1914 Delaware County History pgs. 380-383
Dr. Henry A. Dittmer
Dr. Henry A. Dittmer is a successful physician and surgeon of Manchester, where he has practiced his
profession continuously during the past three decades. His birth occurred in
Clayton county, Iowa, on the 5th of
March, 1858,
his parents being Ernest J. and Mary (Reddingshaffer)
Dittmer, both of whom were natives of Germany. The father emigrated
to the United States in 1849 and the following year took
up his abode near Guttenberg, Clayton county, Iowa, while the mother came to this country
in 1848.
Their marriage was celebrated on the 19th of April,
1852, and
six of their children were born in Clayton county.
Afterward they settled in Colony township, Delaware county,
where Mrs. Dittmer passed away in February, 1877. They became the parents of
nine children, eight of whom reached adult ages, as follows: John and George,
who follow farming in Colony township; Henry A., of this review; Mary, who is
the wife of Dr. J. P. Yon Berg, of Albert Lea, Minnesota; Martin, a practicing
physician of Colesburg, Iowa; Charles, who is a
graduate pharmacist, but is now engaged at farming near Burt, Iowa; Edward,
living on a farm near Burt, Iowa; and Ernest, who is a physician of Manchester.
Henry A. Dittmer was reared on his father's farms in Clayton and Delaware counties and acquired his early
education in the common schools, while subsequently he attended the
German-English College of Galena, Illinois, being graduated from that
institution in 1881. Having determined upon the practice of medicine as a life
work, he began reading under the preceptorship of Dr.
E. Walther, of St. Paul, Minnesota, and when prepared for lectures
took one course in the Homeopathic Medical College of Missouri at St. Louis. Subsequently he pursued a course
at the Hahnemann Homeopathic Medical College of
Chicago and was graduated from that institution in the spring of 1884. At that
time he was married and established his home in Manchester, Iowa, where he began the practice of his
profession and has remained continuously since. He has won and maintained an
enviable reputation as an energetic, progressive and successful representative
of his profession and is accorded a liberal and lucrative practice. For eight years
he served as supreme medical examiner of the Highland Nobles and later acted in
that capacity for the American Nobles. In 1913 he was made a member of the
state board of health and in that connection has also done valuable service.
In 1884 Dr. Dittmer was united in marriage at Hopkinton to Miss Margaret
L. Holbert, a native of Colesburg, Delaware county,
and a daughter of Joseph Holbert, of Hopkinton, who
took up his abode among the first settlers of this county. The Doctor and his wife
have two children, namely: Clarence E., the assistant city editor of the Ohio
State Journal at Columbus, Ohio; and Margaret, who is a student in the New England Conservatory
of Music at Boston, matriculating there after spending
one year at Oberlin. Dr. Dittmer is widely recognized as a leading and able practitioner
of medicine and has long enjoyed an enviable position in both professional and
social circles of Delaware county.
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