DODGE, LEWIS – Biographies – History of Homeopathy

ODGE, LEWIS, M. D., of Chicago, Ills., was born in Utica, N. Y., June 27th, 1815. His father, Jesse
Dodge, was of Keene, N. H., and his mother, Sarah Johnson, of New London, Conn. After pursuing his preliminary studies till the age of about fourteen,
he met with an accident, which possibly changed the course of his after life. It was a compound fracture of his right leg, and the case was treated by
Professor James D. Spencer, of Geneva College, and Dr. Sydney H. Blossom, whose surgical operations in this case were attended with more than usual
success. Dr. Blossom became much interested in his youthful patient, and induced him to become his pupil and a member of his family, at Durhamville, N.
Y. There he remained for two years, studying medicine and surgery until he left, to enter upon his course of literary and scientific studies.

     These were conducted at the various institutions of Woodstock Academy, Hamilton College, Geneva Medical
College, Homœopathic Medical College, Penna., and the Ohio State and Union Law School. He obtained his regular degree of M. D. from the Homœopathic
Medical College, Penna., March 2d, 1850, and the same college, unsolicited, conferred on him, in 1852, an honorary degree for eminent attainments in
medical science.

     From 1840 to 1843 he was Professor in Granville College, Licking county, O., and principal of its
preparatory department, in which position he attained eminence as a practical teacher ; his untiring energy and exactness of mind winning the
affection and esteem, as well of his associate professors, as of the numerous students in his class, many of whom are now noted ministers and
professional men.

     Having retired from Granville College, he opened and maintained for three years a select private school
for the purpose of preparing boys and young men for college, law, or practical business ; in which, as in his recent occupation, he sustained his
high reputation as a teacher.

     While thus engaged he became acquainted with Dr. John Ellis, the pioneer of homœopathy in Detroit,
Mich. He attended one course of medical lectures at Geneva College in 1844 and 1845, and, having thoroughly convinced himself of the truth of the new
doctrine, as set forth by Hahnemann, he commenced the practice of it at Adrian, Mich., adopting it as his future occupation -the practice of the healing
art.

     He was married at Manchester, Mich., to Miss Lavinia Weir, daughter of Deacon John Weir, on March 1st,
1838, with whom he has lived happily ever since, still enjoying her society as in his youth. She has been the mother of six children, three of whom died
young. The loss of the two eldest, and the deplorable ignorance of many of the physicians of the old school, led him to retire from a profitable
business and engage in the practice of homœopathy for the preservation of his own life and that of his family. In making this change he has fully
realized his expectations, as now, at the age of fifty-seven-his wife being fifty-five-both are in good health, the doctor never having been so ill,
during thirty years, as to prevent his attention to business.

     When he first commenced practicing in Adrian, he had charge of a very severe case of nursing sore
mouth, in an influential family, which he treated with such success, with his “little pill-boxes” as to effect a cure within three weeks. He
also treated erysipelas, dysentery, scarlet fever and pneumonia, with such marked success that he speedily gained a widespread reputation for skill,
thus procuring an extensive practice.

     About this period he, in connection with Drs. Ellis, Thayer and others, formed the Michigan Institute
of Homœopathy, commencing the agitation which, after several years, resulted in the passage of a law by the State, establishing a chair of
professorship of homœopathy in the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.

     Dr. Dodge was a delegate from the Michigan Institute to a convention held at Cleveland, O., in 1849,
where the preliminary steps were taken for obtaining the charter for the Western College of Homœopathic Medicine. He was elected its first Professor of
Materia Medica and Medical jurisprudence, which difficult position he occupied to the satisfaction of all. The following year he was, at his own
request, transferred to the chair of Obstetrics, and Diseases of Women and Children ; still retaining, however, the chair of medical jurisprudence.
He was also Dean of the faculty, thus placing on him the great burden of maintaining the Homœopathic medical College, it being the second one in
America.

     For the past six years he has resided in Chicago, where he has an extensive and lucrative practice.

     He, with Professor G, D. Behr, performed the celebrated surgical operation, in which four and one-half
feet of the small bowels were removed, in consequence of mortification. The case was one of strangulated umbilical hernia, which had previously been
treated by another physician. The success was complete, the patient still living at Lee Centre, Ill.

Source : Cleave’s Biographical Cyclopædia of Homœopathic Physicians and Surgeons By
Egbert Cleave