Goddard, Clarence Case, M. D.

The following data is extracted from A Standard History of Kansas and Kansans.

Clarence Case Goddard, M. D. While Doctor Goddard now gives all his time and attention to the Evergreen Place Hospital at Leavenworth, a high class sanitarium for nervous and mental troubles, liquor and drug habits, he had occupied such a disguished position in Kansas medical circles for so many years that hardly any name in the profession is more widely known and more highly honored.

In 1911 he was elected president of the Kansas State Medical Society. He served four terms as president of the County Medical Society, had been the president of the District Society, had been a delegate from Kansas to the American Medical Association, and he had also contributed a number of articles, based upon his individual experience as a specialist in nervous and mental diseases, to the medical journals of the country. Doctor Goddard is a member of the Burlington Railway Surgeons Association, was for many years a surgeon for that company, and held the chair of Nervous and Mental Diseases in the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Kansas City, Kansas, now the department of the State University, for four years when he resigned. He had also been a professor in the Post-Graduate Medical School and Clinic of Kansas City, Missouri.

Doctor Goddard had been a resident of Kansas more than fifty-seven years. He came with his parents to Leavenworth in 1860, and that city had been his home ever since, though during his connection with the regular army as assistant surgeon his duties called him to various parts of the West.

He is of old American ancestry. His forefather, Marcellus Goddard, was a soldier in the Revolutionary war. His father, Edwin Pinney Goddard, was born in Connecticut in 1808, and married Maria Fillmore, a native of Wayne County, New York. She was of the prominent Fillmore family and a second cousin to Millard Fillmore, who was elected vice president of the United States in 1848 and succeeded General Taylor as president in 1850. During his youth Edwin P. Goddard moved to Wayne County, New York, and became an active business man. At one time he was "Receiver of the Port" at Palmyra, and he also operated the first packing industry in that section. Reasons of ill health compelled him to remove to the West, and by gradual stages he finally arrived in Kansas. In 1856 he moved to Knox County, Illinois, and for several years was a merchant at Abingdon. In 1858 he made a tour of the West with a view to a permanent location, and at that time decided to establish a home at Leavenworth. This plan was not finally carried out until 1860. In that year he brought his family to Kansas, going by rail as far as St. Joseph, Missouri, and descending the river on board the Blackhawk to Leavenworth. About a mile south of the then City of Leavenworth, at a place now included within the corporate limits, he established one of the first nurseries in Kansas, and continued that business successfully until his death in 1866. His widow survived him until 1906, being ninety-two when she died. They had ten children, eight of whom reached maturity, and four are now living. One son, Luther M., was for fourteen years a member of the Colorado Supreme Court and for ten years previously had been a judge of the district bench.

Clarence Case Goddard was born at Gorham, Ontario County, New York, March 21, 1849. Since he was twelve years of age his home had been at Leavenworth. Most of his early education came from the public schools of this city, and here he took up the study of medicine with Dr. J. W. Brock. Subsequently he entered the Bellevue Hospital Medical College of New York, and was graduated M. D. in 1873. For about six months following his graduation he was acting assistant surgeon in the regular army, and during 1874-75 he pursued post-graduate studies at Bellevue. He then resumed his connection with the regular army as acting assistant surgeon, and served altogether nearly fourteen years. He was connected with the Department of Missouri, and was assigned to duty at different posts in Kansas, Indian Territory, Texas, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona.

On January 1, 1887, Doctor Goddard resigned from the army and took up regular practice at Leavenworth. Since 1890 he had specialized in mental and nervous diseases. It was in 1890 that he founded the present Evergreen Place Hospital and Sanitarium, in the southern part of Leavenworth. He remodeled and furnished for the purpose what was originally a country home of fourteen rooms with twelve acres of grounds, occupying a place attractive in all its physical surroundings and furnishing the quiet so necessary for the treatment of patients received in the institution. In two years' time the patronage had so grown that Doctor Goddard was compelled to add twenty rooms and a cottage annex of ten rooms. The main building of the sanitarium was burned in 1898 and again in 1908. At the latter year he erected the present hospital building, which represents the Moorish design or architectural features, and is solidly constructed of brick and cement. The present capacity is for thirty-three patients and Docton Goddard now gives his entire attention to the management.

Doctor Goddard is a prominent Mason, had served as master of his lodge, as eminent commander of the Knights Templar and as potentate of Abdalls Temple of the Mystic Shrine. He is a member of the Episcopal Church, is a democrat in politics, and in 1910 was elected to the legislature from Leavenworth County.

In 1874 he married Miss Clara Weibling, of Denver, Colorado. Her father, Harmon G. Weibling, came to Leavenworth from Baltimore, Maryland, in 1854, was a contractor, and died in 1872. Doctor Goddard's only child, Clarence B., was graduated A. B. from the Kansas State University in 1904, in 1908 finished his course in the Denver Gross Medical College at Denver, and was in active practice from that time until his death in 1913. He married Harriet Stearns and is survived by one daughter, Clara Cecelia.

Source: A Standard History of Kansas and Kansans

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