Welch, William Henry 1850-1934

RESEARCHER AND EDUCATOR

A Family Tradition.

William Henry Welch, the early twentieth century's greatest statesman in the field of public health, was born on 8 April 1850 in Norwalk, Connecticut. His father, uncles, grandfather, and great-uncle had all been doctors, but Welch was reluctant to conform to the family tradition. He grew up as the child of a country practitioner, and there had been sick people in his house all day as well as raps on the door at night. When Welch received his A.B. degree from Yale College in 1870, nothing pointed toward a career either in science or medicine; his real enthusiasm was for the classics. After graduation he taught Cicero and German in an academy in Norwich, New York, but the job petered out in the spring of 1871, and Welch had to confront the problem of a career. He turned to medicine as the last resort of a man thwarted in his ambitions.

A New Kind of Medicine.

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