Jacob Frank, A. M., M. D., F. A. C. S. The life and works of this great surgeon of Chicago shows conclusively that one may attain the very pinnacle of a successful career in one's chosen profession and yet find the time and means to render invaluable services to one's municipality and state.

Born in Syracuse, New York, March 16, 1856, as the son of Levi and Ella (Tow) Frank, Dr. Frank received the usual elementary, classical, and medical education, and graduated as Doctor of Medicine from the University of Buffalo in 1882. The then twenty-six year old physician established himself in private practice in Buffalo, New York, and from the very beginning showed a trend for humanitarian service beyond his own interests. He not only accepted the position as district physician with all the responsibility of caring for the public charges of the 2extensive district, but sought service in the U. S. Marine Hospital, where he labored for some time as a contract surgeon, a position which gave him the status of a commissioned officer under the Treasury Department. This was to serve him in good stead at some future time, which the young physician had no way of foreseeing.

Buffalo evidently did not present to the young scientist sufficient facilities and resources to satisfy his scientific thirst. He decided to try his skill as a surgeon in a larger field and came to Chicago in 1885. Here he not only found a realization of his professional aspirations, but an outlet for public service, the fruits of which will remain part of the history of our state. Here he found a prominent place in the sun and here he lived loved, respected and honored by all who have come in professional, military or social contact with him.

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Doubtless, professional success is best measured by the confidence of a client and the recognition by one's conferees. Dr. Frank early restricted his practice to the important specialty of general surgery, but in spite of this he developed one of the largest private practices in Chicago, the vast number of successful operations have constantly added to his following of grateful patients. But there has been no lack of professional recognition. The Chicago Medical Society, which is composed of the ethical physicians and surgeons of Cook County, and is considered one of the largest and most influential medical organizations of the world, recognized his scientific leadership by electing him to the presidency of that corporate body. The Chicago Surgical Society, a specialist organization limiting membership to surgeons of acknowledged skill and integrity, counts him not only as a founder member but as one of its presidents. The national body known as the American College of Surgeons lists him as a founder member.

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But aside from these professional honors which show that Dr. Frank has contributed his share towards raising American surgery to its present high scientific standard compelling recognition of the surgical world, other important national and international bodies have vied to render Dr. Frank the homage he has richly earned. Dr. Frank has been made a corresponding member of the Sociedad Medica Pedro Escobedo of Mexico, St. Mary's College of Kentucky has conferred upon him the honorary degree of Master of Arts, the Japanese National Red Cross has decorated him and conferred upon him life membership. He has also been a member of the International Medical Congresses of Berlin, Paris, Moscow, Panama, etc., before which bodies he presented addresses dealing with the fruits of his experiences and his original investigations. Internationally known as a discoverer of a method to unite the severed intestinal tract, he was hailed by the leading clinics and hospitals he visited throughout the world and was often called upon to operate before large audiences of physicians and students. Dr. Frank is, of course, a member of the 5Illinois State Medical Society and of the American Medical Association, and in addition he holds membership in the Chicago Academy of Medicine, the Chicago Society of Medical History, the Chicago Pathologic Society, the Association of Military Surgeons of the United States, the Association of Military Surgeons of Illinois and many others. He is on the staff either as attending or consulting surgeon of St. Elizabeth Hospital, Columbus Hospital, Grant Hospital, Michael Reese Hospital, and Cook County Hospital.

The most important phase of his public career is that of surgeon-general of the military and naval forces of the State of Illinois, to which office he was appointed by Governor Dunne in 1914. He remained at the head of the military department until his retirement at the prescribed age of sixty-four. In addition to his semi-military service in the 6U. S. Public Health Service above mentioned, he was commissioned in the reserve medical corps of the regular army by President Taft, as first lieutenant, which was the only rank that then could be given, and for which the very cream of the medical profession of the nation was selected by the military authorities. When the law made it possible, he was raised in that corps to a captaincy and later to a field rank commission.

From the moment Dr. Frank became identified with the military service he threw himself heart and soul into the problems which then animated all thinking medical officers. He availed himself of an invitation and participated in a long overland march at his own expense from Fort D. A. Russel in Wyoming to the training camp in Sparta, Wisconsin, during the summer of 1915. Frequently Colonel Frank disdained his mount to march on foot with the men of a regular army ambulance company and a field hospital company to gain personal experience in a march which was singular in the history of military medicine and surgery.

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His experiences were published the same year in the Chicago Medical Recorder. His extensive experience in abdominal surgery in civil life and experiments undertaken for that purpose, led him to publish both here and in Berlin a method of managing gunshot wounds of the abdomen on the battlefield, which was discussed as late as 1915 by the German medical officers serving in Poland in one of their occasional conferences as a suitable method of saving lives.

