ALLEN, TIMOTHY FIELD, A. M., M. D., of New York city, was born in Westminster, Vt., April 24th, 1837. His father, Dr. David Allen, of the same place, but now living at Putney, was a prominent physician and practiced over fifty years. He received his education at Amherst College, Mass., where he graduated in 1858. He afterwards attended lectures in the Medical Department of the University of New York, graduating there in 1861. The degree of A. M. was conferred on him, at Amherst College, in 1863. He commenced the practice of medicine in Brooklyn in 1861, and in 1862, entered the United States Army as Acting Assistant Surgeon, being stationed at Point Lookout. In 1863, however, he resigned this position and entered into a partnership with Dr. Caird Dunham, which lasted two years. He treated his first few cases only according to the allopathic method. He studied homœopathy under Dr. P. P. Wells, of Brooklyn, and has adhered to that system ever since. After dissolving his partnership with Dr. Dunham he practiced alone.
In 1566, he was Professor of Chemistry in the New York Medical College for Women ; in 1867, he was Professor of Anatomy in the New York Homœopathic College, and in 1871, Professor of Therapeutics and Materia Medica in the same College, which position he still retains. In 1867, he became Surgeon to the New York Ophthalmic Hospital, in which capacity he has been identified with that institution ever since. It was, as we learn, through his influence that this institution received Miss Emma King’s endowment of $100,000. He is Vice-President of the Toney Botanical Club, member of the Lyceum of Natural History, corresponding member of the Portland Society of Natural History, member of the Buffalo Academy of Natural Sciences, and some other literary and scientific societies.
In 1873, he was elected President of the New York County Society. Is a member of the State Society and American Institute, and Secretary of the Hahnemann Academy of Medicine. He has contributed various articles to the journals, and is now editing the “Encyclopædia of Materia Medica,” which will be the standard work on this subject. He has also a work in preparation on the treatment of diseases of the eye. Unlike the generality of scientific men, he possesses an excellent taste for music, having composed a large amount of manuscript music, and whilst studying medicine in Brooklyn he for several years officiated as organist at the Church of the Pilgrims. He was then both studying and practicing at the same time. He has also, during the past ten years, officiated in a similar manner in the Fourteenth Street Presbyterian Church, but has recently abandoned the organ from its interfering with his business. He is, furthermore, publishing, as the result of his botanical studies, the “American Herbarium,” of which three parts have already been issued.
In 1862, he was married to Miss Julia Bissell, of Litchfield, Conn., by which union he has had five children, two of whom survive. He possesses an elegant country seat near New York. He is now also associated in the editorship of the New York Journal of Homœopathy, with Dr. William T. Helmuth. He has ever been a hard worker ; indeed, few professional men have ever worked so constantly and energetically ; yet, with all this excessive labor, he never could have performed what he has done without brilliant native talent. He is of an enthusiastic temperament and firm in his belief in homœopathy. To these qualities he owes the enviable position he now occupies, and he richly deserves all he has got, or whatever else fortune may have in store for him. He was nominated and confirmed by the Senate of the State of New York as Director of the New York State Homœopathic Insane Asylum, at Middleton, New York, which position he will undoubtedly fill to the general satisfaction and benefit of the State.
Books By Dr Timothy Field Allen