Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1917-02-16


he attended IL meeting of the Rocky
Mountain Medical association in San
Francisco and was elected to member
ship.
In 1873 DIR. Holton was called to the
chair of materia medica and general
pathology in the medical department
of the University Of Vermont and for
10 years continued in that professor
ship. When he took the chair the
medical class numbered 40 and when
he resigned 260 students were enrolled
and more than 1900 had received their
degrees as doctors of medicine. He
received from the university the de-
gree of A. NJ. in 1879.
The state legislature elected him in
1873 trustee of the University of
Vermont and state Agricultural col
lcge, which Office he retained by sue
ccssive reflections for IS years. In
that same year he was made medical
examiner for the Vermont asylum for
the insane at Brattleboro, now the
Brattleboro Retreat.
An honor which DR.. Holton consid-
cred one of the greatest that ever
came to him was his election, in 1902,
as president of the American Public
Health association. For nine years he
was treasurer of the organization. He
was active in the organization of the
an-American Medical congress, a
body composed Of representatives of
all the countries on this hemisphere,
and was chairman of the board of
trustees and executive committee. I'm.
der the patronage of the national gov
eminent this congress met in Wash
ington in 1893. In 1901 he was presi
dent of the American tuberculosis con
gress. AS vice president of the Ameri
can Medical association he delivered
in Baltimore, Nd, by appointment an
Grafton on state medicine before that
body in 1895.
He was member and i'll some in.
stances an officer, of numerous other
medical and scientific societies both in
this country and abroad, among them
being the Boston genealogical soci.
ETY., the New York Therapeutical so
ciety, the American Academy of Polit
zeal and Social Science, the American
Geographical society and the New
England Educational league. For three
years DR.. Holton was surgeon of the
18th Regiment, Vermont Volunteer
Militia.
Numerous and important as were
his other activities, by far his most
valuable work-a work whose benefits
can never be measured-was as secre
tary of the Vermont state board OF
health. Indeed it is through his labors
as secretary and executive officer of
that board that he is best remembered
In 1873, while president of the Yer
mont Medical society, he advocated a
state board of health. In accordance
with his suggestion n committee of
three physicians, of whom he was one
was appointed to lay the plan before
the legislature. Not until 1856, how.
ever, did the idea become law. Ten
years later DR.. Holton was appointed
member Of the state board, and from
1900 to 1912 he held the position of
secretary and executive officer.
In that position it became necessary
for DR.. Holton to visit practically ev-
cry part of the state, many Of them
repeatedly, and to keep on file q vast
number of statistics and other records
relating to diseases and mortality in
Vermont. These in later years were
kept by card index systems at his resi-
dcncc, and he could command in in in.
slant great fund of interesting and
valuable information.
DIR. Holt0n resigned his Office of see.
rotary of the state board of health in
October, 1912, but remained on the
board and received another re-appoint.
ment in 1915. Not long before his
resignation a government statistician
in Washington came to Vermont to adj
dress the state board. He compli.
mented the officers for their excellent
work, stating that Vermont ranked
third among all the states in the
Union in the accuracy of the records
of vital statistics, whereas a few wears
before it ranked 18th. Sanitary con.
ditions in the state vastly improved
during DR.. Holton S association with
the board. but the work involved a
constantly increasing mass of detail
which fell largely upon the secretary
and it was this multiplicity of duties
that led him to resign.
In accepting his resignation the 9th
er members of the board wrote him in
part as follows: CIV wish to record
our appreciation of the untiring yea
and rare good Judgment with which
YOU have administered this office dur
ing the past &c years. We feel that
the public Health interests Of the
state, and that means the people of the
whole state, are permanently you,
debtors. Your services in this dirac
tion ante-date the establishment of 4;
state board of health, in securing
which you were very largely inhu,n
tial. Your work along these lines viii
be increasingly appreciated as tim'
goes on"
Dr. Holton reached his 50th annivcr
sary as a practicing physician Marcl
Q, 1910, and his close friends planned
to mark the anniversary, but his du
ties made it necessary for him to b'
'away that day. The Brattleboro physi
clans sent him Il handsome amethys
stick ain, and he received many beau
tiful flowers.
His activities were by no mean
ways greatly interested in the cause O
education and in the advancement o
confined to medical lines. He was al
all things that tended to the welfare o
town, county and state. He was
member of the prudential committee o