Governor Dunne selected Dr. Frank to take charge of the sanitary operations during the flood of the Ohio River at Cairo. This task was fraught with great difficulties exceeding those encountered even in wars of magnitude, but he acquitted himself of it to the utmost satisfaction of all concerned, thereby contributing to the prevention of outbreaks of epidemics.

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With his assumption of the surgeon generalcy of the state of Illinois, Colonel Frank at once set himself the task to reorganize the medical service and to raise it to a high plane of efficiency. The very moment the Illinois troops were ordered in the early part of the summer of 1916 to mobilize near Springfield before proceeding to the Mexican border for what then looked as a possible sanguine engagement, Colonel Frank was one of the first high officers to reach the camp of concentration to initiate such measures as were essential to preserve the health of the troops. As each state was anxious to respond to the call of the Federal Government at the earliest possible moment, Colonel Frank encountered a grave peril. Illinois actually was in a position to perform a feat in rapid mobilization, but this could have been 9accomplished only at the expense of avoidable losses, and Colonel Frank did not hesitate to impress on the authorities the need for certain precautionary measures, if the troops were to be available for service in a semi-tropical climate during the hottest part of the season. His counsel fortunately for the officers and men was heeded, so that haste was made without waste. Though then far from being a young man, the surgeon-general himself worked in the heat and dust from early morning to late in the night, shaming many a younger medical officer who began to feel the effects of heat and dust infection. The success of the mobilization was such that even the nonetoo liberally inclined regular army inspectors could not but make splendid reports on the sanitary measures that had been taken, and stinted no praise in commending Colonel Frank to the War Department.

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We quote from Chamberlin's Magazine of that period: "When the call for border duty came, Colonel Frank had the courage to ruin Illinois' chance for a record of rapidity of mobilization. After an inspection of the proposed camp ground, Frank went to the Adjutant-general and to the Governor and said: 'Gentlemen, you have a choice of alternative action, either you can rush the troops into camp ahead of other states and establish a record, or you can give me three or four days to get the grounds in proper shape. In the first case you will have a record of efficiency of rapid concentration of troops, but a lot of men will die of pneumonia, meningitis, typhoid fever and the like. In the second case you will lose your spectacular record, but you will not lose any men.

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"A delay of three days was granted and as a result Illinois did not lose a single man from epidemic sickness during the mobilization."

Although the troops came under the immediate control of the Federal Government, Colonel Frank traveled to Texas to satisfy himself about their welfare and until the out-break of the World War and after continued to pay strict attention to the needs of the Illinois National Guard and Naval Militia, as far as the medical aspect was concerned.

On July 11, 1917, Colonel Frank received telegraphic orders to organize for the Illinois Division, which eventually became known as the Thirty-third, the full complement of a sanitary train, or, as it is designated today, a medical regiment. Illinois then had only two field hospitals at peace strength. It was necessary to raise these to war strength and to recruit two additional field hospitals and four ambulance companies without resort to draft or conscription, which was then not yet in force. In the midst of the activities Colonel Frank war ordered 12to East St. Louis to serve on an important court martial. In spite of all handicaps and the keen competition by the Chicago line regiments to raise their units to war strength, a whole sanitary train was ready for muster into Federal service in record time.

In the early part of the war there was a good deal of want on the part of many enlisted men and their families. Colonel Frank decided that something drastic must be done to ease suffering, economic as well as physical and initiated a service for the soldiers' families along the lines utilized by the Red Cross organizations in camps and home territory. Enlisting the assistance of a number of physicians and institutions he perfected an organization for this nature of immediate war relief, so that no soldier's dependents were left without adequate medical attention and other needed aid. Eventually this organization was turned over to the local Red Cross branch, which named this part of 13the Chicago Chapter of the American Red Cross for Colonel Frank, in recognition of his initiative and his benevolence. Indeed Colonel Frank performed so many unostentatious deeds of kindness for the soldiers themselves that, shortly after the cessation of hostilities, Gen. George Bell Post of the Veterans of Foreign Wars pinned on Colonel Frank's coat the insignia of honorary membership in that veteran organization in the presence of a number of officers assembled at Camp Grant.

Colonel Frank has been president of the Army and Navy Club of Chicago and is also a member of the Army and Navy Club of Washington, D. C.

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Although Colonel Frank has passed the biblical span of three scores and ten, he is still taking an active interest in his profession and in sane military preparedness. He lives with his wife Sarah, nee Lederer, to whom he was married more than fifty-five years ago. His wife, too, hails, from Syracuse, New York, and has always remained a devoted companion to her husband. An only daughter, Myna, is the wife of the well-known surgeon, Dr. Sylvan Coombs, who is engaged in active practice in Chicago.