DR. ADDISON PARKER MACOMBER.
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DR. ADDISON PARKER MACOMBER is a prominent homeophathic physician, residing in Atlantic, Iowa. He is a native of Franklin county, Massachusetts, born May 19, 1831. His grandfather, George Macomber, was a native of Massachusetts, of Scotch descent. Ebenezer Macomber, the son of George Macomber, was also a native of Massachusetts and by occupation was a farmer, which calling he followed during his entire life. In the war of 1812, he served his country faithfully and well, and at the close of the service was honorably discharged, returned to his home and again took up the life of a farmer. He married Sarah A. Jewell, a native of Connecticut and of English descent. She was a relative of the family of that name well known in the history of Hartford.
The subject of this sketch was the youngest in a family of seven sons and one daughter born to Ebenezer and Sarah (Jewell) Macomber, only two of whom are now living, -- the Hon. K. W. and our subject. Four of the sons became physicians. The subject of this sketch was reared on the old homestead in Massachusetts, and until sixteen years of age attended the district schools and assisted in the cultivation of the farm. At the age of fifteen years he taught his first term of school. He subsequently attended the New Salem Academy, and later was a student of the Uxbridge Academy, of which his brother, a graduate of the old Brown University was principal for twenty years. At the age of eighteen years he commenced the study of medicine, with Dr. Joseph N. Bates, of Worcester, Massachusetts, remaining with him three years, and in the meantime attending lectures at Woodstock, Vermont, and Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Not feeling satisfied with the knowledge gained, he entered the medical department of the old University of New York, at which he was graduated in the class of 1853. The celebrated Dr. Valentine Mott was at that time the surgical professor.
On receiving his degree, Dr. Macomber located at Winchester, New Hampshire, where for eight years he was engaged in the practice of his profession with a good success. He then went to Malden, then a suburb of Boston, Massachusetts, where he remained four years, after which he went to Hackensack, New Jersey, where he continued eleven years. From that place he came to Atlantic, Iowa, in 1878, and has since been in constant practice here, meeting the success which he deserves as a physician.
Dr. Macomber was first married in 1853, when he wedded Miss Martha Williams, of Massachusetts, by whom he had one son. His second marriage was to Mrs. Fida G. Fuller, who was a practicing physician. She was accidentally killed in a runaway by being thrown from her buggy. She was a graduate of the Hahnemann Medical College, Chicago, one of the best medical colleges in the United States. In 1888, at Cleveland, Ohio, Dr. Macomber wedded Mrs. Corda J. Barnesa, of Hampton, Virginia, who was reared near Cleveland, Ohio.
Religiously Dr. Macomber is a Presbyterian and is an Elder in the Presbyterian Church at Atlantic, Iowa. A physician of forty-two years' practice, he is not content with knowledge long since acquired but is a careful student at the present time, and ever ready after careful investigation to adopt any new methods that in his judgement will be beneficial to the afflicted. While residing in New Jersey he was for a time president of the New Jersey Homeopathic Medical Society, and while residing in Boston was a member of the Massachusetts Medical Society. In 1892 he served as president of the Hahnemann Association of Iowa.
From A Memorial and Biographical Record of Iowa, Volume I, Chicago: The Lewis Publishing Company, 1896, pp. 145-146. Transcribed July, 2015 by Cheryl Siebrass.
