James William White (November 2, 1850 – April 24, 1916) was an American

surgeon In modern medicine, a surgeon is a medical professional who performs surgery. Although there are different traditions in different times and places, a modern surgeon usually is also a licensed physician or received the same medical training as ...

from

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

. After participating in the

Hassler expedition The United States Coast Survey Schooner ''Hassler'' was the first iron-hulled steamship used in the service of the U.S. Coast Survey. Ship history Plans for a new ship to chart the waters of U.S. Pacific Coast were drawn up in early 1870 by Car ...

to the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...

, he became a respected surgeon, teacher and author at the

University of Pennsylvania Hospital The Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP) is the flagship hospital of Penn Medicine and is located in the University City section of West Philadelphia. It is consistently ranked as one of the top hospitals in the United States. Histor ...

, with which he was associated from 1874 to 1916. He was John Rhea Barton Professor of Surgery at the

from 1900 to 1912 and professor emeritus until his death.Finding aid to th
J. William White Papers 1871-1925
, Archival collections
University of Pennsylvania Libraries
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Biography

J. William White was born in Philadelphia, a son of Dr. James W. White and his wife Mary Ann McClaranan. Dr. James W. White was for many years president of the Board of Charities and Correction, founder of the Maternity Hospital in Philadelphia, and first president of the S. S. White Dental Manufacturing Company. After completing courses of study in the public schools and Friends' School, J. William White entered the Medical Department of the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

, whence he was graduated Doctor of Medicine, class of 1871, receiving from the university the degree of Doctor of Philosophy the same year. Shortly after graduation he became a member of the staff gathered by Professor

Louis Agassiz Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz ( ; ) FRS (For) FRSE (May 28, 1807 – December 14, 1873) was a Swiss-born American biologist and geologist who is recognized as a scholar of Earth's natural history. Spending his early life in Switzerland, he rec ...

for the

to the

, the

Straits of Magellan The Strait of Magellan (), also called the Straits of Magellan, is a navigable sea route in southern Chile separating mainland South America to the north and Tierra del Fuego to the south. The strait is considered the most important natural pass ...

and both coasts of South America. After his return to Philadelphia he began practice, became eminent as a surgeon, and during his entire after life was a teacher and writer in surgery. He joined the University of Pennsylvania Medical School in 1874. His connection with the university as professor emeritus ended only with his death. White was the author of the "Human Anatomy" (1875); ''American Text Book of Surgery'' (1896); ''Genito-Urinary Surgery'' (1897); and an editor of ''Annals of Surgery.'' He was a member of the American Surgical Association, the American Genito-Urinary Association, a fellow of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, and a trustee of the University of Pennsylvania. White was an avid sportsman. He was a member of the Rittenhouse, Corinthian Yacht, Philadelphia Country and The Franklin Inn Club of Philadelphia. He was also a member of the Reform, the Royal Automobile and the Kinsman clubs, all of London, and of the Swiss and American Alpine Club. Once, in September 1880, he swam from Newport to the Narragansett Pier, Rhode Island, making ten miles in five hours and forty minutes in a cold rough sea. Mrs

He married, in Milford, Connecticut, on June 22, 1888, Miss Letitia Brown, who survived him. During World War I, Dr. White served at the American Hospital in Paris, as part of a unit from the University of Pennsylvania Medical School. He also published ''A Primer of the War for Americans'' (1914), later enlarged and republished as ''A Textbook of the War for Americans'' (1915). After his death, his brain was donated to the American Anthropometric Society. An analysis of the society's brain collection in 1907 by

Edward Anthony Spitzka Edward Anthony Spitzka (June 17, 1876 – September 4, 1922) was an American anatomist who autopsied (29 Oct 1901) the brain of Leon Czolgosz, the assassin of president William McKinley. (In 1881, his father Edward Charles Spitzka, a famous n ...

showed that White's brain had suffered damage during the storage process and could not be analyzed.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:White, J. William 1850 births 1916 deaths Physicians from Philadelphia American surgeons Members of the American Anthropometric Society University of Pennsylvania faculty Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania alumni Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania faculty 19th-century American physicians 19th-century surgeons 20th-century American physicians 20th-century surgeons