Multnomah-Marion County OR Archives Biographies.....Pierce, M. D., Edward Allen 1855 - ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/or/orfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Ila L. Wakley iwakley@msn.com June 27, 2010, 11:09 am Source: History of the Columbia River Valley From The Dalles to the Sea, Vol. III, Published 1928, Pages 437 - 439 Author: The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company DR. EDWARD ALLEN PIERCE, M. D., of Portland, Oregon, stands among the leaders of the medical profession of the North Pacific coast region. His learning, skill and accomplishments having marked him as a master of the healing art, in which he has gained distinctive recognition. Dr. Pierce was born in Truxton, Cortland county, New York, in 1855, and is a son of Ethan Allen and Harriet (Geer) Pierce, the former a native of Massachusetts and the latter of Connecticut. He attended the public schools, the Cortland Normal and the Homer Business Academy. He taught school and worked in a store for several years, after which he took up the study of medicine at Binghamton, New York. While acting as a hospital steward in the Broome County Hospital and Insane Asylum, he matriculated in the medical department of the University of the City of New York, from which he was graduated with the degree of Doctor of Medicine in 1885. He entered upon the practice of his profession in Binghamton, where he remained for ten years. During six years of that period he served as county and city coroner. He was appointed by Governor David B. Hill as Assistant Surgeon of the Sixth Battery of the National Guard of New York State, which position he filled until August, 1895, when he resigned his position, sold his practice and moved to Portland, Oregon. In April, 1896, he moved to Salem, Oregon, where he began the practice of medicine and surgery. Soon after he had settled in Salem and on the second day of the state fair there smallpox broke out in a boarding house. This almost threw the city into a panic, as few physicians knew anything about treatment of that disease in the smaller cities of the west at that time and did not care to expose themselves. Dr. Pierce was called from the fair grounds and asked if he would take charge of the situation. He replied that he would do so if the authorities would give him full sway, which they did. Dr. Pierce at once fumigated the boarding house and even used a part of his own home to care for the patients. Later an isolation hospital was established on the county farm. Deaths from extreme cases were buried at twelve o'clock at night and all funerals were held at this hour. Chinese were used in handling the bodies, as no white help was obtainable, and it often fell to Dr. Pierce to do all the work himself; but in two and one-half months the disease was entirely eradicated in Salem owing to his prompt and efficient methods. He continued in general practice until August, 1905, when he moved to Portland to become medical director of the Portland Open Air Sanatorium, the first sanatorium established in the northwest to demonstrate the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis by the open air method. He continued in that service until August, 1912, at which time he resigned his position and later founded the Pierce Sanatorium at Bertha, a suburb of Portland, for the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. In 1901 he was appointed contract physician and surgeon to the U. S. Indian School at Chemawa, Oregon, in order to study tuberculosis among the Indian children. He there became so interested in tuberculosis that he has devoted almost his entire time and efforts in the diagnosis and treatment of that disease. He was appointed by Governor Chamberlain as a member of the state board of health of Oregon in 1903, being one of the charter members and continuing in that capacity for fourteen years. In 1905 the state board of health cooperated with Dr. Woods Hutchinson, at that time its secretary, in the founding of the Portland Open Air Sanatorium. In 1908 Dr. Pierce represented Oregon in the International Congress for the Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis at Washington, D. C., serving on the committee of judges of awards. He received a diploma for the character of the work being done at the Portland Open Air Sanatorium, awarded by congress, and signed by President Theodore Roosevelt. He also attended the International Conference on Tuberculosis by invitation, which was held at Philadelphia at the same time, later being made a member of the International Conference for the Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis which originated in Berlin. In 1909 he was appointed on the National Board of Directors for the Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis. In 1917, he was appointed by the surgeon-general as a contract surgeon, serving at Vancouver, Washington, on half-time, examining soldiers and recruits for entrance into the service of the U. S. A., continuing in that service for three months with the rank of first lieutenant. In September, 1918, he was appointed by the surgeon-general, with the rank of first lieutenant, in medical charge of the Students' Army Training Corps of North Pacific College, having charge of two hundred and thirty military students during the epidemic of the la grippe. And not one of the army students was lost. In 1919 he was awarded a contract for care of soldiers with tuberculosis at Pierce Sanatorium, continuing until June, 1924, when he terminated the contract with the government. He discontinued the Pierce Sanatorium in 1925 and returned to private practice, devoting his attention to the treatment of diseases of the chest and to lecturing at the North Pacific College. Dr. Pierce was united in marriage with Miss Martha Bowerman in August, 1914. He is a member of the Imperial Lodge, No. 158, A. F. & A. M., belonging to all the bodies of the York Rite, also the Shrine. On June 20, 1928, he received the thirty-third degree of the Scottish Rite of Free Masonry in recognition of his splendid services in the various branches of the time honored order. He is a charter member of the Royal Rosarians and author of the Ritual, and is also a member of Portland Chamber of Commerce. He was appointed by the Portland Chamber of Commerce, chairman of a committee consisting of H. B. Miller, ex-consul to Japan, Wallace Nash, an attorney and writer for the Oregon Journal, William McMurray, long associated with the O. W. R. & N. Railway, to study the propagation of the flax industry in Oregon. During the ten years service of this committee, a world survey was made in which it was conclusively demonstrated that the quality and strength of the flax grown in the Willamette Valley was equal to any grown in the world. Also that the industry was practical and was recommended for Western Oregon and Washington. He also belongs to the Portland Academy of Medicine, the City and County Medical Society, the Oregon State Medical Society (being a past president of that body), the American Medical Association, the National Association for the Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis, and the International Conference on Tuberculosis. He is assistant medical director of the Oregon Life Insurance Company of Portland, Oregon. He is vice president of the North Pacific College in which he has filled the chair of physical diagnosis and diseases of the chest, for the past twenty years and is chief of the Medical and Surgical Clinic connected with that college. He was appointed by Governor Chamberlain as a member of a committee composed of Hon. A. L. Mills of Portland, Leslie Butler of Hood River, Senator R. A. Booth of Eugene, George Rogers of Salem, to take over and organize the Oregon State Hospital for Tuberculosis, in quarters formerly occupied by the State Deaf Mute School at Turner, Oregon. In his chosen field of endeavor Dr. Pierce has achieved success such as comparatively few attain and his eminent standing in his profession is recognized not only in his home city, but also throughout the coast region. As a citizen he easily ranks with the most influential of his compeers in affairs looking toward the betterment of his community, and to a marked degree he commands the public confidence and respect. 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