The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1915-02-18
DIR. STEPHEN SMITH, AT92,
SCOFFS AT FATHER TIME
Doyen of State Charities Board Doesn't Know How Old
Age Feels-Hale Now, He Says, Because He Saved
His Stomach Through 60 Years of Ill Health.

here's another curious thing about
lunatics. | discovered after I had been
talking with great umbers OF them
that when j left the asylums and began
TO talk to people outside these latter APP
pcared just the same as the lunatics.
I've treated this subject in my latest
book. which Is just now coming from
the press. 1t is called who's Insane?'v
DIR. smith came to New York in 1850
by way of the Erie, which ran then to
Picrmont. whence passengers were trans
ferred TO river steamers. lie began at
Bellevue and ten years later helped to
establish the Bellevue Medical College.
where he lectured for forty years. lie
edited the Journal Of Medicine, and dur
Ing the civil war went to the front sew
eral times when a big battle called for
additional volunteer surgeons. lie be-
amt interested In public health affairs
and with the aid of william Cullen
Bryant. the poet editor OF the Evening
Post. he succeeded in smoking out some
self-satisfied gentlemen and getting them
interested in sanitary conditions.
THE result was" he said. that We
got tho metropolitan health law passed.
IT'S one Of the beg; statutes ever passed
and has been a mode for the rest 81
III country. I was Commissioner OF
Health for the hrst seven years under
that law.
When we began the death rate here
was IS In 1000. Now It's 70 or II.
A normal death rate would be 10.
Why. the great city Is healthier than
u country village. Folks used TO go TO
the country for their health. Now they
come to New York.
nor the first sixty wears OF his life
Dr. Smith suffered from indigestion. lie
refused President Clcveland's appoint
mont as a delegate to the International
sanitary convention In Paris because he
was afraid the inevitable round OF din
ners would mean the death OF him. but
he was finally prevailed upon TO go
HIS companion AZ dinner one night, n
great French physician. told him II he
imblbcd freely of wine after esch course
he would never be troubled with In
digestion again. DR.. Smith adopted The
suggestion with some misgivIngs. but
says II worked Ike q charm and re has
never had any trouble since.
That doesn't mean that ] still con
;'nuc the wine drinking" he said. 81
stopped that long ago. | have never
smoked in my life. | was no, well for
sixty years and that forced me TO a
Diet Of simple o The result was
that ! saved my stomach for sixty years
and now I am having the Use of IL.
II eat anything now, but one should
he careful.
IL believe there - n great deal In
her~dity. Tie texture OF the body Is the
combined texture OF the bodies of ones
father and mother. II may he very
fine or II may he coarse. The length OF
life depends upon the kind OF material.
Ms mother was 81 when she died. My
Oldest brother died al ST. Ny sister
celebrated her n!nety-c!ghth birthday
here the other day"
pr. Smith is president OF the Tree
Planting Association 81 New York city
and * an enthusiastic advocate Of its
purposes. His IDEAS on IN" subject ara
expressed In a pamphlet on THO Prob
lem OF cry Trees