CO-ROOTS-L Archives

From: "Maggie Stewart" <>
Subject: CLINTON G. HICKEY, M. D.
Date: Sun, 5 Sep 1999 23:46:29 -0400

"History of Colorado", edited by Wilbur Fisk Stone, published by The S. J.
Clarke Publishing Co. (1918) Vol. II

p. 119-120



CLINTON G. HICKEY, M. D.

Dr. Clinton G. Hickey, a man of marked efficiency in the medical
profession, who is vice president and acting president of the state
board of health of Colorado and an active and successful practitioner
in Denver, was born in Nicholville, St. Lawrence county, New York,
October 16, 1858, and is of Irish, English and Dutch descent on the
paternal side. His paternal grandfather, William Hickey, was the
founder of the family in the new world, crossing the Atlantic to Canada
in the early part of the nineteenth century. George Hickey, father of
Dr. Hickey, was born at Renfrew, Ontario, Canada, January 9, 1833, and
spent his last days in Nicholville, New York, where he passed away in
1882, at the age of forty-nine years. He was a harness maker and
saddler by trade and successfully conducted business along that line at
Nicholville during the greater part of his life. He was a consistent
member of the Methodist Episcopal church and a devout Christian man
who, strongly opposed to the liquor traffic, was largely instrumental
in curbing the evils which grow out of the sale and use of intoxicants.
He also stood for those things which are a matter of civic virtue and
civic pride and was a most valued and respected citizen of Nicholville
as well as one of its enterprising and successful business men. He
married Esther Lowry, a native of Waddington, St. Lawrence county, New
York, and a representative of one of the old families of the Empire
state, of lowland Scotch descent on the paternal side, while on the
maternal side, through the Walbridge family, she was of English
lineage. The Lowry family has been represented on American soil since
colonial days. Mrs. Hickey died in the year 1863, at the age of thirty-
three, and is survived by three of her four children, one son,
Clarence, having died in childhood. The others are Emma J., Clinton G.
and Mina A. Hickey.

At the usual age Dr. Hickey became a pupil in the public schools
of Nicholville, New York, and afterward attended the State Normal
School at Potsdam, New York, while subsequently he entered the Albany
(N. Y.) Medical College, from which he was graduated with the M. D.
degree in 1884. He then entered upon the practice of his profession at
Gaylordsville, in the Housatonic valley of Connecticut, where he
remained for three and a half years, after which he returned to the
Empire state, opening an office at Burden and becoming resident
physician and surgeon for the Burden Ore & Iron Company. He continued
to act in that capacity for four years and then resigned his position,
after which he pursued a post-graduate course at the New York
Polyclinic. Thus splendidly equipped by broad study and wide experience
for professional activity, he came to the west, arriving in Denver in
November, 1891. Here he entered upon the general practice of medicine,
in which he has since continued, and his marked ability has won for him
a liberal patronage. He belongs to the medical society of the city and
county of Denver, to the Colorado State Medical Society, the American
Medical Association, the Denver Clinical and Pathological Society and
to the hospital staff of the Hospital of the City and County of Denver.
He is also vice president and acting president of the Colorado state
board of health, now serving his fourth year in that connection, in
which he has done very important work, particularly in the
dissemination of that knowledge which prevents the outbreak and spread
of disease through an understanding of the laws of health. For fourteen
years he was connected with the Denver Medical College on the
dispensary staff and was also one of the lecturers of the school.

On the 21st of January, 1885. Dr. Hickey was united in marriage
in Nicholville, New York. to Miss Jennie Simonds, a native of that
place and a daughter of Titus S. and Mary (Chandler) Simonds, both now
deceased. The Chandlers were early settlers of Massachusetts, arriving
in the new world from England soon after the arrival of the Mayflower
at Plymouth. Dr. and Mrs. Hickey have become the parents of three
daughters and a son, but two of the daughters died between the ages of
four and six years. The elder, Ethelwyn, was in her sixth year at the
time of her death. Muriel died at the age of four years and four months
and there were only four days between their deaths. The son, Dr. Harold
Lowry Hickey, born in Denver, November 15, 1892, was graduated in June,
1913, from the University of Denver and in June, 1917, from the
Northwestern University Medical School of Chicago. He has both the
degrees of Bachelor and Master of Arts from the University of Denver.
As assistant surgeon with the rank of lieutenant he is now serving in
the Reserve Naval Force of the United States. Dorothy, born February
17, 1895, is the wife of Robert E. Sherer, representative of an old
Chicago family. They were married June 27, 1917. She was graduated from
the University of Denver with the Bachelor of Arts degree. Mr. Sherer
is a nephew of Dean Howell of the University of Denver, where he
completed his education, winning the A. B. degree, and it was while
they were students in that institution that Mr. and Mrs. Sherer became
acquainted. They now reside at Alabaster, Michigan.

The career of Dr. Hickey is an interesting one, as it shows the
result of strong purpose and creditable endeavor. At the age of
eighteen he took up the profession of teaching, which he followed for
two years in the district schools and for a year was a teacher in one
of the upper grades in the schools of Nicholville. As a result of his
teaching he was able to repay his father for money advanced to him for
his medical education. He has remained throughout the entire period of
his professional career an earnest and discriminating student of
everything that tends to bring to man the key to the complex mystery
which we call life. His reading has been comprehensive and he keeps in
touch with the latest scientific researches and discoveries, but
important as is his life work, he has never concentrated his efforts
and attention upon medical practice to the exclusion of all other
interests. He is an active and valued member of the Grant Avenue
Methodist Episcopal church and for years has been chairman of its
official board and chairman of the finance committee for the past
twenty-three years. He is perhaps most largely known in connection with
his social welfare work. He served for two years on the City Federation
of Social Welfare and as president of the Adult Blind Home Association.
He is ever cooperating heartily with organized movements for the uplift
of the individual and the advancement of community interests and is
continually studying the grave political, economic and sociological
problems which affect the welfare, happiness and progress of the race.
His studies result in practical efforts for the amelioration of the
hard conditions of life for the unfortunate and he is numbered among
those men who are throwing around them much of life's sunshine.

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• CLINTON G. HICKEY, M. D. by "Maggie Stewart" <>