.D., 1844. He practised in Burlington, N.J.; founded the New Jersey Medical Reporter, which he removed to Philadelphia, Pa.; was physician to Burlington college and St. Mary's hall, and professor of obstetrics in the Philadelphia Medical college, 1856-67. Failing health caused his resignation in 1857, and he traveled in England, France, Germany, Switzerland and Italy.
While at Rome his attention was called to the mismanagement of the insane hospital, and by intercession with the pope he caused the abuses to be abated. He was superintendent of the state training school for idiots and feeble-minded children at Media, Pa., 1857-63. He entered the service of the U.S. Sanitary commission in 1863, and visited the camps and army hospitals with orders for
hospital supplies. He established the Pennsylvania Inebriate asylum in 1865, and conducted the institution, 1865-72. In 1866 he started a reform movement which resulted in the establishment of the American Association for the Study and Cure of Inebriety, of which he was chosen president in 1872.
In the same year, in company with Dr. Dodge of New York, he was summoned by a commission appointed by the British Parliament for the study [p.206] of inebriety, to give the result of his experience in regard to its cure. His testimony, showing that in cases under his care for ten years one-third were permanently cured, one-third were subject to occasional relapse, and one third received
no benefit, was followed by the founding of several hospitals in Great Britain for the treatment of the victims of intemperance. He was among the first, if not the first, to advocate the free use of fresh air in affections of the lungs, with interesting employment for the mind, thus ante-dating by more than half a
century the general practice of physicians at the present day. He was in temporary charge of the Maryland Inebriate asylum, 1872-84, and opened a private Inebriate asylum at Burlington, N.J., in 1876. He was a member of the Neurological Society of Philadelphia; the Jurisprudence Society of Philadelphia; the Obstetric Society of Philadelphia; the American Climatological society; a life member of the Franklin Institute, Philadelphia; corresponding member of the Medico-Legal Society of New York; permanent member of the American Medical association; an honorary member and fellow of the New Jersey Medical society; a member of the British Medical association and vice-president of the colonial and international congress on inebriety of London. He was married in February 1840, to Lydia, daughter of Caleb Gaskill of Burlington, N.J. He is the author of: Inebriety from a Medical Standpoint (1883). He died in Burlington, N.J., Jan. 15, 1891.
The Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans: Volume IIV
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