History of the VCMS from Dr. Drohomer's Chronicle

Dr. Pat Drohomer who practiced medicine in Daytona Beach for many years with his partner Dr. A.M. "Mac" McCarthy chronicled the history of the Volusia County Medical Society (VCMS) in November of 1973. Dr. Drohomer, who many of you may remember, practiced over 20 years with Dr. McCarthy on a simple handshake. They had no contract, no lawyers, no escape clauses, and no non-compete clauses. Dr. Drohomer undertook the writing of the history of the VCMS in November of 1973. He says in his chronicle that the early history of the VCMS was certainly colored by those who wrote about the organization prior to the initiation of formal written minutes which began in 1925. The Society was not incorporated as the VCMS until 1949. The following is Dr. Drohomer's edited history of the VCMS.

The Florida Medical Association Journal, as early as 1902, mentions a Volusia County Medical Society and details its members and member locations. They were recorded in 1902 as:

Dr. George W. Wallace, from Savannah, who came to Daytona Beach in 1870 at the age of 35, was the first doctor in Daytona Beach. He established an office and a pharmacy and served on the first city council in 1870 and was the mayor for ten years from 1877 to 1887.

Dr. Edward Carlton Atwood was one of the most prominent early members of the Society. He was born in 1848 in Pelham, NH, attended Dartmouth College and worked as a surveyor before becoming a physician. His daughter, Evelyn, was a concert pianist and was living in a nursing home in 1973 at the age of 96, when Dr. Pat Drohomer penned the first history of the VCMS, from which this article is exerpeted.

Dr. Atwood, the third doctor in the area, established his office and pharmacy in Daytona Beach, mixed his own medicines, and was often seen riding alone and at night in his horse and buggy to the far reaches of the county.

Dr. Josie Rogers, the first female doctor in our area, was born in 1876. Her parents had come to Daytona Beach in 1870. The chronicles do not mention her birthplace, but she graduated from high school in Ocala and received her M.D. degree from Alfred School of Medicine in 1907 in Chicago and was still alive and retired in 1973. Her niece, Dr. Ruth Rogers, was a homeopathic physician, who was in active practice as late as the early 80's.

Dr. H. Munson, born in Wisconsin in 1851,had studied abroad with Dr. Wilhelm Roentgen, and brought X-ray to Volusia County when he set up his practice in DeLand in 1895, the first year that X-ray was available in the world. He practiced for twenty-five years and died prematurely in 1925.

Other physicians in the county were Dr. Malette, who opened a practice in DeLand in 1881 and Dr. George David, who started his DeLand practice in 1890.

Fresh from their World War I experience in 1918, two enterprising surgeons, Dr. Klocks and Dr. Bohannon, initiated the construction of two hospitals for surgical and seriously ill patients. In 1926 ,on the heels of the first great Florida land boom, the community started the AHalifax District Hospital." This institution was enabled by the legislature with the establishment of a taxing district, and opened its doors in 1929. Almost simultaneous, West Volusia Hospital opened in DeLand. It is axiomatic that good hospital facilities attract good physicians and improve the techniques of those already in the community.

In January 1925, Dr. H. S - Woodbery and Dr. L. Glatzen were President and Secretary respectively, of the thirty-five member County Medical Society. The meetings were rotated between DeLand, Daytona Beach and New Smyrna Beach, but usually in a doctor's office.

Prominent physicians at this time were Dr. Hugh West, an Emory graduate (1923) who became a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons in 1935. He studied with Dr. Smith-Peterson at Harvard University and maintained his competence by continuing his post graduate education by frequent trips to the learning centers of the world, and being an avid reader of the current medical literature. He was noted for performing the first thyroidectomy in Volusia County, was the first to use spinal anesthesia for abdominal surgery, and was the first surgeon to nail a hip with a Smith-Peterson nail in order to repair a fractured hip. He was alive and retired in 1973, and Dr. Drohomer noted that he was an avid hunter and fisherman.