{{short description|American chemist, physician and writer}} {{Infobox person | name = Henry Leffmann | image = Henry Leffmann 1929.png | birth_date = {{birth date|1847|9|9}} | birth_place = Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S. | death_date = {{death date and age|1930|12|25|1847|9|9}} | death_place = | alma_mater = Jefferson Medical College (MD) | occupation = {{hlist|Chemist|physician|writer}} }}
'''Henry Leffmann''' (September 9, 1847 – December 25, 1930) was an American chemist, physician and writer.
==Biography== Leffmann born in Philadelphia.<ref name="White 1936">White, James Terry. (1936). [https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015078229138&view=1up&seq=332 ''The National Cyclopædia of American Biography, Volume 25'']. New York: J. T. White & Company. pp. 158-159</ref> He was the fourth son of Henry Leffmann, a German Jew and Sarah Ann Paul of Doylestown a Quaker of Welsh ancestry.<ref name="White 1936"/><ref name="England 1922">England, Joseph W. (1922). [https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc2.ark:/13960/t3319tq90&view=1up&seq=435 ''The First Century of the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy, 1821-1921'']. Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science. pp. 429-430</ref>
In 1864 he became a chemical laboratory assistant at Philadelphia High School.<ref name="England 1922"/> He was assistant to Benjamin H. Rand at Jefferson Medical College (1865-1870). He obtained his M.D. in 1869 from Jefferson Medical College.<ref name="England 1922"/> Leffmann was chemist to the coroner of Philadelphia (1875-1880) and district attorney (1885-1897).<ref name="White 1936"/> He was a chemist to dairy and food commissioners of Pennsylvania. He married Fannie Frank in 1876, they had no children.<ref name="White 1936"/><ref>Malone, Dumas. (1933). [https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofamer11amer/page/142/mode/2up ''Dictionary of American Biography'']. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. pp. 142-143</ref>
Leffmann was lecturer on Toxicology at Jefferson College (1870-1882), lecturer on botany at Wagner Free Institute of Science (1874-1875) and Professor of Chemistry (1885-1903).<ref name="England 1922"/> He was microscopist of Pennsylvania State Board of Agriculture (1877-1905), professor of chemistry at Philadelphia Polyclinic (1883-1898) and pathological chemist at Jefferson Medical College Hospital (1887-1905).<ref name="England 1922"/> He received an honorary Ph.D from the Wagner Free Institute of Science in 1874 and a DDS from Philadelphia College of Dental Surgery in 1884.<ref name="England 1922"/>
Leffmann supported women's rights and has been cited as an "early male medical pro-feminist".<ref>{{cite journal|author=Peitzman, Steven J.|year=2003|title=Why Support a Women's Medical College? Philadelphia's Early Male Medical Pro-Feminists|journal=Bulletin of the History of Medicine|volume=77|issue=3|pages= 576–599|doi=10.1353/bhm.2003.0132|pmid=14523261|s2cid=24663355}}</ref> He was professor of chemistry at the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania (1890-1917) and emeritus until 1923.<ref name="Peitzman 2000">Peitzman, Steven Jay. (2000). ''A New and Untried Course: Woman's Medical College and Medical College of Pennsylvania, 1850-1998''. Rutgers University Press. pp. 86-88. {{ISBN|0-8135-2815-1}}</ref> Leffmann was not religious and joined the Society for Ethical Culture.<ref name="Peitzman 2000"/>
==Criticism of Christianity== Leffmann authored a pamphlet ''The Mental Condition and Career of Jesus of Nazareth'' in 1904. He argued that Jesus was a megalomaniac and that much of his phenomena could be explained by hypnosis and suggestion. Leffmann was an advocate of the swoon hypothesis, arguing that Jesus did not die on the cross, but was "tenderly cared for, probably by the mother and brothers whom he had disowned and scorned, and quietly buried after his death, which may have occurred very soon afterwards."<ref>Leffmann, Henry. (1904). ''The Mental Condition and Career of Jesus of Nazareth Examined in the Light of Modern Knowledge''. Philadelphia. pp. 18–21</ref>
==Selected publications== *[https://archive.org/details/b28099576/page/n4/mode/2up ''Memoranda on Poisons''] (1878) *[https://collections.nlm.nih.gov/bookviewer?PID=nlm:nlmuid-60730920R-bk ''First Step in Chemical Principles''] (1879) *[https://archive.org/details/101567642.nlm.nih.gov/page/n6/mode/2up ''A Compend of Chemistry, Inorganic and Organic''] (1891) *[https://archive.org/details/selectmethodsinf00leffrich/page/n6/mode/2up ''Select Methods in Food Analysis''] (with William Beam, 1901) *[https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/008728555 ''The Mental Condition and Career of Jesus of Nazareth Examined in the Light of Modern Knowledge''] (1904) *[https://archive.org/details/analysisofmilkmi00leffrich/page/n6/mode/2up ''Analysis of Milk and Milk Products''] (1905) *[https://archive.org/details/cu31924029626789/mode/2up ''Outline Autobiography of Henry Leffmann''] (1905) *[https://archive.org/details/aboutdickens00leff/page/n8/mode/2up ''About Dickens''] (1908) *[https://archive.org/details/statesrightsfeti00leffrich/page/n8/mode/2up ''The States-Rights Fetish: A Plea for Real Nationalism''] (1913) *[https://archive.org/details/examinationleff00leffrich/page/n6/mode/2up ''Examination of Water for Sanitary and Technic Purposes''] (1915)
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== *[https://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/lookupname?key=Leffmann%2C%20Henry%2C%201847%2D1930 Henry Leffmann] (Online Books)
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Leffmann, Henry}} Category:1847 births Category:1930 deaths Category:19th-century American chemists Category:19th-century American medical doctors Category:20th-century American chemists Category:20th-century American medical doctors Category:American feminists Category:American food chemists Category:American humanists Category:American critics of Christianity Category:Jefferson Medical College alumni Category:Jefferson Medical College faculty Category:Medical doctors from Philadelphia Category:Swoon hypothesis Category:Chemists from Pennsylvania