Oliver Wendell Holmes I (1809 - 1894)

Oliver Wendell Holmes I

Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. was an American physician, poet, and humor writer.

Holmes studied law at Harvard University, then medicine in Paris. He practiced medicine for 10 years, taught anatomy at Dartmouth College (Hanover, North Carolina) for two years, and became professor of anatomy and physiology at Harvard in 1847. He later became dean of Harvard Medical School and held that position until 1882. Holmes' most significant contribution to medicine was his research on the contagiousness of postpartum fever. In 1843, he published a treatise on the subject, The Infectiousness of Postpartum Fever. He also introduced the term anesthesia into scientific usage.

Today, Oliver Holmes is remembered as a gifted writer of the 19th century in the United States. Beginning in 1857, he published his "Breakfast at the Table" articles-essays in The Atlantic Monthly and later published several collections written in a conversational style, with Holmes's characteristic humor and wit. He also wrote several poems, three novels, and many poems and anecdotes.

Oliver Wendell Holmes was the father of lawyer Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841-1935). According to some sources, he was the prototype of the detective Sherlock Holmes, the famous hero of writer Arthur Conan Doyle.